An Image Maker

A roundtable conversation was recorded for television in 2007 at the Stockholm International Film Festival.

When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.

Crotchety retired doctor Isak Borg travels from Stockholm to Lund, Sweden, with his unhappy daughter-in-law, Marianne, in order to receive an honorary degree from his alma mater. Along the way, they encounter a series of hitchhikers, each of whom causes the elderly doctor to muse upon the pleasures and failures of his own life. These include the vivacious young Sara, a dead ringer for the doctor's own first love.

A young nurse, Alma, is put in charge of Elisabeth Vogler: an actress who is seemingly healthy in all respects, but will not talk. As they spend time together, Alma speaks to Elisabeth constantly, never receiving any answer.

After a seven-year absence, Charlotte Andergast travels to Sweden to reunite with her daughter Eva. The pair have a troubled relationship: Charlotte sacrificed the responsibilities of motherhood for a career as a classical pianist. Over an emotional night, the pair reopen the wounds of the past. Charlotte gets another shock when she finds out that her mentally impaired daughter, Helena, is out of the asylum and living with Eva.

After taking a bullet to the head, Salander is under close supervision in a hospital and is set to face trial for attempted murder on her eventual release. With the help of journalist Mikael Blomkvist and his researchers at Millennium magazine, Salander must prove her innocence. In doing this she plays against powerful enemies and her own past.

A boy, obsessed with comparing himself with those less fortunate, experiences a different life at the home of his aunt and uncle in 1959 Sweden.

Stockholm, in the 1950s. Erik is expelled from the local school for getting into one brawl too many. To protect Erik from his violent stepfather’s reaction to his expulsion, Erik's mother arranges for Erik to spend a year at Stjärnsberg Boarding School, the only school willing to accept him. This is Erik's last chance to graduate to Upper School and he promises his mother, for his and her sake, to do all he can to stay out of trouble.

A US intelligence officer, stationed in Germany, is caught in a political dilemma when the Russians kidnap a young Army private, the son of prominent American businessman. In exchange for the soldier's return, the Russians attempt to barter a trade for an elderly German couple who they want for treason.

In the late 19th century, two Swedish emigrants, Lasse Karlsson and his son Pelle, arrive on the Danish island of Bornholm hoping to find work on a farm and save enough money to travel to the United States of America.

The four wives of four brothers share stories of their marriages as they wait for their husbands in a small, secluded cottage.

Carl Hamilton manages to infiltrate an international gang that has stolen advanced Swedish GPS-guided missiles. But the league is subjected to a sudden deadly attack by a well drilled group of mercenaries of unknown clients. Hamilton escapes the massacre, but the rockets have disappeared without a trace.

It's 1975, and Martin is a teenager looking to break out of a stifling home environment ruled by his alcoholic father and long-suffering mother. When Martin's pal Micke suggests they get jobs together as waiters at a resort off the Swedish coast, Martin is all for it, but before long Micke finds better things to do and Martin is left on his own. The presence of pretty fellow server Jenny is a major consolation, but to his surprise, guileless Martin is soon chosen as the protégé of Gösta, the resort's short-tempered manager. Gösta clearly likes Martin and makes him his right hand man, which gives Martin a crash course in the seedy side of life when he discovers Gösta has a number of other business interests, not all of which are legal or ethical.

In this film about Ingmar Bergman's parents, Henrik Bergman is studying for the priesthood and trying to make ends meet when he encounters the lovely, affluent Anna. Despite their social differences, Henrik and Anna fall in love, wed and move to the country. They lead a quiet life as Henrik works as a priest, but it isn't long before the simple people and plain surroundings make Anna long for a more lavish lifestyle, which causes marital stress.

Swedish intelligence officer Carl Hamilton's 7-year-old goddaughter Nathalie is kidnapped. When the kidnapping's underlying motive becomes known, the Swedish authorities assume a passive role, forcing Hamilton to action. With the help of international contacts, Hamilton manages to get them on track. Hamilton, along with some military colleagues, plans a daring rescue mission.

When the police reveal a narcotic smuggling the driver is shot dead. It appears that the driver is Superintendent Martin Beck's son. Beck breaks down and moves out of the way. But on his colleagues request he returns.

American businessman Chris Johnson spent WW2 in Sweden and fell in love with a nurse, Karin Engström. He lost contact with her after war and now, seven years later, he returns to Sweden on a business trip, trying to find her again.

First love - or first infatuation - overwhelms Indy in Vienna, where he is smitten with the daughter of Archduke Francis Ferdinand. Needing emotional guidance, Indy consults Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung to discover what love is all about. In Florence, when Indy's mother is equally smitten with Giacomo Puccini, composer of Romantic operas La Boheme and Tosca, Indy must guide his parent safely back to her spouse.

A pair of upper middle ages where the man has been retired due to tinnitus undergoes a crisis. The woman has been cheating and crying and crying excuses at home. It appears that ...

By chance Erik meets Viivi, an Estonian violinist playing in the Stockholm subway. They start an intense romance. Erik's mother dislikes the relationship, not having forgotten her escape from Estonia during the war. She reveals facts from the past and Erik finds out that his Swedish father adopted him. His real father was an Estonian nazi. Viivi has grown up in communist Estonia where her father was a party member and worked for the KGB.

