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A Swedish Love Story

En kärlekshistoria

Roy Andersson · 1970

Synopsis

A summer in Sweden. Pär, fifteen, and Annika, fourteen, notice each other in the cafeteria of a rest home where their families have come to visit. Pär lives with his father, a garage owner; at Annika's, the father, a refrigerator salesman, keeps going over his failures, the mother accepts her role as a housewife, and Aunt Eva has given up her dreams. The two teenagers shyly fall for each other, between Pär's moped gang and Annika's girlfriends, and make a world of their own, far from the disenchanted adults.

Context

Shot from 16 June to 26 August 1969, the film is its author's first feature film; he was twenty-six and had just finished his studies. In it he seeks the comedy and absurdity of ordinary situations, in the manner of the Czech filmmakers he admired, Miloš Forman foremost. Shown at the Berlin festival in 1970, it was then a great popular success in Sweden. It was not released in France until 2008, under its English title.

Who it is for

One hundred and fifteen minutes, in Swedish. The film takes its time and looks at length at adults who say nothing to each other.

Prizes and reception

Guldbagge for Best Film, shared that year; two secondary prizes at Berlin in 1970, where the Golden Bear was not awarded.

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