Körkarlen (1921 film)

Infobox Film
name = Körkarlen


caption = Director Victor Sjöström
director = Victor Sjöström
producer = Charles Magnusson
writer = Selma Lagerlöf (novel)
Victor Sjöström
starring = Victor Sjöström
Hilda Borgström
Tore Svennberg
music =
cinematography = Julius Jaenzon
editing =
distributor = AB Svensk Filmindustri
released = 1921
runtime = 93 min.
country = Sweden
language = Silent film
budget =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
amg_id = 1:37918
imdb_id = 0012364

"Körkarlen" is a classic 1921 Swedish silent black and white film. It is also known as "The Phantom Carriage", "The Phantom Chariot", "The Stroke of Midnight", and "Thy Soul Shall Bear Witness".

Made in 1921, it was directed by and starred Victor Sjöström, and also starred Hilda Borgstrom, Tore Svennberg, and Astrid Holm. It was based on a novel of the same title Körkarlen (1912) by Selma Lagerlöf.

Plot summary

The film is a drama, telling the tale of a legend that the last person to die in any year, if he or she is a sinner, will for the next twelve months drive the Phantom Chariot which takes the souls of the dead. This seems to be the destined fate of the films anti-hero, a drunk (played by Sjöström) left for dead after a fight in a graveyard and taken aboard the Phantom Carriage as the clock nears midnight on the last night of the year. Here he is taken to witness how his vicious behaviour has affected those around him, including his abandoned wife and children and a dying Salvation Army girl (Astrid Holm) who has unavailingly tried to save him.

Influence

The film was a powerful influence on the later Swedish film director Ingmar Bergman who also utilised the figure of Death in "The Seventh Seal". Bergman's film "The Image Makers" (2000) is an historical drama depicting the making of "Körkarlen".

ee also

*Wild Strawberries (film)

External links

* [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0012364/ IMDb page]