Bo Widerberg’s New Swedish Cinema (The Criterion Collection)

Driven by a desire to forge a socially conscious Swedish cinema—one that broke with the inward-looking psychodrama of Ingmar Bergman to give dynamic expression to the everyday experiences of working-class Swedes—writer Bo Widerberg turned to filmmaking in the early 1960s, realizing his ambition in politically committed yet poetic works that merge social-realist themes with a refined, often breathtakingly beautiful visual sensibility. Dramatizing the struggles of ordinary people fighting to chart their own destiny, these four acclaimed, popular, and pivotal films from Widerberg’s most prolific period live and breathe with a rare vitality—and helped launch a new Swedish cinema.

FOUR-BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES


* New restorations, with uncompressed monaural soundtracks
* New introduction to director Bo Widerberg by filmmaker Ruben Östlund
* New interviews with actor Tommy Berggren and cinematographer Jörgen Persson
* The Boy and the Kite (1962), a short film by Widerberg and Jan Troell, with an introduction by Troell
* Swedish television interviews with Widerberg from the 1960s
* Behind-the-scenes footage from the making of Elvira Madigan
* PLUS: An essay by film historian Peter Cowie and excerpts by Widerberg from his 1962 book Vision in Swedish Film