O' Horten

O' Horten is a 2007 internationally co-produced comedy-drama film written and directed by Bent Hamer. The film's title character Odd Horten is a habit-bound train driver, who is about to retire. On the day of his retirement he ends up in an unexpected situation, and is forced to reconsider his life. As in other films by Hamer, the themes are loneliness and old age, and the courage to take chances. O' Horten has been described as a film without a strong plot or a clear chronology. The film's main cast consists mainly of senior Danish and Norwegian actors, including Bård Owe, Espen Skjønberg, and Ghita Nørby. There are also several cameos from various well-known Norwegians, such as ski jumper Anette Sagen in her first film role. The music was composed by John Erik Kaada. Generally well received by critics, it was chosen for Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival. Skjønberg was awarded an Amanda Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Plot Odd Horten is an overcautious 67-year-old man about to retire after forty years as a train driver on the route between Oslo and Bergen. As he awakes, he goes through a meticulous daily routine, as he prepares for his second-to-last time driving the train to Bergen. When he gets there, he makes small talk with Svea, who owns the boarding house where he stays when there and whom he now may never see again. Back in Oslo, his colleagues throw him a farewell party, but Odda timid manis uncomfortable with the attention. As the party moves to a co-worker's apartment, he ends up getting accidentally locked out. He climbs up a scaffold, trying to reach the apartment window, and ends up in a young boy's room. The boy asks him to stay and wait for him to fall asleep, but Odd falls asleep first. He oversleeps in the unfamiliar room and arrives too late for the train he was to drive on his final working day. He is left standing on the platform without any fixed points in his life, with nothing but a life of emptiness stretching out before him.