All language subtitles for The.Man.Who.Stole.The.Scream.2023.1080p.WEB.H264-CBFM

The following programme contains
strong language.

(SOFT MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

My name is Pal Enger.

(SPEAKING NORWEGIAN)

I always love to play games.

The stronger the opponent,
the better I play.

But in some games you're really
playing against yourself.

And that's the way

you always lose.

This is probably the greatest,
most disseminated image

I can think of in the world.

The most iconic and famous
painting in the world.

Is it a man? A woman, a foetus,
a skeleton, a ghost.

Maybe it's you and me.

This was not an ordinary theft.

Could someone have done it
for pure evil?

Theft of this nature is
so extraordinary.

Someone is playing.

Someone who wanted to show
that I did it.

I grew up in Tveita, in the 1980s.

There was a divide in Tveita,
some people were into sport

and some were into drugs.

I go with sport.

When, I was maybe eight,
nine years old,

I want to be a football player.

I start to be so good
I can play football,

maybe professional.

And they take me
to the A-Team in Valerenga,

very early.

COMMENTATOR:

PAL:

I played at the A-Team in Valerenga
and Pal played in the youth team,

and then he suddenly
came up in the A-Team.

He was a talented guy,
which football Norway knew about.

This could be something big

because of his talent,
his potential.

He was always smiling and joking.

He was very easy to like.

But he...

..got some other interests.

I was the best criminal in Norway.

(SIRENS WAIL)

In the nineties,
I used to be a police prosecutor

and I was in the theft squad
in Oslo.

In the eighties,
the crimes in Oslo was increasing.

It was more violence.

It was more serious burglaries.

Tveita is a region
in east part of Oslo.

Lot of young people grew up
and they tried to do

burglaries together,
smash and grab thefts.

And that's the reason why in police,
they call them the Tveita gang.

(EXPLOSIONS)
(TENSE MUSIC)

I really take it seriously.

Everything I do,
with the crime things.

I took it really serious.

And you have a special room.

Nobody else coming in there.

We always talk about crime.

In the 1990s, I was...

..taking care of Pal's
billiard salon.

When Paul came in there,
it felt like special vibration

in the in the whole place.

When they came in.

When I come into the room,
the room change.

I feel it myself.

Pal was very special.

If he stands up for something,

he stands up for it,

but he is not known for violence.

No.

As he was like the master,
the master thief.

Near the top of the League.

The Scream is a very important
painting for all the world.

Hundreds of thousands
of people come every year

to see the genius of it.

Munch is trying to convey
the raw emotion of loneliness,

fundamental anxiety,

and the feeling of being
alienated from other people

and separated from
the lives of others.

Munch disregarded all rules.

He was a maverick
and he was a kind of outsider.

He was not an easy person,
I think.

(LOW, MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

My stepfather was a wild guy.

He hit me and my mother.

And he screamed so much,

at my mother all the time.

Really? I really want to.

Don't listen to that.

I really...

..hold my ears.

It was myself I see
in the painting.

I maybe feel...

..other people have it also.

(MUFFLED YELLING)

I go to the museum alone,
maybe for six, seven years,

maybe two times in the week.

And that's a lot when you are young.

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

(ALARM BLARING)

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

(MUSIC ENDS)

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

We hide the painting
in the ceiling of the snooker club.

The police come there in the week
and play pool.

So I say to Bjorn every time
they stand in there and play,

they don't know it's hanging
just one metre from them.

They are so close.

But they didn't know.

That was the best feeling.

So we let them play for free...

..just to have them there.

My phone rang at work.

I said Ericsson, and he said,
it's Pal.

What on earth? What have you done?

And he said relax mate,
I'm sitting in a flat.

No, I do not want to know
where you are.

The whole world is looking for you.
I would- Would not.

So he didn't tell me where he was.

He was hungry. He was starving.

He couldn't go to the grocery shop.

PAL:

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

The decision of the International
Olympic Committee is...

The decision is... Lillehammer.

I learned so much in prison.

The other prisoners,

they call me the asking man
because I ask all the time

how you do this,
how you do that,

how we can do this.

I read about metal.

What you want to use when you
breaking in with these metals

and how you break things.

I check the alarm system
and knew alarm systems

before I was an ordinary criminal,
maybe.

But by the time I left the prison,
I was an expert.

When I come out and the plans start
for real.

This time I will leave
Bjorn out of it.

What I needed was someone else
to steal it for me.

(LOW, MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

So I get new friends.

And I meet William.

He had no place to live.

He lived on the central station.

He was nice and he was clever.

And he keep the mouth shut.

William was there all the time.

