The Captor

The reunion of writer/director Robert Budreau and star Ethan Hawke after acclaimed Chet Baker biopic Born to Be Blue (2015) is prefaced as "based on an absurd but true story", and breezily chronicles Sweden's first-ever hostage crisis. The incident in 1973 is now credited as the source of the concept of Stockholm Syndrome, the phenomenon of hostages becoming psychologically attached to their captors. In an understated beginning, Hawke rocks up to a Stockholm bank in cowboy garb (think Dennis Hopper in Easy Rider) and casually holds up the place, taking employees like mousy clerk Bianca (Noomi Rapace) hostage. Not everything is as it seems, though, especially when Mark Strong's notorious convict is released and added to the mix. Hawke bristles with cool bravado - he demands a Ford Mustang as getaway vehicle because the car was in Bullitt - and gives a magnetic performance as the pill-popping, Bob Dylan-loving antihero, Meanwhile, Rapace oozes believable vulnerability as the married mum torn between a life of domesticity and her charismatic jailer. The 70s are beautifully evoked (that means beige!) and there's a deft balance between the light-hearted and the serious. It may not all be true or indeed the complete story, with little of the aftermath re-enacted, but Hawke makes you wish it was.