Seven Swedish films to CPH:DOX

Today sees the programme release for CPH:DOX in Copenhagen, one of the world’s leading documentary film festivals. Seven Swedish films and three co-productions have been selected. Jenifer Malmqvist’s Daughters is competing for the Nordic:Dox Award, as is Viktor Nordenskiöld’s pandemic-based story Behind the Swedish Model. Also screening are VR film The Memor, and Marcus Lindeen’s dance documentary Dear Dancer has its international premiere.

– It’s starting to be a good tradition that Swedish documentary film starts the year off impressively, and then keeps going from strength to strength. Calendar Girls was in competition at Sundance, as was Nelly & Nadine in Berlin, where it won the jury’s Teddy Award. We now have seven films and three co-productions at CPH:DOX, a highly attractive festival both for audiences and the industry. It’s great to see, says Sara Rüster, Festival Manager at the Swedish Film Institute.

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Daughters, director Jenifer Malmqvist – world premiere in Nordic:Dox

Sofia, Hedvig and Maja grew up with grief. They were just 8, 10 and 16 when their mother took her own life. In Daughters we meet the sisters both as children and now as young adults, as they reflect on what it was like growing up in the aftermath of trauma.

Jenifer Malmqvist is the director and screenwriter, educated at Poland’s National Film School and based in Malmö. Her short films have screened at festivals around the world: Birthday/Födelsedag (2010) and On Suffocation (2014) both premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, and the latter won the Nordic Short Film Award at Nordisk Panorama as well as a Guldbagge Award for Best Short Film. Daughters is her first feature film.

Daughters – which is world premiering at the Copenhagen festival – is written and directed by Jenifer Malmqvist, and produced by Margarete Jangård and Hanna Markkanen, WG Film, with funding from the Swedish Film Institute, Film Commissioner Jenny Gilbertsson. Cinematography is by Ita Zbroniec-Zajt, who has worked with Jenifer Malmqvist on all her films since 2010.

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Behind the Swedish Model, director Viktor Nordenskiöld – international premiere in Nordic:Dox

Everyone is affected, but a few are expected to have all the answers. State Epidemiologist Anders Tegnell, Health Minister Lena Hallengren and Sweden’s pandemic strategy are making headlines all over the world. Behind the Swedish Model looks at how they deal with praise, criticism and an increasingly astonished outside world.

Viktor Nordenskiöld is a director, producer and journalist, with a background as reporter and foreign correspondent for Sweden’s national broadcaster SVT. His short Out of This World (2014) premiered at the Berlinale, and his previous documentary The Feminister/Utrikesministern (2018), which followed Foreign Affairs Minister Margot Wallström in her work, was also shown at CPH:DOX and at FIPADOC in France.

Behind the Swedish Model is written and produced by Nordenskiöld and Dylan Williams for Freetown Films, in co-production with SVT. The film received funding from the Swedish Film Institute, Film Commissioner Anna Weitz.

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Dear Dancer, director Marcus Lindeen – international premiere in the Artists & Auteurs section

During summer 2020, Swedish dance company Cullberg were to put on the first performance of the new work Horse, by legendary American choreographer Deborah Hay. The pandemic put a stop to that, and the premiere was postponed. Unable to travel, Hay carried on rehearsing from her home in Texas – with the dancers online in the studio in Stockholm. At the same time, film director Marcus Lindeen was invited to portray the work on and off stage until the premiere. The result was the short film Dear Dancer, which has its Swedish premiere at the upcoming Tempo Documentary Festival in Stockholm, before its international premiere at CPH:DOX.

Playwright and director Marcus Lindeen is active on both screen and stage. His debut film Regretters/Ångrarna (2010) won a Guldbagge Award for Best Documentary Feature, and won the Prix Europa, as did The Raft/Flotten (2018). The latter has also been screened and awarded at more than 50 international festivals, including CPH:DOX where it won the main prize, the Dox:Award.

Dear Dancer is produced by Jesper Kurlandsky, Fasad Production, with choreography and narration by Deborah Hay and music by Hans Appelqvist. Here too, cinematography is by Ita Zbroniec-Zajt.

