Scott Lord Silent Film: Genuine, A Tale of A Vampire

In The Haunted Screen, author Lotte H. Eisner chronices that although the film Cabinet of Dr. Caligari fell short of creating a new genre, director Robert Weine continued developing the elements of genre that could be found in the first film in the second, "Genuine". She credits scenarist Carl Mayer with having "immediately concieved action in terms of images", included those interpreted by the "body wriggling Fern Andra".

Actress Fern Andra, Dowager Baroness von Weichs, born in the United States, had been a child tightrope walker. In addition to appearing under the direction of Robert Weine in the film "Genuine", during 1920 Fern Andra starred under Weine's direction in the film "The Night of Queen Isabeau" (Die Nacht der Konigin Isabeau). The film is considered a lost silent film with no existing copies survive.

Actress Fern Andra directed ten films for Fern Andra Film between 1915-1919, before her having acted on the screen for producer Eric Pommer.

Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (Robert Weine) Silent Film

Scott Lord Silent Film: Nosferatu (F.W. Murnau, 1922)

The film adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's account of Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde directed by F.W. Murnau during 1920 is presumed to be a lost silent film with no known existing copies of the film. "The Head of Janus" (Der Janus Kopf, Love's Mockery) had starred Conrad Veidt and Bela Lugosi and is credited with having been one of the first films to include the use of the moving-camera shot, "the unchained camera". Silent Horror Film Director F.W. Murnau made 21 feature films, 8 of which are presumed lost, with no surviving copies. Included among them is the 1920 horror film "The Hunchback and the Dancer" (Der Bucklige und die Tanzerin) photographed by Karl Freund. As early as 1973 author Lotte H. Eisner, in her volume Murnau, expressed a concern about Film preservation, "The particular problem which Murnau poses for the film historian is that of the loss of nearly half his work. Of the twenty one films listed in the filmography at the end of this book, nine are missing some of the other twelve are in a very incomplete state. Of course the publication of a book like this can bring films to light and we may be lucky enough to find some of the missing nine." Two of the lost films of F.W. Murnau made chronologically before and after his film "Nosferatu" were the 1921 film "Schnsucht" and the 1923 film "Die Austreibung",

Although the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Open Learning has gone on to join the EDX platform in its production of MOOC internet classes, two of which on art and propaganda I have enjoyed completing, its early open courseware offering of The Film Experience offers a summary of Murnau's relation to Expressionism provided by Professor David Thorburn, who views Expressionism as having employed "principles of distortion and surreal exaggeration". Influenial films, to reword his lecture, emerged from the "cultural center of society" and its "cultural authorities" to create a Golden Age of German Silent Film from between the 1918 armistice through 1927 and the advent of sound film by filmmakers that had brought artistic inentions from the established theater and arts as a modernism, in fact. Thorburn begins by comparing the screen to the canvass by noting the theatrical authority of the static camera as an imagined member of the audience and how characters are situated in space, an ideal observer, almost to the point of asking if there is anything moving within a stationary insert shot. Professor David Thorburn sees F. W Murnau as the director which freed German cinema from the "constraints of high art". He notes F.W. Murnau depating from the concept of "filmed theater" towards something more cinematic through the use of natural sunlight during both interior and exterior shots, the sunlight itself a motif in the film "Nosferatu" and credits Murnau with the discovery toward a more subjective camera. Thorburn, and myself perhaps, see author Lotte Eisner as an "important historical figure' in the historiography of film criticism.

Lotte H. Eisner, in her biography titled Murnau, looks at a scene change to the shooting script of "Nosferatu" written by Henrik Galeen made by the director, F.W. Murnau, but adds that few additons and revisions to the original script were made by Murnau. "Sometimes the film is different than the scenario though Murnau had not indicated any change in the script...But there is a suprising sequence in which nearly twelve pages (thirteen sequences) have been rewritten by Murnau."


Having chronicled the films of F.W. Murnauin her biography Murnau, Lotte H. Eisner looked at his directing in her volume The Haunted Screen, "In a film by Murnau, every shot has its percise function and is entirely concieved with an eye to its participation in the action." Lotte H. Eisner analyzes the film "Nosferatu" in her companion volume to his biography of Murnau, The Haunted Screen. "Nature participates in the action. Sensitive editing makes the bounding waves foretell the approach of the vampire."

