Latest news with #LarsHammar
Times
12 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Times
The Last Journey review — this Swedish documentary will make you weep
This profoundly lovely Swedish documentary is a crowd-pleasing road movie that hides a feral heart. Slickly shot, it's an often bleakly funny account of a last-ditch drive from central Sweden to southern France by the TV host Filip Hammar and his ailing 80-year-old father, Lars. Filip is retracing the beloved holiday trips of his childhood in an attempt to jog Lars, a former French teacher and committed Francophile, out of his incipient physical and cognitive decline. Along for the ride is Filip's fellow Swedish TV personality Fredrik Wikingsson, who invests the project with the kind of larky bromantic air (think early Judd Apatow) that's made it the highest-grossing Swedish documentary in history. • Read more film reviews, guides about what to watch and interviews That's the commercial. The reality is thornier. For every glossy drone shot of the three principals whizzing through the French countryside in a vintage Renault 4, there is a growing suggestion that Filip's mission to 'rejuvenate' his father is one of juvenile denial. Lars speaks in a whisper and can't eat, drink, walk or bathe without help. He falls and is hospitalised early on. His memory is fading. And though he is still moved by French culture, and by the songs of the Belgian Jacques Brel, he often appears on camera as a frozen soul who is fastened, in the uncompromising words of WB Yeats, 'to a dying animal'. The film, co-directed by Hammar and Wikingsson, eventually acknowledges this and captures a fiercely sad conversation in which Lars says to his son, with poetic clarity, 'I hope you're not disappointed in me, Filip. Because I'm not the same any more. It's just that time has passed.' And speaking of weeping … sweet Lord! The film builds to the kind of devastating sequence that doesn't just gently jerk some tears but grabs them and yanks them out relentlessly until you've collapsed in a heap on the floor, wailing, 'No more! No more! Jag alskar dig, Lars! Jag alskar dig!'★★★★☆ PG, 95min In cinemas from Jun 20 Times+ members can enjoy two-for-one cinema tickets at Everyman each Wednesday. Visit to find out more. Which films have you enjoyed at the cinema recently? Let us know in the comments and follow @timesculture to read the latest reviews
The Sun
14 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Elio film review: Pixar's latest adventure is nourishing slice of intergalactic fun with nods to Hollywood classic
ELIO PG (98mins) ★★★☆☆ 2 SPACE and sentimentality are the linchpins of Disney and Pixar's latest animated adventure which encourages you to dream big. Sci-fi obsessed Elio Solis (voiced by Yonas Kibreab) is a cape-wearing cosmic obsessive adopted by his Aunt Olga after his parents pass away. When extraterrestrials make contact, Elio doesn't hesitate to respond, and before you can say 'Martian' he's beamed up to a kind of cosmic UN Committee from various galaxies, including Aunt Olga (Zoe Saldana). They believe he's the leader back on Earth and Elio doesn't correct them. He's soon tasked with negotiating an alien peace treaty with baddie Lord Grigon (Brad Garrett), but this quickly turns into a journey of self-discovery as, along with new wiggly best friend Glordon (a cutesy Remy Edgerly), our hero realises what really matters to him. Reminding us that there's no place like home, there's many Wizard Of Oz homages here, as we transport through solar systems and scary villains. Intergalactic, nourishing, family fun. ★★★☆☆ 2 THIS warm, funny and often deeply moving documentary charts Swedish TV presenter Filip Hammar's attempt to bring his 80-year-old father Lars back to life – figuratively, at least. Since retiring from his job as a French teacher, Lars has become increasingly withdrawn and frail. So, Filip decides to buy a battered old Renault 4, and whisks his dad off on a nostalgic road trip to the south of France, hoping to reignite a spark. They're joined by Filip's longtime TV partner Fredrik Wikingsson, and the pair's banter keeps the film fun, even as emotional undercurrents start to appear. The journey is nearly derailed early on by a nasty fall, and though Lars is slow to warm up, glimpses of his old self soon begin to reappear, particularly when surrounded by the culture and language he has loved for so many years. At times, the film veers close to manipulation. But what shines through is Filip's deep affection for his father, and a quietly powerful message about ageing, legacy and the bonds between parent and child. It's a bit uneven, but The Last Journey has heart to spare – and plenty of charm.
