Discoveries from Sweden World Cinema

Göran Brehmer lives in Stockholm and can't resist flirting with women.

Three lonely people who want to be something else. Something different. Something new. They are all struggling with something unstated. When the actors are replaced by clay animations, their dreams are realized and disguises provide relief. — Hanna Sköld

In 1927/8, the cameraman Paul Lieberenz accompanied the Swedish researcher Sven Hedin on an expedition through Inner Asia from Beijing to Urumqi. Lufthansa was planning to launch a direct flight from Berlin to Beijing; meteorological observations had to be made, weather stations had to be built and the land had to be investigated for places that would make appropriate airfields. But the film is less focused on the research carried out by the 27 academics in total than on the caravans, made up of no fewer than 300 camels and numerous helpers, as they make their way with "Faustian drive" (Siegfried Kracauer), through rocky and sandy deserts.

Two men on a fishing trip realize that things are a bit out of the ordinary. A mystery is forming.

The brothers Ingmar and Gustav Nilsson are running a motel and a shop where everything from car tires to fish nets can be bought. They're very unsuccessful, and Ingmar wants to sell the place, but Gustav doesn't. One day the municipality wants to buy their business buildings, but they refuse to tell why until they've bought it. Meanwhile, Ingmar wants to hire a woman that he can fall in love with and Lufsen, a dizzy craftsman, is trying to fix some sewage pipes in the kitchen. Written by J. Rieper

Bao Ninh's novel "Krigets sorger/The Sorrows of the War" deals with how the Vietnamese themselves perceived the war. A low-key and desperate picture, far from the heroic self-sacrificing struggle that those in power like to emphasize.

Adam's hooked on the idea that you only live once. Jenny on the other hand sees life as a gift. They share a connection-issue and neither of them have been in a real relationship. Adam wants to figure out why a smart girl like Jenny, would not even applying for the college she's most interested in attending.

A performance by the Sofia girls in Valadalen

Rolle is a lone man whose family left him because of his alcoholism and violent behavior. Now he tries to save his daughter from a violent relationship to be reconciled with his past.

A poetic film about a young woman's life and dreams. A woman who had the courage to change her life and realize her dreams. A movie about Jonna Jinton. Blogger, photographer and artist and nature lover.

Ensam Tillsammans (Alone Together) is a coming of age movie, about the time when all the boundaries are tested and everything is at stake. We follow a group of friends on their journey to a music festival. Dreams and hopes of how it will be and how the journey develops puts their friendship at stake and their roles change. Ensam Tillsammans is a film about the breaking point between being a child and a grown up. The film is made from the target groups perspective, using their language, tone and humour. A true coming of age movie!

18 vignettes about the final moments of various Swedes before the end of the world.

Documentary about life and struggle of the people on the lonely island of Stora Dimun in the Faroe Islands.

Twelve staged scenes that were modelled after a set of drawings. Accompanied by metallic sounds, various body parts, limbs and objects form surrealistic collages against the background of a black space. Peter Weiss intended to create associative images that can not be deciphered completely. Beyond any logical interpretation, he wanted to show pure inner feelings.

A series of vignettes pertaining to the most complicated things in life: love and relationships.

Phychiatrist Montague Ullman details his philosophy on the meaning of dreams.

A girl is sacrificed to a lonely god

A one minute short about women's collective fear of sexual assault.

Coral grows outside of the government-run liquor store and the diamond factory’s soul watches over ghosts, refuges and sleeper who move through a depopulated northern Sweden.

The physician and professor Herman Lundborg headed the world’s first state racial biology institute in Uppsala, Sweden, from 1922 to ’35. He was obsessed by the threat of racial mixing between Sámi, Finns and Swedes in the north. On his travels, he is drawn to a woman of Finnish-Sámi descent, and has a child with her.

Soldier Fabian Bom moves around 1940s Helsingborg with his usual antics.

