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At the end of the Second World War, orphans of various nationalities come together at the Pestalozzi Children’s Village in Trogen. When the order arrives from Poland that the Polish children must return to their country, it comes as a shock to 13-year-old Andrzey: he doesn’t want to leave Anja, for whom he has developed a strong affection. The two children decide to flee and go into hiding…Read More »
Journalist Åke Bergström is sacked from the newspaper he’s working at because of an article he wrote about the condition in Swedish prisons. To show his boss he was right he and his friend, the author Sune Berger, agree to fake the murder of Sune, so that Åke can study the prison from the inside…Read More »
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In Stockholm, the fashion photographer Susanne Frank misses her married lover Henrik Lobelius that lives in Gothenburg with his wife and children, and the naive twenty years old model Doris has a troubled relationship with her boy friend Palle Palt. Susanne schedules a session of photo shoots in Gothenburg with Doris, and once there, she calls Henrik for an encounter. Meanwhile, Doris meets an elegant middle age gentleman on the street, the Consul Otto Sönderby, who buys expensive gifts for her: a dress, a pair of Italian gloves and valuable pearl necklace.Read More »
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Three women in a maternity ward reveal their lives and intimate thoughts to each other.
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At the height of his international acclaim, Ingmar Bergman followed two meditations on death, The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries, with an examination of the mystery and pain of birth. This intimate chamber drama, set in a maternity ward, follows the emotional crises of three women as they grapple with motherhood. Another major success for the director that was also recognized for its exquisite performances by Ingrid Thulin, Eva Dahlbeck, and Bibi Andersson, Brink of Life is one of Bergman’s most brilliantly nuanced explorations of the inner lives of women.Read More »
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“Ride tonight!” – In the south of Sweden, some farmers get into trouble when the German Count is forcing them to perform day labor for him. But a man refuses to bow to the German Count.Read More »
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One of Ingmar Bergman’s most satisfying marital comedies, A Lesson in Love stars the droll and sparkling duo of Eva Dahlbeck and Gunnar Björnstrand as a couple deep into their married years and seeking fresh pastures. Björnstrand’s gynecologist falls for one of his patients (Yvonne Lombard), while his wife flounces off to Copenhagen to renew her fling with a sculptor (Åke Grönberg). Deftly interspersing scenes of farce with interludes of tranquil reflection, A Lesson in Love serves as an aperitif before the full-blown comic brilliance of Smiles of a Summer Night the following year.Read More »
In Sweden at the turn of the century, members of the upper class and their servants find themselves in a romantic tangle that they try to work out amidst jealousy and heartbreak.Read More »
Criterion wrote:
One of Agnès Varda least-seen films is also one of her most fascinating: an eccentrically imaginative science-fiction fantasia that touches on human nature, free will, and the creative process. Working with major stars for the first time on a feature film, Varda casts Michel Piccoli as a writer and Catherine Deneuve as his silent wife, a couple who relocate to the island of Noirmoutier (a longtime second home for Varda and her husband, Jacques Demy) where strange goings-on hint at a sinister force controlling the minds and actions of the residents. Slipping between “reality” and fiction, genre spectacle and avant-garde experimentation, Les créatures is a beguiling, endlessly inventive exploration of the mysterious alchemy that transforms life into art.Read More »
Statare, or country workers who recieved most of their payment in natura and didn’t own their own land, were the lowest of the low in Old Sweden. Maria – nicknamed ‘Rya-Rya’ – is born into this lot. A beautiful young woman, who the men tend to flock to, she quickly becomes with child. Her life changes forever…
Based on a novel by Ivar Lo Johansson.Read More »