The Guardian
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Last Journey review – Sweden's Ant and Dec hit the road with octogenarian dad
'Do you want to rot away in an old armchair?' asks Filip Hammar, a Swedish TV presenter, talking to his dad. In this charming, often hilarious documentary, Hammar takes 80-year-old Lars on a road trip to the south of France; the idea is to rekindle Lars's spark, shake a bit of life back into him. Since retiring as a French teacher, Lars has been sitting around at home, steadily more depressed and frail. Hammar wants to show his dad that life is worth living. But as you'd expect from a documentary this heart-warming, Hammar has a lesson or two to learn himself. For the trip, Hammar has bought a knackered old Renault 4, the same car the family had when he was a kid. Their destination is the apartment they rented every summer holiday (judging from the old photos, this was pre-factor 50 sunscreen; everyone was a livid shade of lobster). Father and son are joined by Hammar's best mate Fredrik Wikingsson, another TV presenter. The two are a fixture on Swedish telly; like Ant and Dec they come as a pair, Filip och Fredrik. Their easy, lived-in banter jollies everything along. The trip is nearly over before it begins, when Lars falls going for a pee at night in a hotel. But Lars is a life-long Francophile, and slowly, slowly, a little of the old charisma creeps back in as the holiday gets into swing. It's not quite enough for Hammar, who is desperate to get his old dad back. (So desperate he hires actors to create the perfect French experience for Lars.) There is a heartbreaking scene when Hammar persuades his dad to cook his old speciality, ratatouille. But poor Lars can barely slice an aubergine. Hammar's love for his dad, how much he treasures his childhood, is incredibly touching. There's a simple, profound message here for parents – you get out what you put in. And the scene at the end, showing just what an influence Lars had on his students, would squeeze a tear out of granite. The Last Journey is in UK and Irish cinemas from 20 June.
Telegraph
07-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The Last Journey: behind the scenes of the feel-good film of the summer
When Filip Hammar was growing up in Köping, a Swedish town less than two hours' drive from Stockholm, his father Lars's obsession with France was an acute source of embarrassment. 'It was a very working-class town – they manufacture Volvo cars there – and this guy is sitting round wearing a beret,' recalls 50-year-old Hammar, who, with his friend Fredrik Wikingsson, 51, is one half of Sweden's best-known double-act, presenters of TV documentaries, quiz shows and podcasts. 'Now, I look back and think, 'Wow, that took a lot of courage!'' Every summer throughout Filip's childhood, Lars, a school teacher, would drive the family in his orange Renault 4 to Beaulieu-sur-Mer, on the French Riviera, a journey of 1,450 miles. 'He was such a Francophile that when France did nuclear tests in Polynesia in the 1980s, the local newspaper called and asked if he was going to stop teaching French and drinking French wine.' In 2008, after 40 years of teaching, Lars retired, aged 66. He had been looking forward to this new phase of life: he and his wife, Tiina, could now travel to France as often as they wished; it would be his troisième âge. It didn't turn out that way. Without his job, Lars lost his spark; the school had been his stage, and the performance was over. Although medical tests found nothing wrong physically, he took to spending his days slumped in his armchair, as if waiting for the end to come. Something had to be done. So Filip came up with a plan, a road trip to reinvigorate his father, destination: Beaulieu-sur-Mer. He tracked down a vintage Renault, identical to the old family car, and roped in Fredrik – as well as a tiny film crew, so that the nostalgic journey could be documented. Lars, then aged 80 and armed with a French dictionary and a big fat book about Charles de Gaulle, was installed in the passenger seat, with Filip taking the wheel, and long-legged Fredrik crammed into the back seat, and off they went. When the film of their adventure, The Last Journey, was released in Sweden last year, it quickly became Scandinavia's highest-grossing documentary of all time. Now, this funny, life-affirming film is coming to British cinemas, which is how I come to find myself in London's Soho Hotel, asking Filip and Fredrik how Lars is handling his late-life fame. 'He said, 'I wish I was a little bit younger, a bit less frail, so I could enjoy the success more,'' replies Filip. 'But he gets so many lovely letters and emails from people who've seen the film, and Facebook messages from ex-students. I think he loves it.' There were points in the filming when this happy ending seemed far from assured. Only a couple of days into the journey, in Malmö, Lars fell, cracking a bone in his leg and requiring hospitalisation: it looked as if the whole trip was off. Instead, Filip and Fredrik decided to drive the ancient Renault ('Europe's most overtaken car', as Fredrik calls it) across Denmark, Germany and Belgium, where they were reunited with Lars, who had travelled there by train with Tiina, after being discharged from hospital. The documentary captures the playful, staged moment when the two friends plant Lars behind the wheel and push the Renault 4 over the border into France, a smile of sheer delight breaking across his face. His troisième âge had begun. 