THE OUTLAW AND HIS WIFE

Iceland, second half of the 19th century. A wanderer claiming to call himself Kari arrives in a village and finds work in the house of Halla, a rich young widow with whom he falls in love. When Halla’s brother-in-law Bjorn, who is in love with her, discovers Kari’s past, he reports him to the police. Kari and Halla take refuge with their little girl in a hut in the mountains. After many adventures over many years, including the death of their child, the two lovers, tired of living, choose to free themselves by letting themselves die in a snowstorm. The Outlaw and his Wife, adapted from the novel by Icelandic author Jóhann Sigurjonsson, was shot in Lapland and is considered the first major film in Swedish cinema, making the Nordic landscape a real protagonist of the story, compared to the actors’ faces. In this work by Victor Sjöström, considered by Luis Delluc as ‘the most beautiful film in the world’, nature acts as a counterpoint to the emotions of the two fugitives, inexorably marking their end.