Irma Christensson Movies

Scripted (but not directed) by Ingmar Bergman, Best Intentions is a multilayered backwards glance at the courtship of Bergman's own parents. Henrik Bergman (Samuel Froler) is a struggling theology student in the year 1909. His intended, Anna Aakerbloom (Pernilla August, who married director Bille August while the film was in progress) is from a well-to-do family. Despite the expected class differences and personality clashes, love-or at least mutual understanding-prevails. But after a harsh, spare few years as the wife of a clergyman, Anna yearns for the more bountiful pleasures of her family home. Bergman writes himself into the proceedings as a mewling infant. The current three-hour theatrical version of Best Intentions (original title: Den Goda Viljan) was simultaneously prepared as a six-hour TV miniseries, which ran in Europe, Scandanavia, and Japan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Either a failed love affair or the Swedish winter would be enough to send almost anyone off on a Mediterranean holiday. Torc has had to endure both of these. So it's little wonder that he overdoes a bit during his first few days in Cyprus, even if his getting drunk and going nude bathing on a clothed beach does land him in jail briefly. Still, his woman tour guide is rather miffed at him for this inconveniently rowdy behavior. Now committed to mineral water as his drink of choice, he accompanies the few folks on the tour who will speak to him on long walks, and he falls in love with his tour guide in this whimsical movie, based on the novel by Stig Claesson. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Ingmar Bergman's sixth feature film, The Devil's Wanton offers in embryonic form many of the themes explored in Bergman's later work. Math teacher Anders Henrikson, recently released from a mental institution, decides to exorcise his inner demons in film form. Henrikson persuades film director Hasse Ekman, a former student, to put together a film depicting an Earth in the hands of the Devil. Ekman passes the idea on to writer Birger Malmstein, who coincidentally is currently going through Hell on Earth with his prostitute lover (Doris Svedlund). She, in turn, is being tormented by her former pimp. A black-Sabbath variation on Schnitzler's La Ronde, The Devil's Wanton was produced by Lorens Malmstadt, the man who first saw box-office potential in Bergman, even with bleak, defeatist films of this nature. Originally titled Fangelse, The Devil's Wanton has also been released as Prison. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Sjatte Budet was the second, and final, directorial endeavor by veteran Scandinavian film star Stig Jarrel, who also appears in the film as Dr. Krister Ekberg. The plot is implicit in the title, which translates as The Sixth Commandment. That commandment is "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery," and it is studiously ignored by the characters in the film. A past master at thespic double entendre, Jarrel includes several censurable situations in the film, few of which survived when the film was eventually distributed in the U.S. In the principal role of Jane Hagwald, Esther Roeck-Hansen is effective, though her performance is compromised by some surprising ill-chosen camera angles. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When the subject of the great Swedish films comes up, the title Saltstänk och krutgubbar is seldom invoked. Even so, this "slice of life" comedy pleased the crowd in 1946, and should do the same today. Most of the story takes place on a tiny Swedish island just a few miles from Stockholm, with the amorous adventures of one islander (Sigurd Wallen) setting the plot in motion. The director of photography was newcomer Sven Nykvist, who later achieved international renown for his work in the films of Ingmar Bergman. The English-language title of Saltstänk och krutgubbar is Gay Old Time -- not quite a literal translation, but it will suffice. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide