Ernst Gunther Movies

In this alternately humorous and tragic semi-autobiographical film, director Stellan Olsson reminisces upon his childhood. After a long absence, Man, who represents Olsson, returns to his home town Svalov. As he walks the familiar streets taking photographs the old times return in a series of flashbacks which chronicle his budding sexuality, his friendships, and his thoughts on the adult world. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Roland (Jesper Salen) is a boy growing up in Stockholm. It is the middle of the 1920s, and he suffers from the twin handicaps of being Jewish and the son of a socialist. However, despite the taunts and bullying he endures, he gets in a few licks of his own, and manages to have some fun (and get some revenge on his tormentors). One particularly successful ploy of his is to take some of the illegal condoms his mother is selling in her tobacco store and use them to power some slingshots he has made, sellling them to neighborhood boys. This affectionate, richly detailed portrait of a man's early adolescence in pre-war Stockholm is based on an autobiographical novel by Roland Schutt) ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

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

This big-budget animated feature from Sweden, drawing upon some of that country's best known performers, is a children's adventure story with a cautionary ecological theme. The director drew his inspiration from such diverse sources as The Tempest by William Shakespeare, Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe, and Machine Island, by ules Verne. In the story, Prospero has been exiled from his home, and is living on the island of Melonia with his daughter Miranda, an albatross named Ariel, and a fruit-monster called Caliban. Just as Caliban has finished creating something called "power soup" from the emanations of a local volcano, a crew of ne'er do wells crash-lands. They are from Plutonia, a polluted industrial planet given over to entirely to making weaponry, and they have come to steal Caliban's creation. Their plan is to take over the world Melonia is on and make it just as ugly as their own. Prospero and his kin band together to rescue the children on the industrial planet, who have been enslaved to work in the munitions factories, and at the same time put a stop to the evil plans of the Plutonians. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

A challenging and powerful adaptation of a novel by Torgny Lindgren, this drama objectively examines the quiet courage of impoverished people whose faith in God's word enables them to uncomplainingly endure the gross injustice inherent in their culture. Set in the 19th century in the rugged countryside of northern Sweden, the tale centers on Tea, a young woman who is forced to submit to the sexual desires of her landlord. Her situation is not unusual for the times, and whether or not the woman was married, it was considered a morally acceptable means of paying the rent in accordance with their interpretation of the Bible. If a woman refused to sleep with her landlord, she and her family would be evicted. The tale is told from her perspective. Tea was a young bride the first time her landlord Ole Karlsa came calling, and upon her return home she finds that her husband has hung himself. Over the years, Tea has borne many of Ole Karlsa's children, none of whom he officially claims. Despite her years of sexual service, she remains poverty-bound, but this has neither stolen her pride nor broken her spirit. She staunchly refuses to allow Ole Karlsa to get close to his illegitimate brood. Eventually the landowner dies and soon afterward his son Karl Orsa comes to collect his "rent." In between visits, Tea finds happiness for the first time in years when she becomes lovers with a romantic wanderer. Her joy is short-lived, for the drifter is arrested for stealing. More trouble comes when Karl Orsa decides that Tea is too old and that her oldest daughter, in accordance with the custom, must take her place. He refuses to listen to Tea's pleas that to sleep with her daughter would be incest, and this sets up a series of tragedies, all of which are stoically borne by Tea, her family and Karl Orsa (who is just as much a victim of culture as the rest). ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This uneven comedy is set in the 1920s and stars Janne Carlsson, one of Sweden's favorite comics, in the role of Albert Jansson, a fisherman who turns from fish to foul in order to make a better living. In a near-parody of its cinematic predecessors, Smugglarkungen is also set in a bucolic coastal community where love and the forces of virtue face heavy-duty challenges. Albert is an honest fisherman until he succeeds with a vengeance at bootlegging and cannot but enjoy the happy consequences of his success: namely, the physical attractions of the fair Sickan (Nina Gunke) and equally appealing Grethe (Sanne Salomonsen, one of Denmark's more popular rock stars). Albert's love-life is rudely interrupted when the "smuggling king" Strauss (Ernst Gunther) and his minions resent his intrusion on their lucrative turf, and to make matters worse, Lt. Winkel (Bjorn Skifs) is sent from Stockholm to investigate possible customs violations in the area. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Ake and His World is a long, lyrical study of a Swedish country doctor of the 1930s. Ake is the doctor's six year old son, from whose point of view this film is told. Ake watches in innocent bemusement as his busy father weighs life and death issues on a daily basis. It's possible that this Swedish film bore a little influence on the 1991 American comedy My Girl (91), in which the young heroine's father is a mortician. Allan Edwall both wrote and directed this film, which was released in its native country as Ake og hans värld. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This farce cocerns Sweden's King Gustav (Per Oscarsson who plays all the lead roles). The royal monarchs of three major European countries are patiently or not-so-patiently hovering on the sidelines while watching the future King Gustav closely. No single king appears to possess the brains he was born with, so history seems to be made by default, as it were. Gustav does blunder around, but not enough to miss being crowned king. As a result, France, England, and Germany invade Sweden hoping to take by force what they could not gain by incompetence. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Adapted from the famous story by Franz Kafka, Metamorphosis tells the bizarre tale of a young traveling salesman who wakes up one morning and discovers that he has turned into a giant cockroach. Everyone is disgusted, most of all himself. Neither he nor his family can quite decide what to do about this change. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide