People & Culture - Sweden - page 697

band out of spite. It's based on a semi-autobiographical graphic novel by Moodysson's
wife, Coco, called Aldrig Godnatt ('Never Goodnight'), and it's an excellent portrait of the
texture of urban Swedish life in this period.
Lebanese-born Josef Fares (Jalla! Jalla!, Kopps, Zozo, Leo) is part of a new guard of
second-generation immigrant directors. Alongside Iranian-born directors Reza Bagher
(Wings of Glass) and Reza Parsa (Before the Storm) , Fares has turned a spotlight on the
immigrant experience in Sweden. His uncharacteristically dark 2007 feature, Leo , also
marked Fares' on-screen debut.
Another Swedish award-winner is director Roy Andersson, once dubbed a 'slapstick
Ingmar Bergman'. His film Du levande ( You, the Living ) scooped up three prizes (includ-
ing best picture) at Sweden's prestigious Guldbagge Awards in 2008.
That year also saw the well-deserved success of Tomas Alfredson's odd, quietly unset-
tling teenage-vampire story, Let the Right One In , based on a best-selling Swedish novel.
Its American remake was also well received.
But of course the big news in contemporary Swedish cinema recently has been the film
version of Stieg Larsson's runaway hit series of crime novels, starting with The Girl with
the Dragon Tattoo (2009). Starring Michael Nyqvist and Noomi Rapace, the Swedish tri-
logy was a huge commercial success, and the first installment has been remade in English
by director David Fincher, with Daniel Craig as journalist Mikael Blomkvist, mostly on
location in Sweden.
Swedish Literature
Historically, the best known of Sweden's artistic greats have been writers, chiefly the poet
Carl Michael Bellman (1740-95), influential dramatist and author August Strindberg
(1849-1912) and children's writer Astrid Lindgren (1907-2002).
During WWII some Swedish writers took a stand against the Nazis, including Eyvind
Johnson (1900-76) with his Krilon trilogy, completed in 1943, and poet and novelist Karin
Boye (1900-41), whose novel Kallocain was published in 1940. Vilhelm Moberg
(1898-1973), a representative of 20th-century proletarian literature and a controversial so-
cial critic, won international acclaim with Utvandrarna (The Emigrants; 1949) and Nybyg-
garna (The Settlers; 1956).
Contemporary literary stars include playwright and novelist Per Olov Enquist (1934-),
who achieved international acclaim with his novel Livläkarens besök (The Visit of the