Eisner later adds, "Murnau was one of the few German film-directors to have the innate love of the landscape more typical of the Swedes (Arthur von Gerlach, creator of Die Chronik von Grieshums, was another) and hes was always reluctant to resort to artifice." Murnau had visited Sweden where the cameras being used were made of metal rather than wood, which aquainted him with techniques that were in fact more modern. Author Lotte H Eisner, in her volume Murnau writes of F.W. Murnau viewing the films of Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller "when he made 'Nosferatu', the idea of using negative for the phantom forest came from Sjostrom's 'Phantom Carriage', which had been made in 1920. Above all, he had a love-hatred for Mauritz Stiller, whose 'Herre Arne's Treasure' he couldn't stop admiring." Interestingly enough, "Nosferatu" was by all accounts banned from exhibition in Sweden untill 1972 due to its having what was thought to be graphic content.

Not only can we look at Murnau's film to compare and contrast its use of landscape and location to that of Swedish Silent Films, but the Wisconsin Film Society during 1960 pointed out that its narrative was situated in a different century. "Murnau probably felt that by transferring the action to the year 1838 he would have an atmosphere more condusive to the supernatural. Because of the distance in time, an audience is perhaps more willing to employ its 'suspension of disbelief'." The Film Society mentions F.W. Murnau having filmed the Vampire's carriage in fast-motion for effect, an effect which it felt had been lost on the audiences of 1960. It conceded that shooting on location brought the film "far from the studio atmosphere", but hesitated, "Although frequently careless in technical details (camerwork, exposure, lighting, composition, and actor direction) it had variety and pace."

Interestingly, as scholar Janet Bergstrom, UCLA, surveys the work of F.W. Murnau she concerns us with evaluating how "conventions relating to sexual identity, the spectator and modes of abstraction do or do not carry over from one highly conventionalized national cinema to another. She allows that the emigre directors from Germany were less of a school of literaure than perhaps Sjostrom and Stiller were. She alludes to the women in Murnau's films as appearing one-dimensional mostly during a "morbid fascination with the female body"- "sensuality in death".


Lotte H. Eisner, in her volume Murnau, writes, "As always, Murnau found visual means of suggesting unreality". Professor David Thorburn, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, expresses aprreciation and gratitude for the author's writings pointing out that "her arguments in The Haunted Screen are still widely accepted." In regard to the expression of unreality, David Thorburn sees Expressionism as having been typified by "distortion and surreal exaggation" as well as having been "interested in finding equivalents for he inner life, dramatizing not the external world, but the world within us." If not the first horror film, Thorburn delegates "Nosferatu" to being an "origin film" and as "the film in which we can see Murnau freeing the camera.....no one had ever used the camera outdoors more effectively up to this time than Murnau". Lotte H Eisner, in The Haunted Screen writes, "The landscape and views of the little town and the castle in Nosferatu were filmed on location...Murnau, however, making Nosferatu with a minimum of resourses saw all that nature had to offer in the way of fine images...Nature participates in the action."

In Expressionist Film: New Perspectives, author Deitrich Scheunemann looks at the dismissal of Lotte Eisner's expressionist name tag as genre called for by authors Werner Sudendorf and Barry Salt. Salt excludes Murnau's film "Nosferatu" from German Expressionist Film, the criteria being an affinity with expressionist painting and drama. Scheunemann continues later, "Because of the uncanny nature of the protagonist, Nosferatu has often been compared to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. However, the uncanny and its various embodiments in the form of doubles,vampires and artificial creatures are not in itself motifs of the expressionist movement." Author Lotte H. Eisner can still be seen comparing Nosferatu with other German Silent Cinema from 1919-1924 and the camera technique used in depicting setting and mood, "When Nosferatu is preparing a departure in the courtyard, the use of unexpected angles gives the vampire's castle a sinister appearance. What could be more expressive than a narrow street, hemmed in between monotonous brick facades, seen from a high window, the bar of which crosses the image?"

Author George A. Huaco, in his volume The Sociology of Film Art, points out that the novel and film differ in plot resolution, "In contrast to the novel Dracula, the plot of Nosferatu deemphasizes the role of Professor VAn Helsing; the final duel is between the heroic bourgeois housewife Nina and the evil aristocratic vampire. Hoaco goes so far as to venture that this reflects the growing economic crisis of the period."

David Bordwell, author of On the History of Film Style, finds in "Nosferatu" a concurrent use of shot reverse shot and crosscutting "without any of the ambivalence of Griffith's ruminative cuts." Bordwell attributes Murnau with having employed classical continuity in the film as well as having used "long-depth compositions that reiterate the graphic motif of the arch."

Close-up magazine during 1929 reviewed the film, unaware that the Wisconsin Film Society would later favor the 1931 Tod Browning version, "The film opens with beautifully composed shots typical of Murnau (one spotlight on the hair, now turn the face slightly, and another spotlight)....It is unquestionably a faithful transcription of the book.

During 1926, when Murnau was readying to come to American, the periodical Moving Picture World interviewed his assistant, Hermann Bing, "Murnau's intention is to try to make pictures which will please the American theatre patrons- commercial successes because of their artistry....Murnau's object will be not to describe but to depict the relentless march of realities not for the objective, but from a subjective viewpoint." This almost seems like a nod to Carl Th. Dreyer's later film "Vampyr", other than that Dreyer's film had been made during the advent of sound film while Murnau was in America, shortly before Murnau's death. Fox Film publicity happenned to announce F.W. Murnau's coming to America by withholding the title of his debut American fim, giving the name of the dramatist that wrote its photoplay as Dr. Karl Mayer. "Theater Audiences Everywhere Are Waiting For This Creation".

Silent Film

In regard to the extratextual discourse of movie magazines of the time period, during 1929 the periodical Motion Picture News subtitled their review of "Nosferatu" with "Morbid and Depressing". It deemed Murnau's adaptation of the novel by Bram Stoker to be "a vague yarn hard to follow with several sequences that have a tremendous part to do with the plot introduced most haphazardly." The opinion of the periodical was that "The picture itself is a most morbid and depressing affair without entertainment value. It will not be acceptable anywhere except in the 'arty' houses."

Silent Horror Film



Faust (F.W. Murnau, 1926)


Silent Film


Silent Film

Cover Letter: Scott Lord on Silent Film https://garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com

The blog "Garbo-Seastrom" (authored by Scott Lord) is a specialized online publication dedicated to the preservation, historical analysis, and critical appreciation of silent cinema, with a particular emphasis on the golden age of Scandinavian film—specifically Swedish and Danish cinema.

Core Focus Areas of the Blog

• The Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film: The blog heavily examines the monumental contributions of Swedish directors and actors during the silent era, focusing centrally on Victor Sjöström (often anglicized as Victor Seastrom) and Mauritz Stiller. Their pioneering work at production companies like Svenska Bio established a cinematic language characterized by deep psychological realism, stark Nordic landscapes, and a profound connection to nature and folklore.

• Greta Garbo and Early Collaborations: Given the blog's namesake, it frequently explores the trajectory of Greta Garbo, her early roots in Swedish cinema, and her vital artistic partnership with Mauritz Stiller (who famously discovered her and brought her to Hollywood, shaping her early screen persona).

• Lost Films and Archival Research ("Lost Films in Found Magazines"): A recurring theme of the blog is the investigation of "lost" cinematic history. By utilizing contemporaneous print culture—such as film fan magazines, trade publications, and novelizations from the silent era—the author reconstructs lost or deteriorated celluloid. This extratextual approach illustrates how films were marketed, reviewed, and received by audiences of the 1910s and 1920s, treating the photoplay as both a literary and a significant social phenomenon.

• Transatlantic Connections: The blog bridges European silent cinema and early Hollywood, tracing how Scandinavian filmmakers like Victor Sjöström and Mauritz Stiller transitioned to the American studio system (such as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer) and influenced American directors like D.W. Griffith, as well as actors and stars like John Gilbert and Lon Chaney.

Cover Letter: Scott Lord on Silent Film. https://garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com

The website hosted at garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com (titled Swedish Silent Film and frequently referenced as Scott Lord on Silent Film) is a specialized digital archive, historical repository, and scholarly platform curated by independent film historian and researcher Scott Lord. The blog is dedicated to exhaustive, multidisciplinary explorations of early international cinema, with its primary focus centered on the "Golden Age" of Swedish Silent Film (roughly spanning 1917 to 1924) and the substantial aesthetic, thematic, and industrial migration of Scandinavian talent to the classical Hollywood studio system.

Core Thematic Pillars and Figures

The platform derives its name from two monumental figures whose careers came to symbolize the transatlantic exchange between Stockholm and Hollywood during the silent era:

• Greta Garbo: The blog charts her transformation from Greta Gustafsson in Stockholm into the iconic "Divine Garbo" of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Rather than offering a standard biographical retrospective, the site explores her screen presence as a crafted, modernist construct—analyzing how advanced lighting, Art Deco aesthetics, and the directorial approaches of filmmakers like Clarence Brown and Mauritz Stiller engineered her legendary public enigma.

• Victor Sjöström (Victor Seastrom): The site features granular breakdowns of Sjöström’s dual legacy. It examines his foundational Swedish masterpieces produced for Svenska Biografteatern (such as The Outlaw and His Wife and The Phantom Carriage)—noted for pioneering naturalism, psychological complexity, and innovative double-exposure techniques—as well as his influential American directorial tenure at MGM, highlighting major psychological works like He Who Gets Slapped and The Wind.

• Mauritz Stiller and the Scandinavian Diaspora: The blog documents the broader creative network that shaped early studio cinema, including Stiller (Garbo's mentor and discoverer) alongside key actors and directors such as Lars Hanson, Einar Hanson, Gustaf Molander, and John Brunius.

Methodological Approach: "Lost Films in Found Magazines"

One of the blog's most significant contributions to film historiography is its reliance on "extratextual discourse" to combat the devastating reality of silent-era preservation: the estimation that 70% to 80% of all silent films are entirely lost due to the chemical decomposition of unstable nitrate stock.

To counter the physical absence of these works, Scott Lord adopts a forensic, archaeological approach by systematically mining vintage print ephemera. The blog extensively references:

• Vintage Fan Magazines: Periodicals such as Photoplay, Motion Picture Classic, and Screenland.

• Trade Publications: Contemporary industry resources like Exhibitor's Herald and Motion Picture News.

• Serialized Fiction and Photoplays: Contemporary novelizations, book dustjackets, screen adaptation reviews, and full-page promotional layouts.

By cross-referencing these primary sources, the blog reconstructs the structural intent, visual style, technical specifications (such as tinting instructions and reel lengths), and contemporary audience reception of films that can no longer be physically screened.

Significance

Functioning as a digital museum and research tool, garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com bridges historical preservation with modern film appreciation. It emphasizes the importance of looking past mere plot summaries to understand the photoplay as a complex social phenomenon, ensuring that the ephemeral visual culture of the early 20th century remains documented and critically analyzed.

Cover Letter: Scott Lord on Silent Film https://garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com

The blog garbo-seastrom.blogspot.com (authored by Scott Lord) is a specialized online publication and archive dedicated to the history, preservation, and critical analysis of silent cinema, with a primary focus on the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film, Scandinavian cinema, and legendary figures such as Greta Garbo, Victor Sjöström (often spelled Seastrom), and Mauritz Stiller.

Core Themes and Content

• The Swedish Silent Cinema Movement: The blog extensively explores the groundbreaking contributions of Swedish studios like Svenska Bio and the artistic visions of directors like Victor Sjöström and Mauritz Stiller, whose mastery of natural landscapes, psychological depth, and visual storytelling heavily influenced global cinema.

• Greta Garbo's Early Work: Documenting Garbo's transition from European stages and silent masterpieces (such as Gösta Berlings Saga) to Hollywood stardom, looking closely at contemporary critical reception, trade papers, and rare photographs.

• Lost Films and Archival Discovery: A significant portion of the discourse centers on film historiography—examining "lost films in found magazines," how historical periodicals, reviews, and continuity scripts offer clues to deteriorated or missing silent celluloid, and tracking down rare 35mm prints.

• Silent Era Stars and Directors: Beyond Sweden, the blog regularly touches upon major icons and movements of the broader silent era, including analyses of classic Hollywood stars (like Clara Bow and Lon Chaney) and international directors.

As The Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film Begins to Wane

Swedish Silent Film Companies Merge, Svensk Filmindustri Emerges

The historiography of film criticism, especially when it leads to peer review, not only adds an interest to film studies, but recomplicates its theories to deepen their insights, particularly when embracing the development of a director's chronology or that chronology of successive directors. William K. Everson, not necessarily a renown theorist but an author popular for being a proponent of silent film study toward the end of Lillian Gish's life had the problem of genre theory looking at the Western Hollywood film as a Geography rather than a Dramatic theme, which necessarily is an expected trope of the Western simliar to Dracula's Castle and its predecessor the Haunted House. Writing in Film Culture Magazine, edited by Jonas Mekas during 1959, a half century after "The Great Train Robbery" and Everson's usual subject material, Everson seemingly tailored his article to a modern audience when approaching the same chronology as I did: the switch from the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film and the directing of Swedish Silent Film director Victor Sjostrom, a theater manager who had adapted himself from the proscenium to a more painterly medium, occuring on Sjostrom's return to Sweden to the more dramatic dialouge driven interior camera of Gustaf Molander and the advent of sound. Everson's task and mine being the same, what we have is an uncanny description of what had prophetically ended, transformed, to predate the sound era. Everson leaps to "Sunshine Follows the Rain" directed by Gustaf Edgren in 1946 starring Mai Zetterling without reference to Sjostrom. Importantly, neither does he reference Ingmar Bergman, but he does give us what we are looking for, a concise summary of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film provided after the Ingmar Bergman film "Wild Strawberries" where the Scandinavian Winter had been reduced to Victor Sjostrom and Ingrid Thulin having "escaped to the Swedish summer" to a more serene location of a backyard pond. Everson sees Edgren in 1946 having "utilized landscapes as an integral part of the film and not merely as a scenic backdrop." Exclamation point. True, Hollywood silent film when "comparing The Theif of Bagdad to Star Wars" relied upon the scenery department- specificlly to transport the audience reception and the character identification involved in spectationship, the geography of the Hollywood Western being an inevitable commodification, the character in relation to the the diegetic world is advertisized to the viewer spectator Perhaps Bo Florin has added insight by having credited Swedish Film director Mauritz Stiller with the ability to "functionalize all filmic elemets for the purpose of telling a story"..

Author Leif Furhammar has written that the merger between Swedish Silent Film companies Svensk Bio and Skandia to form Svensk Filmindustri took place in 1919, after Christmas. Without Swedish Silent Film directors Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller, who would leave for America with Lars Hanson and Greta Garbo, the remaining pantheon of John Brunnius and Gustaf Molander would teeter and by 1925 delineate the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film with films that luckily, remarkably, would be contemporary interior dramas more amenable to the advent of sound rather than films that analysed the interior of the character by contrasting it to exterior landscapes and the divine-like prescence of nature as an unreachable narrator, or perhaps the character in specific historic contexts of interest to an audience looking to distance themselves aesthetically from modernity.

Swedish Silent Film scholar Bo Florin makes note of the province held by Nils Bouveng at the newly structured Svenska Filmindustri after the merger had taken place of the smaller companies into one and that Bouveng had published an article entitled Swedish Film Advertising: How the Industry Plans to Conquer the World in the 1919 periodical Filmjournalen. Nils Bouveng of Swedish Biograph was very much responsible for the distribution of Swedish Silent Film in the United States. The publication Exhibitor's Herald during 1921 noted that although Bouveng was deemed to have thought the film market overcrowded, he would still export film "of merit" to the United States. It wrote,"Swedish Biograph has control of all product of Scandinavian studios and will offer only the cream of these pictures to American theaters...While Thy Soul Shall Bear Witness is regarded as its finest offering, company executives believe that Judge Not, Sir Arne's Treasure, Youth Meets Youth, Dawn of Love and Secret of the Monastery will compare favorably with any American made production." Actors that were anticipated to greet audiences in the United States included Mary Johnson, Gosta Ekman Renee Bjorling, Tora Teje, Edith Erastoff Lars Hanson, Karin Molander and Victor Sjostrom.
Scandinavian films were often peered at by American and British film magazines and for thos looking for film rveiews, extatextural discourse on European films can often be located within them. Picture Play Magazine during 1921 looked at the theater screens of Sweden. "Lars Hanson, a star of the Swedish constellation may be added to the European counterparts of American stars. Lesley Mason denominates him 'the Charles Ray of Sweden' and considers him the best male bet of Europe so far as American popularity is concerned. The most popular of the Swedish feminine stars, according to Mr. Mason, are Tora Teje, Karin Molander and Mary Johnson. During the following year, 1922, the periodical Picturegoer magazine in fact recognized actress Mary Johnson as being the leading actress from Sweden in an article about actors known internationally and transnational cinema but opined that as a foreign celebrity she entertained a more subdued fame, as though to denote a lack of commodification of the female in extratextural discourse, ie. exploitation. "Although she rejoices in the title of 'Sweden's Sweetheart", loveable, little Mary Johnson has never recieved a 'fan' letter from Sweden. The reason is extremely simple. There are no 'fans' there. The star, as a star and personality, simply doesn't count. The Swedish picturegoer is very critical as to story, technique and acting and highly appreciative too; but as to writing to the movie stars- perish the thought." Author Walter Bloem, in his volume The Soul of the Moving Picture from 1924, in a discussion on The Scene, singled out two Swedish Silent Film actresses by briefly mentioning Karin Molander and Tora Teje as having "the psychic power which spells variety in the creation of character" as contrasted with a plentiful supply of American actresses that presented "a soporific drama of a single sorrow or grief or pain, of a conventional melancholy, sadness or lament." Author Benjamin B. Hampton to the contrary, in his volume A History of the Movies, published during 1931, seems to transverse the period following the Golden Age of Silent Film as though from 1925-1930 were stagnant, typifying Swedish Silent Film as tendentious. "The Scandinavians, despite fine actors and directors, lean so frequently toward gloomy, sophisticated stories, that they have been negligible factors in production as far as production is concerned." Hampton overlooks that this is exaclty what helps to account for the film made in Sweden after 1925 having been attempts at commercial success through light hearted comedies.

