#classic swedish films

[vintage-old-hollywood]

Britt Ekland

[annoyingthemesong]

SUBLIME CINEMA #646 - LILYA 4-EVER

Bleak and overwhelming, this is a movie that has haunted me since I first saw it. Lukas Moodysson’s best film is also one of the best Swedish films of all time, up there with Bergman and Andersson’s. This is as uncompromising a film there is, shot in whatever hellhole location in Estonia they dug up to stand in for Soviet Russia - and the feeling of humanity’s grime and decay lingers all these years later. 

[minayuri]

Aud Egede-Nissen in Dimitri Buchowetzki's Karusellen (1923)

[honeygleam]

smultronstället (1957) dir. ingmar bergman

[labyrinthofstreams]

Anita Ekberg on the set of Back from Eternity (1956).

Photographed by Earl Leaf on April 6, 1956.

[soldier27-blog]

Liv Ullmann

[honkaigakuen]

persona x et mourir de plaisir

[whosthatknocking]

Vargtimmen | Hour of The Wolf (1968), dir. Ingmar Bergman

[vintage-old-hollywood]

Ewa Aulin

[film-classics]

Greta Garbo - The Face of the Century

Greta Garbo (born Greta Lovisa Gustafsson in Stockholm, Sweden on 18 September 1905) was a Swedish-born actress who built her global appeal on a carefully maintained mystique during her short career. Called "The Face of the Century," she is regarded as one of the Hollywood's greatest beauties.

Garbo was born into a poor family and dropped out of school at 13 to take care of her father. His death deeply affected her and promised to make a life for herself that was void of financial hardship.

Following her father's death, Garbo worked as a salesperson at PUB department store.  After modeling for the store's catalogues, she earned a more lucrative job as a fashion model, which led to a role in her first film in 1922.

She then earned a scholarship at the Royal Dramatic Training Academy, where she met Finnish director Mauritz Stiller, who became her mentor.  Louis B. Mayer of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer wanted Stiller in Hollywood. The director agreed to a contract with one condition: Garbo. Reluctantly, Mayer inked her a deal, too.

She made her first MGM film in 1926, and by 1928, had become MGM's highest box-office star with A Woman of Affairs. She followed it up with several more hits, including Camille (1936). Her career slowed down in the 1940s and retired at 35.

After retiring, Garbo declined all opportunities to appear onscreen, shunned publicity, and led a private life. She died, aged 84, in a New York, as a result of pneumonia and renal failure.

Legacy:

Nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performances in Romance (1930), Camille (1936), and Two-Faced Woman (1941)

Presented an Academy Honorary Award in 1955

Received the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actress twice: Anna Karenina (1935) and Camille (1936)

Won the National Board of Review Best Acting Award three times: Camille (1936), Ninotchka (1939), and Two-Faced Woman (1941)

Was the highest-paid star at MGM for most of her career

Won the Photoplay Awards - Best Performances of the Month for a record eight times: May and December 1926, February and November 1927, March and September 1928, and January and March 1929

Won Best Actress for Anna Christie (1930) and Queen Christina (1933) from Picturegoer Awards

Listed by the Motion Picture Herald as one of America’s top-10 box office draws from 1930 to 1932

Was one of the subjects of French composer Charles Koechlin's "Seven Stars Symphony" (1933)

Granted the Swedish royal medal Litteris et Artibus in 1937

Is one of the celebrities whose picture Anne Frank placed on the wall of her bedroom in the “Secret Annex” in 1942

Voted "Best Actress of the Half Century" in a 1950 Daily Variety opinion poll

Named “the most beautiful woman that ever lived” in 1954 by Guinness World Records

Given the George Eastman Award by George Eastman House in 1957

Has appeared on many postage stamps from, among others, Swedish Posten in 1980 and 2005, Correos de Cuba in 1995, Deutsche Post in 2001, US Postal Service in 2005, Poșta Română issue in 2005, and Australia Post in 2008,

Made a Commander of the Swedish Order of the Polar Star by order of King Carl XVI Gustaf in 1983

Depicted in the film Garbo Talks (1984)

Awarded the Illis Quorum by the government of Sweden in 1985

Had a star was named after her in 1985

Has appeared on commemorative coins from Germany in 1994, France in 1995, and Sweden in 2005

Listed 25th in Entertainment Weekly’s 100 Greatest Movie Stars of All Time in 1998

Ranked #38 in Empire's Top 100 Movie Stars in 1997

Has had a museum, the Garbosällskapet, dedicated to her in Högsby since 1998

Named the 5th-greatest female star of classic Hollywood cinema in 1999 by the American Film Institute

Inducted in the Online Film and Television Association Hall of Fame in 2002

Ranked #8 in Premiere magazine’s 50 Greatest Movie Stars of All Time in 2005 and #25 in 100 Greatest Performances of All Time in 2006 for Ninotchka (1939)

Honored by Stockholm City Council in 1992 with a square, Greta Garbos Torg, and a bust of her likeness in 2009

Honored by Norwegian Air Shuttle as its "Tail-fin Hero" on its Boeing 787 Dreamliner in 2016

Featured on 100-krona banknote by Sveriges Riksbank since 2018

Featured in an exhibit at the Postmuseum in 2005, the Belmacz in 2013, the Fotografiska in 2016, the Staley-Wise Gallery in 2016, and Galerie56 in 2023

Honored as Turner Classic Movies Star of the Month for April 2019

Honored with a statue of her, "Statue of Integrity," in 2016, located in the forest in Härjedalen

Has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7021 Hollywood Boulevard for motion picture

[blacknarcissus]

Music in Darkness (1948)

[theaskew]

[labyrinthofstreams]

Greta Garbo in publicity stills for Camille (1936).

Photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull.

November 23, 1936.

[driveintheaterofthemind]

Vintage Poster - Unga Kvinnor (Little Women) (Swedish)

Art by Moje Aslund

RKO (1933)

[schlock-luster-video]

On September 18, 1922, Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages debuted in Sweden.

[atna2-34-75]

Intermezzo, Gustav Mollander, 1936