Arne Sucksdorff’s first film for Svensk Filmindustri, this lyrical short follows a fox cub through his playful explorations and predatory instincts in the Swedish forest. Blending moments of enchantment with unsentimental depictions of cruelty, the film captures the cycle of survival among animals with striking rhythmic editing and sensuous close-ups of fur, eyes, and forest textures. Rich in light and detail, Summer’s Tale became an enormously popular nature film and established Sucksdorff’s reputation for poetic documentary.

A feature-length documentary, possibly focusing, at least in part, on the recent anti-globalization protests in Gothenburg, Sweden and the alleged police misconduct during the protests.

Folk och Rackare play music; Ebbe Schön and Sif Ruud tell Christmas stories.

Anders and Maria never dared to believe in love, until they met one another. Life, which had been filled with tragedy, abuse and sleeping rough, suddenly had a meaning. This film recounts the wedding of the couple and their journey to find hope through love.

A wildlife film about mulldjuret (Arengus Cephalopoda), a water-living mulusk. During one year we follow its hunting routine, feeding and reproductive behavior.

A report from Spångens Snickeri in Norrköping, where disabled and odd people work. Each one works to their own ability. The film is about the essentials of life – about community and love, and about what and who really is different. A film about everyday occurrences in a new light.

A music film featuring Sweden's foremost electropop pioneers, Page. Facts for all Gothenburg was recorded at the classic Sticky Fingers in the spring of 2020, just before the Covid-19 crisis shut down concert activities in Europe indefinitely.

Professor Barring is awarded the Nobel Prize in physics. According to Barring the scientist's sole duty is to seek the truth, even if this leads to the "gates of hell".

A portrait of the musician and composer Ralph Lundsten in a film about art, music and philosophy - a cosmic journey in Sweden in music and images.

Two middle-aged women on a tennis court. One experienced, the other one not so much. One hour match. The psychological game starts. Match is a film about in direct and direct aggression and how to finally express suppressed feelings.

Three perfectly true stories about lying. In three episodes based on documentary interviews we meet the burglar who, when found out, claims to be a moonlighting accountant, the boy who finds himself lying and confessing to a crime he didn't commit and the woman whose whole life has been a chain of lies.

The clock is ticking! An old lady and her cow have to rush off on a hot air balloon adventure. What are they up to? And why is the cow so anxious?

In the aftermath of the 1979 Iranian revolution, the militant organization People's Mojahedin (MEK) left their homeland, allied with Saddam Hussein, and settled in Iraq. Here, based on collectivist ideas, they established a large camp, Camp Ashraf. The organization became increasingly tied to its leaders, and in the early 1990s, it was decided that hundreds of children in the camp would be raised by sympathizers abroad. Amir, Parwin, Hanif, and Atefeh are some of those who ended up in Sweden, and in Sara Moein's deeply engaging documentary, they narrate their experiences to a rich archive of materials. They also try to reconnect with the organization and their parents, who are now in Albania.

Teodor is afraid to tell his rich wife that he works extra nightly at the sinful hotel Babylon.

When 22-year-old Romanian beggar Florin meets 38-year-old Swedish single Josefin outside the grocery store, love arises immediately. Eight months later they get married and move in the small village of Oskarström. But when the pressure from the Florin family in Romania becomes too great, the dream of a better life in Sweden is challenged and the relationship is put to the test.

Swedish film producer Lorens Marmstedt created Terrafilm with a group of young directors in mind, Hasse Ekman, Ingmar Bergman and Hampe Faustman. Terrafilm appeared as both the commercial and the artistic leader in Swedish film. 45 films was produced from 1938-1957. Some of the more attentive titles were "Ett Brott/A Crime)" (1940), "Flickan och Djävulen/The Girl and the Devil" (1944), "Musik i Mörker/Music in the Dark" (1948) and "Singoalla"(1949).

Jens is driving a car in the middle of the night. He doesn't know why he's driving, or where he's going. As the dark woods are closing in on him, paranoia comes creeping. Is there someone in the trunk..?

An experimental short film about a young woman in a modern city environment in Stockholm

A man comes home after work. His wife and bird hate him.

Jackie is on a caravan holiday with her mother. She lives a lonely life without friends or even someone to talk to, and the holiday has so far only reinforced her sense of isolation. Jackie longs for a place where she belongs. There, she can find something different, someone to talk to, someone to dance with.

Mrs. Andersson’s mischievous Kalle gets adopted by Director Graham and moves from the working-class area into the high society of Stockholm.

A film about Johnny Bode. Schlager diva, Operetta hero, filth musical innovator, enfant terrible, compulsive liar and amoral rogue. Johnny Bode (1912-1983) was very successful in Sweden and Europe. Yet he is today almost completely forgotten. Why? His life was so overwhelming, glamorous, fast and bizarre. So un-Swedish. He became fascinated by the nazism. Was arrested by the Gestapo and detained at Grini concentration camp in Norway. For five weeks. After the war he moved to East Berlin and proclaimed himself a dear friend of the GDR. Later he was deported and returned to Sweden. A time of fencing and small crimes followed. Escaped to Brussels at first and later Vienna. He was, as Juan Delgada, hired by the Vienna Opera to create new operettas. And was very successful. Johnny Bode died exhausted alone and abandoned in Malmö during the summer of 1983.

During a snowball fight between Bo, a pink armless dinosaur, and his friend, Green Guy, Bo comes to a saddening realization - he cannot throw snowballs. This heartwarming tale explores Bo's journey of self-acceptance and learning that even without arms you can live a full life.

Lova does everything to console heart-broken Fanny. When late one night they come across an unlocked car, the imagination takes a spin. Lova talks about dreams, about just taking a leap and leavinng everything behind. About the only thing that matters is having each other.

Claes is a pensioner whose greatest wish is to finally make it to the nearby cinema. What if it rains? What if his sweater doesn’t match the shirt he is wearing? It's probably better to stay in the safety of his own home and switch on the television. In the total isolation of his solitary life, and out of an entirely unfounded fear of stepping outside his flat, Claes has turned his tidy home into a prison. This is a film that demonstrates what loneliness can do to a person.

In her room 15 year old "Hannah" decides to start selling sex. She puts up an ad and offers her services as an escort. In her diary Hanna describes how she, over the course of an autumn sells sex in Stockholm. Hanna's first sex buyers ask no questions about her age, which is often enough to avoid being convicted of buying sex from children, claiming that it was thought that the girl was older. As the majority of sex buyers can get away with fines, police prioritize other crimes. The documentary "En eskortflickas dagbok" gives insight into a chaotic world.

A con artist arrives to a small island to swingle money from the fishermen.

A week before a wedding the grooms father suddenly dies. The family can't afford booth a funeral and a wedding so they decide to do the only logical thing; mix the two ceremonies.

Father and daughter are at home when they are forced to seek shelter while they don't really know what is happening.

A young woman's hometown is flooded and she starts to remember her childhood

Based on a series of interviews documentary film maker Anders Wahlgren made with architect Sven Markelius in 1969. Sven Markelius was one of the most radical architects in Sweden for many years. Since these interviews were the only recorded interviews made with Markelius we can get some insight into his philosophy 50 years later.

When the pandemic strikes, the Thai berry pickers are prevented from traveling to Sweden. Who will pick the berries then?

A woman trapped inside a strange server room must deal with manifestations of her tattered past until her time is up.

In this fourth documentary in the Jordbro suite, we follow Mona's journey from Jordbro to Sundbyberg; from an eight year old mischievous girl, to a grown-up woman working as manager, with a husband and a kid on the way.

Sequences of photographic abstractions have been balanced against more realistic sections. A surrealistically charged encounter between two lovers, a young woman and a man.