'Conventionally, you're not supposed to stage stuff in a documentary,' says Filip, who resists the idea that non-fiction films should maintain a po-faced, unmanipulated, 'fly-on-the-wall aesthetic'. Fredrik tells a story about the great German director Werner Herzog giving a talk to a class of film students. After one of them asked him if he'd ever staged something in any of his documentaries, 'Herzog said, 'Everyone who thinks a documentary needs to be straight up and fly-on-the-wall, raise your hand.' And everybody raised their hands. Then he said, 'Happy New Year, losers!' and left the room.' In The Last Journey, we see Filip ask his father what he used to love most about France. Lars thinks for a minute. 'It was great to meet people who don't stop at stop signs,' he says. 'Every Frenchman is his own president.' He also mentions that he used to enjoy seeing how the French would argue in traffic, which prompts Fredrik to visit a local casting agency, hire a couple of actors and stage a minor road-rage incident for the unwitting Lars. The following day, Filip takes his father to a roadside café for lunch, while Fredrik hides around the corner, directing proceedings via a walkie-talkie. ('Car number one – go! Car number two – go!') One of the actors pulls up in front of the café, blocking the road with his car; when a second actor drives up, an argument breaks out that ends with someone getting slapped. Lars watches, entranced, mouth slightly open, from his ringside seat at the café. I ask Fredrik when they broke it to Lars that the whole scene had been orchestrated. 'He was at a screening, two weeks before the premiere,' he says, 'and I suddenly realised we'd forgotten to tell him. When he was watching it and realised it was a set-up, he just turned to me with a lovely smile and said, 'You bastards.'' Filip laughs. 'He's always been a good sport.' The French trip functions as what Fredrik calls a sort of 'reverse bucket list' for Lars; repeating the same experiences he'd already ticked off decades before. They stay in the apartment where the family always used to go, enjoying the same old view from its balcony, and take trips to all the familiar haunts: the cemetery at Sète where Lars's hero the singer-songwriter Georges Brassens is buried; the beach; the market; the posh restaurants, where Filip now has to help his frail father keep the food on his fork and raise his wine glass high enough to swallow. 'And, in the editing, we realised that these almost desperate attempts to recreate the past also said so much about what Filip wants out of this,' says Fredrik. 'It's a metaphor for what he is trying to do, to recreate what was before.' And this is perhaps the film's most poignant aspect: Filip's desperation for his elderly father to enjoy life as he used to causes Lars in turn to feel sad that he is no longer living up to his son's expectations, that he is somehow disappointing him. It is Filip, it seems, who is in denial about ageing, not Lars. That realisation lands with unexpected emotional force. The process of making The Last Journey also led Filip to question his father's long-held view of France. While the country was always a source of happiness for Lars, 'I sometimes think, does France deserve all this love? We screened the film in Paris the other night, and it went down well, but to the French, it's like, 'You don't have to tell us that our country's great; we know!' I love France, but I also detest that self-congratulatory aura that almost every Frenchman has.' 'They take it for granted,' adds Fredrik, before admitting, slightly sheepishly, that he owns a second home in France. 'I love the weather, but the people..? The local baker treats me like s--- every morning.' The Last Journey is not the first time that Filip has turned the camera on his family. In 2007, he and Fredrik made an acclaimed series about Filip's sister Linda, who has a learning disability: I en annan del av Köping (In another part of Köping), which ran for four seasons. 'She was living in a home with three male friends, also learning disabled, and when you hung out with them, they were so funny, it was almost like Seinfeld,' Filip tells me. 'The first episode opened with her saying, 'Uh-oh, I've been unfaithful again...' and that set the tone for the series. It was not what people would expect.' The show was so popular that, for a while, Linda became a national celebrity. 'At one point, she was voted 'Woman of the Year' in Sweden. Ahead of the queen! 'For some reason, I tend to explore my family and my hometown in our work – it must be a kind of therapy, or a way of dealing with weirdness,' he says. 'But I have said to Fred, 'By the way, whenever you want to do something about your family, I would be open to that...'' 'They're not charismatic enough!' replies Fredrik. 'That's the harsh truth. They're so low-key.' 'But there is a sort of inverted charisma vibe to your parents,' says Filip, kindly. 'You'd have to dig really, really deep,' concedes Fredrik. When The Last Journey came out in Scandinavia, the scale of its success took both men by surprise. 'It had more admissions than Dune: Part Two, which had a huge marketing budget,' points out Fredrik. 'God, we're so boastful. There have been several successful documentaries in Sweden in recent years: one about the ex-prime minister Olof Palme; one about Ingrid Bergman; one about the footballer Zlatan Ibrahimović. And one is about a teacher from a small town: my dad. He beat them all.'
