Clark, a new Swedish mini series starring Bill Skarsgård on Netlfix, is based on the true story of a notorious Swedish bank robber, Clark Olofsson, who gave rise to the phrase "The Stockholm syndrome." Directed by Jonas Åkerlund, Clark is a dynamic six-part series with an eclectic visual style that reflects the craziness of its lead character's life.
Clark follows Clark Olofsson (played by Bill Skarsgård), a charismatic career criminal, who spent his life in between committing various crimes, prison sentences, escaping prison and being on the run. It starts from his birth in 1947 until the late 1980s when he was sentenced to ten years in prison for aggravated drug trafficking. It's all told through Clark's perspective, who depicts himself as a ladies man, seemingly able to charm everyone around him, especially women, and a great criminal mastermind.
Clark is a fast-paced six-part series, mostly based on the "truths and lies" as told by Olofsson himself in his autobiography, with a great leading performance from Bill Skarsgård. If you ever wondered where the term Stockholm syndrome came from, this series will give you a vivacious illustration of it and what it means.
Clark Olofsson's notoriety blew up after his involvement in the bank heist of the Sveriges Kreditbanken in Stockholm in 1973, from which the phrase "Stockholm syndrome" originates. Bank robber Janne Olsson (played by Christoffer Nordenrot) took four hostages in the process, then demanded that his prison mate, Clark Olofsson, be brought to the scene. Olsson, Olofsson and the four hostages were then kept in the bank vault for six days by the police until Olsson surrendered himself to them. What made this bank robbery so extraordinary is that one of the hostages, Kristen "Kicki" Enmark (played by Alicia Agneson), phoned the Swedish Prime Minister to ask him for the police not to harm them and the two bank robbers.
This is what would subsequently be coined as "Stockholm syndrome," a hostage siding with their captor. But as the series points out, through its megalomaniac leading character, it really should be called the Olofsson syndrome. This series is thus not about this particular event in 1973, but a portrait of Clark Olofsson, the man himself, and how his personality and character could have inspired such a syndrome.
The series thus begins, in black and white, by depicting Clark's childhood from his actual birth. But as the episodes unfold, these initial images of his childhood will change and alter, becoming more and more brutal, revealing the drunken violence Clark's father inflicted on the family. This is how the whole series functions: showing events as Clark initially would like everyone else to see them, and then hinting at what really happened. This is especially blatant in Clark's claim of being a ladies' man. The series makes it repeatedly clear that the women in Clark's life were not all that satisfied with their encounter with him in the bedroom.
This is what makes this series such a nuanced portrait of Sweden's most infamous criminal. It plays along Clark Olofsson's sense of self-aggrandizing, showing the charming power he had on people and the Swedish population at large, while also hinting ever so subtly at the reality of Clark's life. The writer Clark meets to work on his biography, Sussi Korsner (played by Alida Morberg), towards the end of the series, offers a great counter-perspective on everything the series showed us until then. She is not taken in by his charms and sees him for what he really is, and not the image he is trying to project of himself.
Through its striking visual style, dynamic pace and dark comedy, Clark cleverly points to Clark Olofsson's personality traits and charisma, which fooled the Swedish people into falling for him. Clark is a great limited series with excellent performances from Bill Skarsgård and the whole cast.