Police officer Stig Nyman is murdered by an unseen assailant brandishing a bayonet. His colleagues Beck, Rönn and Kollberg pick up the case quickly, keen to find the perpetrator of the attack on one of their own. Their investigation leads the team to discover that Nyman was a lousy cop with a history of brutality. As their search draws closer, they are caught unaware by a rooftop assassin with a sniper rifle, picking off every cop he can...
The Man on the Roofwas adapted from the novel by celebrated writers Sjöwall and Wahlöö, whose Martin Beck character has been realised in multiple films and recent TV series Beck. Influenced by The French Connection's gritty vérité style, celebrated director Bo Widerberg created an incredible spectacle here that would become legendary in Sweden and remains a foundational work of of Scandi noir.