Gunnar Fischer

When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.

The Guldbagge Awards is an official and annual Swedish film awards ceremony honoring achievements in the Swedish film industry. Winners are awarded a statuette depicting a rose chafer, better known by the name Guldbaggen. The awards, first presented in 1964 at the Grand Hôtel in Stockholm, are overseen by the Swedish Film Institute. It is described as the Swedish equivalent of the Academy Awards. The awards ceremony was first televised in 1981.

Crotchety retired doctor Isak Borg travels from Stockholm to Lund, Sweden, with his pregnant and unhappy daughter-in-law, Marianne, in order to receive an honorary degree from his alma mater. Along the way, they encounter a series of hitchhikers, each of whom causes the elderly doctor to muse upon the pleasures and failures of his own life. These include the vivacious young Sara, a dead ringer for the doctor's own first love.

A traveling magician and his troupe arrive in a Swedish town in the 1840s, where their act is scrutinized by local authorities and a skeptical medical official. Their stay leads to a series of confrontations that test the boundaries between performance, belief, and deception.

The story takes place during the weeks before Christmas, in the small mining town of fictitious Granhyttan in Bergslagen, Sweden. One day a suspicious couple, Signe and Orvar, arrives in the small town and retires in an abandoned hut. Nobody knows what they up to; but strange things starts to happen as Staffan finds a gold nugget while playing in a disused mine at the Kråkberget Mountain during a skiing trip with his schoolmates. Staffan believes the nugget is a part of Skarp-Erik's gold, as his grandpa had told exciting stories about. The news about the gold discovery spread quickly and Staffan and his friends are soon pursued by curious schoolmates, school staff and also the mysterious strangers. All this happens as the students are rehearsing for the nativity play before Christmas break.

One summer day, two teens begin a reckless affair and abandon their families to be with one another.

Early in the 20th century, middle-aged lawyer Fredrik Egerman and his young wife, Anne, have still not consummated their marriage, while Fredrik's son finds himself increasingly attracted to his new stepmother. To make matters worse, Fredrik's old flame Desiree makes a public bet that she can seduce him at a romantic weekend retreat where four couples convene, swapping partners and pairing off in unexpected ways.

Don Juan is sent from Hell to Earth with a mission: to seduce a virgin in order to spoil her pure wedding. The mission becomes frantic when Don Juan falls in love for the first time in centuries.

The four wives of four brothers share stories of their marriages as they wait for their husbands in a small, secluded cottage.

Ola is a pop idol, touring with his band in Sweden in the mid-60's. Julia is a young actress in a traveling theatre company. They meet and fall in love.

A small picturesque town at the turn of the century. The conservative views of the townspeople are shaken when they find out that the school teacher Franzén published his own poetry anonymously many years ago. At the same time he acknowledges his love affair with a waitress at the city hotel, Fanny. What is most upsetting is the fact that Fanny has a grownup daughter, Anna, with no known father. Could their poet teacher be the father although he and Fanny are not married?

Set in 1860s Holland along the famed Zeider Zee — young Hans Brinker finds himself responsible for supporting his family after his father becomes injured in an accident. He and his sister, Gretel, travel to Amsterdam in search of funds to help pay for their father's operation. Their only hope lies in the city's annual ice skating race in which Hans must face off against his arch-rival, Ludwig Schimmel, in hopes of winning the prize money.

A fractured portrait of desire and isolation, following a failing marriage and parallel stories of emotional entrapment as memories surface during a train journey through postwar Europe. Told through flashbacks and multiple narrative threads, the film signals Ingmar Bergman’s emerging mature style.

During a brief summer vacation, a lonely woman recalls her first love thirteen years earlier.

A suicidal factory girl, just out of reformatory school and anxious to escape her overbearing mother, falls in love with a sailor who can't forgive her past.

Produced in 1968 for New York's WNET public television station and filmed by Gunnar Fischer, host Lewis Freedman visits director Ingmar Bergman during the production of SHAME. They discuss some of Bergman's major works leading up to SHAME as well as the just-released HOUR OF THE WOLF.

Love triangle between Svante, his fiancee Inga and Sophie, a girl from a rich family.

For his final film, Jacques Tati takes his camera to the circus, where the director himself serves as master of ceremonies. Though it features many spectacles, including clowns, jugglers, acrobats, contortionists, and more, Parade also focuses on the spectators, making this stripped-down work a testament to the communion between audience and entertainment.

A study in forgiveness as oppression and goodness as provocation. Six youth criminals are chosen to participate in a social experiment where they are assigned to live together in a rundown apartment in the heart of Stockholm, Sweden. The six boys are being supervised by two forgiving and uneasy social workers. Their need to continue to commit petty crimes escalates out of boredom with the situation. One night they run into a young girl in trouble.

A young woman struggles with life, love and career. She is courted by a young man but is unwilling to enter into a relationship if it means limiting her freedom.