Stig Engström is breathing heavily. Then he walks away with waddling steps. It would be easy to catch up with anyone who wanted to. A man in his early fifties, unsportsmanlike. Several times he threatens to slip on the snow-covered sidewalk. A handbag, an old-fashioned, yes, ridiculous accessory, dangles from her right wrist. It symbolizes Engström and his life – he too looks unfavorable and is tolerated more than liked. Where life takes him and what is worth preserving on the way is determined by others.
However, you know that at the beginning of the Swedish Netflix series The unlikely killer not yet. You don’t even know whether Engström fired the shots that had previously cracked off from the off. He stares at the lifeless victim and his shocked wife, then stumbles away through Stockholm’s streets like a wounded animal. A pathetic person who instantly captivates in strange ways.
The dead person is Olof Palme, Sweden’s Prime Minister, murdered on February 28, 1986. The perpetrator has not yet been identified beyond any doubt. There are many indications of Engström. But he is no longer alive, so no proceedings can be brought against him, at the end of which one might see more clearly.
Are all the same? A lie of life in Swedish society
On the surface, the five episodes, based on research by journalist Thomas Pettersson, are about police work. About sloppiness and wrong strategic decisions. About a device that is not equipped: Because rotary telephones first have to be issued so that officials assigned to it can receive information from the population, but there is no coordinated procedure for viewing them. The German police must help with the creation of a phantom image.
The real story of this series is different. It is about a life lie of Swedish society as an egalitarian community. The premier’s widow (Cilla Thorell) is a monstrous diva. Otherwise women do not play a role. Not in the police, not in families. The helplessness and speechlessness with which Margareta Engström (Eva Melander) put up with the increasingly strange behavior of her husband for a long time is disturbing.
And what about the men? Want to make a career, belong to the upper class, not submit to a social democratic leveling off, which they blame on Olof Palme. Hans Holmér (Mikael Persbrandt), who initially heads the investigation, succeeds. Or a couple of guys who Engström tolerate in their circle of friends – as someone they can look down on. Engström puts up with it in order to belong.
The way Robert Gustafsson plays this Stig Engström is impressive: Engström is jovial and conciliatory, although deeply offended. Driven without having lost the ability to act strategically. Appreciative, but at the same time submissive. Gustafsson does not clearly define the character, above all he does not pathologize it. In the course of The unlikely killer the question of whether Engström shot Palme becomes more and more exciting. Less on the basis of factual details and circumstantial evidence, but simply out of the consideration: Could the unlikely event that this person becomes a murderer out of offended vanity have occurred? The series gives refreshingly contradicting answers.
The unlikely killer, Netflix.