[3] Upon release, unique for adaptations of Lindgren's work, it was given an 11 certificate by the Swedish board of censors, causing the Riksdag to enact an age limit of 7 and above for future films.

The source work is widely considered, although the violent content is much toned down on screen, the most political and violent of Lindgren's books, involving themes of dictatorship, occupation, treason, democide, war, suicide and forced labour of nigh-Holocaustian reminiscence.

Most of the named characters do not survive the film (although its setting in concurrent realities soften this fact).

), a truism (used ironically out of context) pronounced to proclaim loyalty and submission to the autocratic occupational power of Lord Tengil of Karmanjaka.

[5] Often interpreting the film in contemporary terms, they compared Staffan Götestam's portrayal of Jonatan to Che Guevara,[5] and Georg Årlin's portrayal of Tengil to Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Augusto Pinochet, Richard Nixon and Saddam Hussein.