And come in, a man,
like he was very big.

And he really hit William hard.

And William just do this.
And he got really hurt.

And he do it one more time,
William did this one more time.

I choose not to help him
because I want to see

how he take it... for real.

So I see William was really hard
in his head.

I was sure he don't gonna say
something

if they take him or something.

One day William asked me,

Can we do something big, Pal,
like you do before?

And then I started thinking,
now I find the man.

William didn't know what tools he
going to use to take down

the Scream.

So I fixed the cutter.

We test it, and I show him
how to use it and which window.

I have to teach him to drive.

He cannot.

He can't use the clutch. Nothing.

William and me,
we're sitting in Zara Cafe.

And they selling postcards
in the cafe.

You'd see three people
sitting with a beer

and laughing on the chair.

On the postcard I write,
"Thank you for bad security."

FEMALE NEWSREADER:

MALE NEWSREADER:

In 1994, I was Minister of Culture.

The Olympic Games gave Norway a
chance to put ourselves on the map.

Now we'll show them.

Thrills aplenty promised.

Will the world speed skating record
be broken again?

Will Torvill and Dean win
gold for Britain?

We'll find out soon.

In 1994, I was curator
at the National Gallery.

It was going to be
the best Winter Olympic ever.

We had prepared for the Olympics,
some exhibitions.

We had the idea that
we should put on a show

called Munch in
the National Gallery.

In the middle of all this,
we had the diamond,

which was the Scream.

I'm scared just before.

I feel I shouldn't do it.

All night before...

..something said in my stomach.
Don't do it. Don't do it.

(CROWD COUNTING DOWN)

The start of the 1994
Winter Olympics.

The world's biggest snow show.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

(TENSE MUSIC)

(ALARM RINGING)
(MUSIC CONTINUES)

(MUSIC CRESCENDOS, ENDS)

(CHEERING)

(SOFT, MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

Everything goes like I hope it goes.

So it was perfect.

I had to go to work
very early in the morning.

I was passing many people
going to the railway station

to be at Lillehammer.

When passing the museum,

I saw this ladder standing
up to the ground floor.

I thought first that some
window cleaner had left it.

But then I saw white curtains
flapping through broken glass,

and I wondered
what the heck had happened.

When I got up to the room,

I saw that some policeman was there,
but no one else.

The floor was full of glass.

And there was no Scream
at its place beside the window.

I saw a piece of paper
on the floor.

I was not allowed to touch it.

It was written
"Thank you for the bad security."

Our blood went cold.

My mobile called.

I was told by the chairman
of the board

I have a very dramatic
thing to tell you.

And the Scream has been stolen.

And I said, "But how?"

Well, they used to let the ladder.

I had to go over to
the Prime Minister

who was sitting beside me.

And just tell her that.

Well, I have some very dramatic news
to tell you.

Skrik is stolen.

We just waited for someone said,
"Ah, this was just a joke."

But of course, it wasn't a joke.

It was...

It was deadly serious.

One of the world's most
famous paintings,

The Scream by Edward Munch,
has been stolen...

..in Oslo as part
of a special exhibition marking

the opening of the...

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

Scream, regarded as Norway's
Mona Lisa...

The painting is said to be
priceless because it

would be impossible
to sell on the open market.

In 1994, I was assistant
chief of police, you know,

so the police department.

NEWSREADER:

Well, in the middle of that footage,

suddenly we saw the painting
dropped down.

It was painted on cardboard.

As long as this painting
is kept in a first class museum...

..then it could survive hundreds
and hundreds of years.

But as soon as you take it out,
it's quite vulnerable.

The fact that Munch used cardboard
was part of his experimental way

of dealing with his medium,

and he wanted the surface
to be shown through the paint

and the chalk.

There are other paintings
made by Munch on cardboard,

and I think he always used it
in a very deliberate way

because he had something
he wanted to achieve.

When we saw that footage,
we were actually very afraid

that they would ruin the picture.

Perhaps they would burn it

if they couldn't get
the money they wanted.

Could someone have done it
just for pure evil?

(SOFT, MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

I feel so happy.

I never feel better.

And I see it for real.

The back side, everything.

When I have it,
in the control of it,

I was so happy.

I feel so good.

Like I walk one metre
from the ground.

I feel power.

NEWSREADER:

The press had been there from
all corners of the world.

The smallest nation on the other
side of the world, you know.

The Scream, they know it.

So if we didn't know it before,

we got to know how famous
this piece of art was.

I was sitting with my parents
watching the news,

then I saw from the Gallery the—
the ladder and the broken window,

and they told that 'The Scream'
was stolen.

Well the first thing
I did was to tell my parents

"Oh I'm going to get a lot of work"
and they asked me "Why?"

and then I told them
"Because this is Pal Enger,

he's involved in this in one way."

Course Pal Enger, the suspicion
they fell on him right away.

(SOFT, TENSE MUSIC)

PAL:

Sometimes I called the police
and say

"I see Pal has something in the car"
and they stopped me,

and they stopped me, and after
a while they don't stop me anymore.

Because they feel like idiots.

So sometimes I have something
in the car, then they don't stop me.

Back in 1994 I work as
a crime reporter for Dagbladet.

It's the best newspaper in Norway.

Compared to English paper,
you can compare it

to— to Daily Mail or The Telegraph
or something like that.

Pal was something different,

you can't compare him
to other Norwegian criminals.

A few weeks after the theft,
I met him in the city.

"The police think that you can be
the guy behind this thing."

At that time,
I had nothing to write about,

so then you try to find
a good story.

"Should I take a picture of you
at the National Gallery?"

When we coming in,
I was very, very excited

how the security gonna look at us.

And they look at us, I promise you.

That was a good story.

It was a way for him to say
'Ha-ha-ha' to the police as well.

Pal told me, very proud that
he had been a father,

I said 'Congratulations'
so we printed 'Oscar' his son,

is born with a scream,
and the name Pal Enger.

The police didn't like it,
Paul was playing with them.

He was saying "I know that you know,
but you can't catch me."

As the time passed,
and they hadn't found 'The Scream',

of course then there were
some dark moments.

I found this situation very,
very difficult and someone said

"Well, what do you want us to do?"

and I just said that
"Well, you do what has to be done."

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

Well I met him
in the late April 1994.

He was not that charming little boy,

but something was wrong with him.

He was nervous,

he saw police people,
it was sort of paranoia.

So I walk with a gun all the time,

because I was afraid of other
criminals tried to take it from me

or give it to the police
and get reward.

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

(SOFT, MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

So I speak to Bjorn.

He was so nervous,

so I never see him
so nervous before.

Because he know
he gonna get involved with it now.

But I didn't want to just give up.

Maybe it was still a game to win.

Maybe I'll get the ransom for it.

(MUSIC CONTINUES)

My name is Einar-Tore Ulving,

and in the 90s I was, as I am today,

much involved in buying and selling
works of art,

especially by Edvard Munch.

The person who first contacted me
about 'The Scream' was Mr Jan Olsen.

He called me up and told me
very clearly

"I can get 'The Scream' back."

Bjorn speak to Olsen, and Olsen
speak to Ulving, the art dealer.

I said "You need to give us
a proof...

..that the painting exists
and then we can discuss money."

I take the frame
and put it somewhere.

Mr Olsen called me up and say
"Read Dagbladet"

which is the local paper, "Monday
morning and you will see the proof."

Me and a man from the Gallery drive
outside Oslo, about 30 minutes,

and we have some instructions,
so we drive further out.

And we see the frame.

The expert from the National Gallery
he go outside, I was exciting,

"Yes, yes it is" he said.

It was lying just there
and I recognised it immediately.

When I saw the frame,
I was pretty happy, yeah.

I know that I have
a really good story.

When they found
the bits of the frame,

then suddenly I think
most of us thought

"Wow, where's the rest?"

The question was
we would accept to pay a ransom.

Many people thought that we had
to do anything to get it back.

NEWSREADER:

The artists organisations
were very clear

that if we paid ransom

then that would just be
a kick-start of theft.

We needed a new plan.

In 1994,

I was the head of the arts
and antique squad at Scotland Yard.

I spoke to Leif.

You know, I could see
that he was under huge pressure,

and there weren't a lot of art
squads in the world anyway,

that could help him.

We were one of them.

When I first heard about
Scotland Yard,

that felt like Christmas Eve.

In Norway, Scotland Yard is
something very special.

We all have read Agatha Christie.

Leif rang me and said that a piece
of the picture had been found,

which confirmed to him that the
picture was still in that country.

I said, "Well, you know, we could
possibly mount

an undercover operation."

The next person that
I talked to was Charley Hill.

Charley has got a background.

He’s an American, paratrooper in
the Vietnam War, would you believe,

and all sorts of weird
and wonderful things.

'Cause this was gonna
be a dangerous job.

I think that a good undercover cop
has to have character

and imagination.

Self-righteously, I have that
in spades, even when I'm wrong.

The Norwegian police needed
the help of the Metropolitan Police

in London, because we knew
what we were doing

and we'd done it before
very successfully,

and I was part of that big success.

And so someone like Leif Lier
is no fool.

Being offered free help
from the best in the business,

he jumped at it.

And so, I came up with the idea
of pretending I was a guy

from the Getty, to negotiate not
so much a ransom,

but, you know, a substantial reward,

in return for the Norwegian
government allowing

this wonderful painting

to be exhibited at the Getty Museum
in California.

The thing about the John Paul
Getty Museum is it just smelt

and sounded of money.

We had to make sure
that the Getty were onside.

You know, we had to have an office,
a telephone number.

You have to suck people
into the trap.

"Welcome to my parlour,"
said the spider to the fly.

My approach to undercover work is
slightly different from,

I suppose, other undercover
officers, who had to blend in.

I had to blend out.

They wanted some knowledgeable,
mid-Atlantic accented art dealer,

who was essentially as dodgy
as they were,

but who could move the stuff they
needed moved

and get the money they wanted
to get.

We picked the Plaza Hotel.

It's all big and flash
and Americanised and, you know,

it went with the persona
that Charley was playing.

I arrived at Plaza Hotel,
and I met Mr Olsen,

and we were then waiting for
this Mr X coming from abroad.

So, I announced my arrival.

I had my American Express card.

I had to be the, you know,
the guy with the cash,

so it looked like what I wanted to
portray, which was a, sort of, a guy

who worked for a big Californian art
museum, the richest on our planet.

So, I was the guy from the Getty.

He could play it up to a T,
which meant going up to the bar

and ordering large quantities
of alcohol and expensive stuff,

which he revelled in, I might add.

I just kept talking to them about,
you know,

what the Getty could do and
what it's done

and how would we do it,

and put the burden on them more
than on myself, to work out a plan.

You've got to be able
to bring people into your world,

so they feel safe and secure
with you. You can trust me.

At exactly that day, there was
a big police conference in Oslo.

And of course,
that was at that hotel.

So, the crook come inside,
he saw a lot of policemen.

It was being used by
the Scandinavian narcotics officers'

annual conference
as their meeting venue.

No one had told us that.

I thought,
"This is really gonna be hard work

if the Norwegian police keep
screwing up."

I had my vanity on line.

I was the man that was gonna get
these things back,

and I wasn't gonna have some
piddling idiocy screw up

getting The Scream back.

I said, "We'll go up to my room."

I said, "We'll, you know,
go up and have a drink

and talk about it up there."

Ulving and Olson and I,
knocking back the Jack Daniel's.

Then I thought, "Well, what I really
need to do is leave out

all my Getty Museum stuff,

so they can have a good rummage
through it."

I said, "I've gotta go for a crap."

I went into the bathroom.

I didn't need one, but, you know,
I just went, and I closed the door,

I locked it, you know, stayed in
there an appropriate amount of time,

then, sort of,
flushed it and flushed it again,

and sprayed the place with,
you know,

whatever it was that was there.

And then, you know, washed my hands,
you know, took a while.

And then came out.

And sure enough,
as I sat down again,

I could see that Olson had
been through my stuff.

And that more than anything else
convinced Olson

I really was the guy I said I was.

We just needed to get the guy
from the Getty away from the hotel,

on his own,
so I can have full control.

I'll be damned if the phone goes
about half past eleven that night.

It's Ulving downstairs in the hotel,
saying,

"You've got to come with us.

We're gonna go get the painting,
'The Scream.'"

So, I said to him,
"It's near midnight. Go away.

I'll talk to you tomorrow."
Click, down went the phone.

I knew he would ring back.

So, he rang back and said to me,
"You've gotta come down now.

It's really important."

Charley then phoned me in my room.

He said, "They wanna do it now,"
and I said, "Under no circumstances.

There is absolutely no way."

But Charley being Charley
went down to downstairs.

I say, "Alright, I'll put my shoes
on and I'll come down and see you."

I left the hotel and went
and sat in Ulving's big Mercedes.

They wanted me to go for a midnight
ride down to some wild wood,

to see the painting.

I see them from a distance.

He put one step out again.

He was afraid.

And then a man clothed in black,

completely black clothes
and black cap,

which covered his face...

..he entered the car.

And I later found out
he was Bjorn Grytdal.

That's when Grytdal got in,

wanted to know why I had the door
open and my right foot outside,

with my tasselled loafers,
but no socks.

I said, "Because you're gonna pull
out a gun

and I'm gonna roll out of here."

And Mr Olson said, "You are just
going to view the painting,

and then you are off."

The man in black behind me said,

"If anyone is following this car...

..we will destroy the painting.

Completely destroy it.

And now we drive."

