Forest Grump. And you can’t see the forest for the twee. Tom Hanks plays Curmudgeon sexagenarian Otto in A MAN CALLED OTTO.
Recently widowed and retired Otto is the quintessential angry old man next door, the self appointed and self opinionated neighbourhood watchman, with strict principles and a short fuse, who spends his days enforcing block association rules that only he cares about, and visiting his wife’s grave.
Otto decides that life is finally not worth living. He decides to commit suicide, but after a series of attempts, it appears that life is not ready to give up on the grump.
Into his solitary, isolated life, enter a boisterous young family next door, headed by Mexican spitfire, Marisol. She and her family form an unlikely friendship and through this relationship and a series of flashbacks, we come to understand Otto’s past happiness and heartbreaks.
Marisol can be just as prickly as Otto, but she is not as brittle. Her personality begins to soften Otto’s hard edges and the narrative emerges as a tale of unreliable first impressions and the gentle reminder that life is sweeter when it’s shared.
Based on one of Sweden’s biggest locally-produced box office hits ever, A MAN CALLED OVE, A MAN CALLED OTTO does suffer from a sticky sentimentality and episodic through line.
A tad cloying, but its heart is in the right place, so A MAN CALLED OTTO stands as an undemanding couple of hours of curmudgeonly cuteness.
