Redoubt

Overbevist om at krigen nærmet seg, samlet han kassert metall, jernbaneskinner og landbruksredskaper, bar dem hjem og støpte dem inn i betong. Tilfluktsrommet var ikke bare ment for ham selv, men for hele landsbyen – og til og med kongen.

Denis Lavant leverer en forbløffende fysisk prestasjon som en gårdsarbeider som bygger en festning for landsbyen. John Skoog forvandler den sanne historien til en taktil og urovekkende vakker svart-hvitt-visjon om frykt, hengivenhet og besettelse.

John Skoog vokste opp i nærheten av huset og har fulgt historien om Persson i mer enn ti år. Her forvandler han den til noe som befinner seg mellom levd historie og moderne myte. Filmet i taktilt svart-hvitt bygges filmen av kropper, materialer og arbeid: jord, dyr, maskiner, tømmer og betong, formet av skiftende årstider og rytmene i livet på landet.

Redoubt is a haunting black-and-white vision of fear, devotion and obsession.Based on the true story of Karl-Göran Persson, a farm worker who spent decades transforming his small house in the Scanian countryside into a fortress.

Convinced that war was approaching, he collected discarded metal, railway tracks and agricultural tools, carrying them home and casting them into concrete. The shelter was intended not only for himself, but for the entire village, and even the king.

At its centre is an extraordinary physical performance by Denis Lavant. His wiry body seems inseparable from the structure taking shape around him. Stubborn and vulnerable, solemn and unexpectedly playful, a man who stands apart from the community, and outcast, but through his devotion a man of many layers, kindness and tender weirdness appears. Without reducing his project to either fear or madness, Redoubt explores how care, conviction and obsession can become part of the same act.

John Skoog, who grew up near the house, has followed Persson’s story for more than a decade. Here, he turns it into something between lived history and modern myth. Photographed in tactile black-and-white, the film is built from bodies, materials and work: earth, animals, machines, timber and concrete, shaped by changing seasons and the rhythms of rural life.