And this man from the Getty Museum,

left the car and said,
"You do that."

"Fuck," I think.

(SOFT MUSIC)

Bjorn did
show up behind the brick fence.

He picked up something
wrapped in a blanket,

and I understood immediately
what it was.

And I said,
"I have a summerhouse very close.

We can go there."

No heating was on,
no lights were on,

and he brought the blanket with
the thing inside,

and he took off the blanket,

and there I saw 'The Scream'
on my dining table,

in full size.

And I turned it a bit.

I saw the sketch on the reverse
side...

..and I knew immediately,

"This is Norwegian people's Scream,

used to hang at
the National Gallery,

and now it's on my dining table."

Bjorn decided that we should meet
the man from the Getty Museum

at eight o'clock in the morning, at
the cafe between Oslo and Tonsberg.

And then we decided
this is what we'd do.

Grytdal and Olson
would go back to Oslo,

and Ulving and I would go
and get the painting.

And then when I had the painting,
I would ring to give him the money.

And everybody seemed happy
with that.

Obviously, I had no intention,

and so the police could swoop once
I had the painting.

And then we got to the summerhouse.

But I just wanted to, you know,
do what I'd trained myself to do,

which was, you know, check to make
sure I wasn't taking a fake in.

The aura of a masterpiece
comes straight at you.

The central image of 'The Scream'...
is so arresting

when you look at it, it just stops
you dead in your tracks.

It is a masterpiece of
human anxiety,

and it expresses just that.

I walked out of Ulving's summerhouse
with The Scream,

opened the passenger side door,
and I was trying to work out,

"How can I get it in?"

And I accidentally bumped it
on the headrest.

I know that, because I was told
later, they had to iron it out.

So, I damaged this multi-
multi-million dollar painting.

The funny thing then was that
it wasn't space for the painting.

So, I had to take the roof down.

So, in the backseat of
the sports car, with no roof,

we had 'The Scream' standing up.

While driving.

And give it— gave it to
the National Gallery and the police.

Every minute goes,
I understand everything fucked up.

(LOW, TENSE MUSIC)

NEWSREADER:

When I understand
everything goes wrong,

I drive down to the gas station.

I don't know why
I take the baby with me.

I don't know.

When I'm driving out from
the garage,

is coming two motorcycles after me.

So, I was sure that was police.

I have this thing when you can put
the baby, because it was just born.

I put it on my chest.

I put the gun in my belt,
under there,

and I put the baby over.

It was a scary way to do,
but I did it.

I go to the gas station
where they're selling hot bread

and things like that,
and looking around.

I was sure they're gonna arrest me.

And I just walked to the car,
it's five metres,

and before I know anything,

I was on the floor and the baby was
taken from me,

and the gun was (CLINKS)
that was professional police.

They drive me directly to the police
station,

but they don't charge me
for 'Scream',

because they have no evidence.

I was in the garden and the phone-

the cell ring from the papers

and said he was gonna
immediately come to job,

because there's news about
'The Scream'.

When I come inside the press room,
I was sitting.

Leif Lier had a smile
was from here to here.

He was really happy.

And a few seconds later,

two men from the gallery
showed the painting.

I was surprised that there was only
a small, tiny, little piece

of the cardboard that was ruined,

but that was very easily fixed.

The picture was back, but we were
not finished with the investigation.

Pal Enger was arrested the same day,

but we were not clear to charge him
for the theft.

Pal was charged for wearing
a loaded weapon.

When the trial started,

I was very anxious,

very stressed about
how our evidences look like.

I was afraid that
I wouldn't succeed.

There was a lot of different
things that he might have forgotten

that we have recorded
or got information about.

We had witnesses.

He was calling the journalist,
he was calling Bjorn Grytdal.

It was people hearing him
talking in prison.

NEWSREADER:

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

NEWSREADER:

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

Yes, I'm guilty for planning it.

But I don't cheat. They cheat.

They lie and they say things
to the court that wasn't true.

I play by the rules.
They don't play by the rules.

And the sentence was totally wrong.

As it comes to Pal Enger,
have no excuses at all.

I think he was a hooligan
and a thief.

I mean, we can all be very obsessed
with pictures,

but we don't go and steal them.

Forget what that self-serving
son of a bitch thinks about himself.

You know, he stole it,
he doesn't deserve to have it,

and it deserves to be back
where it is, with the people of Oslo

and Norway and the rest of the world
can appreciate it.

Screw his sensitivities.

But one thing I like...

..is nobody else
gets sentenced for it,

and nobody else gets credit for it.

It's my story.

That's good.

(SOFT MYSTERIOUS MUSIC)

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