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The Memor – VR film screening in the Inter:Active section

The Memor is an environment that elicits a person’s ability to move beyond the present moment. The first encounter in this choreographed VR experience is with a stromatolite, a fossil that precedes the human experience by 3.7 billion years. Everyday objects, ghost-like empty shells, lead the visitor to a series of inner rooms. Called forth here are a piano builder’s workshop, a benevolent abyss, and other rooms where Virtual Reality can be defined as an ability rather than a form of technology. The visitor’s presence completes the illusion of continuity, and evokes a world which, without the human, would be an abandoned stage at night.

The Memor is directed by Martina Seitl, Christer Lundahl and Matt Shaw, and produced by Lundahl and Seitl for Lundahl & Seitl ScanLAB Projects, with screenplay by Malin Zimm.

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Highlights

The Highlights section is showing three Swedish documentaries, all of which have garnered attention at international festivals:

Nelly & Nadine

Magnus Gertten’s film recently won the Jury Award at the Teddy Award at the Berlinale, where it world premiered. The film, about the unlikely love story of two women who fell in love in the Ravensbrück concentration camp in 1944, is released at Swedish cinemas on 18 March via Doc Lounge. Sales by Rise and Shine World Sales.

Calendar Girls

Maria Loohufvud and Love Martinsen’s feel-good documentary portrays the Calendar Girls, Florida’s most dedicated dance group for women over 60. The film world premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January, and is released at Swedish cinemas on 18 March via Folkets Bio. International sales: CAT&Docs.

The Scars of Ali Boulala

Max Eriksson’s portrait of the rebellious and highly gifted skateboarder Ali Boulala world premiered in competition at the Tribeca Film Festival last year, and recently screened at the Göteborg Film Festival. Lucky Dogs is distributing the film, released at cinemas 25 March. World sales by Charades.

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Swedish co-productions

TSUMU – Where Do You Go With Your Dreams? – in competition in Nordic:Dox

Kasper Kiertzner’s film follows three young friends in Greenland. They have filmed their lives full of love and creativity, but their upcoming adulthood and the harsh realities of life threaten their friendship. The film is a Danish-Swedish co-production, produced by Jannik Splidsboel, Playground Production with David Herdies and Michael Krotkiewski of Momento Film as Swedish co-producers, with funding from the Swedish Film Institute, Film Commissioner Jenny Gilbertsson.

Dreaming Walls – screening in Highlights

A film by Amélie van Elmbt and Maya Duverdier about the legendary Chelsea Hotel in New York, which is being renovated to make a luxury hotel. In the midst of the construction chaos, a few remaining guests try to keep the hotel’s bohemian soul alive. Dreaming Walls, which recently world premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival, is a co-production between Sweden, Belgium and others, produced by Hanne Phlypo, Clin d'oeil Films, and again Momento Film’s David Herdies and Michael Krotkiewski are the Swedish co-producers, with funding from the Swedish Film Institute, former Documentary Film Commissioner Juan Pablo Libossart. Sales by Dogwoof.

A House Made of Splinters – screening in Highlights

A group of social workers in an orphanage in war-torn eastern Ukraine work tirelessly to create an almost magical place of freedom. The children are only allowed to stay for nine months, a short time to prepare them for the harsh realities outside. Simon Lereng Wilmont directs. The film is a Danish-Swedish co-production, produced by Monica Hellström, Final Cut For Real, with Tobias Janson, Story, as Swedish co-producer, with funding from the Swedish Film Institute, Juan Pablo Libossart. Sales by Cinephil.

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Sportscast 2 – world premiere in Next:Award

Sara Sjölin retells the tragicomic story of her destructive, failed relationship with an ex-girlfriend in great detail, to the images of an old football match between Swedish arch-rivals Malmö FF and Helsingborgs IF played out in its entirety.

A film by Copenhagen-based Swedish director and artist Sara Sjölin.

CPH:DOX runs 23 March – 3 April.

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