A man and a woman meet in 1960. They marry because that's what you are supposed to do. But something goes wrong on their wedding night. They have no idea what to do with each other. Sexually. Emotionally. The husband meets a man who knows what to do with his sexuality. Suddenly a hand can do something no hand has done before and lips something no lips have ever done. The two men have a secret love affair. But there is a problem: The woman. And she has something up her sleeve. Will she act? Yes, she will. What happens? Nobody knows. Until now.

The General's daughter, Helene, grows up in a safe world. She doesn't want to get married or have kids. She meets a man who talks about platonic love which seems to fit her nice. They get married but when he wants to get more intimate with her she rejects him. August Strindberg's short story "Mot betalning" from the collection "Giftas 2".

In 1925, eccentric inventor and Franz Schubert devotee Carl Åkerblom is confined to a psychiatric ward in Uppsala after attempting to murder his fiancée. Obsessed with death, music, and the future of cinema, he joins forces with a fellow patient to create a “living talkie,” an experimental film performance with live-spoken dialogue. As the project unfolds, art, madness, and mortality collide in a tragicomic reflection on creativity and human frailty.

She loves to ride in the bus and read smart book ... He likes to sit by the water and drink soda ... She loves to write down their thoughts on the fly and be glad that they do not end ... He likes to watch as boats come and invent passengers biography ... She loves ice cream and menthol cigarettes ... And he - horses and storefronts ... She had to roam the streets at night, even if you do not want to ... he loves the city nightlife, which helps him to dream ... and one day ... quite by accident ... They meet ... hE and SHE ...

Helen, a priest, is approached by scientist Lisbeth with a desperate plea for help. A young man, who has been sent to a high security psychiatric ward after having killed an old couple, has attempted suicide while rambling about God. Having been part of an experiment attempting to humanize inmates by assigning them pets, the young man has suddenly gone ballistic. Fearing that he will attempt suicide again priest and scientist must now confront their mutual animosities while trying to grasp the truth. In a race against time the two women begin a shocking journey deeper and deeper into the sick mind of a young man's soul.

Following a failed heist, Charles-Ingvar ‘Sickan’ Jonsson ends up in prison. Once released, his gang have become law-abiding citizens and Sickan has to continue on his own. Crime broker Anita tasks him with a simple burglary, but it turns out to be something a lot bigger than Sickan thought it was. Now he needs the help of his past accomplices to carry out the most difficult heist in the history of the gang.

The purpose of the work is to illuminate the human process in the 21st century. In times of personal independence and immense opportunities relationships have become non-relationships. The nature of being human thus becomes a complex navigation through dangerous waters where everyone feeds on their neighbor and the possibility of love is blocked by a constant emotional distortion, yet there are no boundaries; the field opens up a plethora of crossroads. The individual loses sense of direction and amidst confusion there is the future, as distant as it seems, ever present, irreversible.

Olof is driven from home when he wants to marry the wrong girl. He takes a job as a log driver and his reputation as a womanizer goes far and wide.

An otherworldly evil is slipping into a small town in Sweden. Six unrelated girls have been chosen to fight this evil. Together they must overcome their differences in order to save themselves and the world.

Based on the novel by Maria Gripe, this is the story of two children, Klas and Klara, growing up in the poor Swedish countryside of the mid-19th century. Their father Albert is a glass-blower, famous for his beautiful vases, but still unable to earn enough money for his wife Sofia and the children. At a spring fair a distinguished gentleman arrives and buys all of Albert's glassware. After this nothing will be the same again. Klas and Klara are kidnapped and taken to a strange castle...

Bloody Boys follows three families through three parallel stories.

A mysterious stranger, Meisner, arrives in a northern Swedish town in 1820, calling himself a magnetist - an amalgam of hypnotist and healer - and claiming he can cure diseases un-treatable by doctors. Ignoring the objections of his colleagues, Dr. Selander allows Meisner to cure his blind daughter, Maria, who not only regains her sight, but also falls in love with the charismatic magnetist. Dark secrets and repressed memories start to emerge, amidst the love between father and daughter, man and woman.

The film is based on a true occurrence in Sweden in 1988. A Finnish couple murdered a young boy and his parents when they prevented the theft of the son's bicycle. The film tries to describe the relationship between the dominant Jari, who calls himself "Il Capitano", and his more mature "soldier" Minna, that develops into mutual dependence.

Depicts the explosive relationship between August Strindberg and Siri von Essen in 1889 while Siri is rehearsing a lead role in a play written by Strindberg.

A boy imprisoned for a double murder is used in a prison experiment involving placing an animal in the cells of prisoners.

Set in 1920, The Image Makers depicts a private screening at Svensk Filmindustri, where silent-era director Victor Sjöström presents scenes from his adaptation of Selma Lagerlöf’s The Phantom Carriage. As the Nobel Prize–winning author watches alongside cinematographer Julius Jaenzon and young actress Tora Teje, tensions emerge between generations, genders, and artistic roles, exposing the emotional costs behind creation.