The periodical Motion Picture News during 1925 cited Charles Magnusson as the president of The Swedish Film Industry, Inc. of Stockholm. The occaision was his visit to America and Hollywood. It quoted Magnusson as having said, "American pictures are teaching the people of Sweden to think like Americans, to dress like them and to act like them...They are all emulating the American screen stars and bobbed heads are almost universal throught the North country." He added that Swedish filmmakers were dependent upon artifical lighting, "Our plant in Stockholm is about twelve acres, but we have only two production stages." The Film Daily covered the same visit of Charles Magnusson to Hollywood with the title "Sweden Can't Compete". It claimed that Sweden would look to European markets rather than American and that Swedish audiences demanded American films, one hundread out of one hundread and forty films shown in Sweden being made in Hollywood. Leif Furhammar explains, "Swedish film ended up in a vicious circle, where the production volume declined as American films gained market share, resulting in theaters demanding even more American films to fill the Swedish void." In 1925, only 3% of films screened first run to Swedish audiences were produced in Sweden against 70% of films shown in Sweden being American.

The sentiment that the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film had been overwhelmed by Hollywood and its towering economic system rather than the expected bolstering of Swedish studios through exportation is expressed by author Joel Fryholm, Lund University, who includes the global prescence of American films as conributing to the decline of the Scandinavian art film in a paper tracing the "Swedish Agitation against American Films" and the splashing of advertisements for them in Swedish newspapers that had neccesitated the need for debate regarding legislation. Providing a historiography of Ipsea, for which Gustaf Molander and Olaf Molander directed, Fryholm sees Ipsea as much of the demise of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film by its differing from the transnationalism of a global American cinema by providing a national cinema that differed it choice of subject material from earlier "peasant films", their romanticism, their depiction of provincal culture and that they often "forgrounded the local natural landscape". In effect, Fryholm seems to decribe Sweden as losing world wide ticket holders by offering a new Sweden shown in "Swedish International Films", the reverse effect modernizing storylines had had for the silent film career of Greta Garbo, who at the crescendo of the silent era began to offer a flapper alternative while depating from early costume dramas. In extratextual discourse, film critics had begun to appraise the lack of "peasant films" before the departure of Sjostrom, Stiller, Hanson and Garbo to America had taken hold in the critical reception of first run features. Perhaps not an autuer, Gustaf Molander had reinvented himself and the signature styles of Swedish silent cinema, newspaper critics attempting to compare his films to those made in Hollywood, which at the beginning of the decade absorbed 80% of the Swedish market, as though a new cinematic experience for the remaining 20% of Swedish movie theater tickets. This alternative cosmopolitanism and metropolitanism intended to vie with Hollywood is in part faulted for the decline of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film it later having beenn seen unfavorably by film historian Gosta Werner.

During 1921, the periodical Motion Picture Magazine reported there would be an increase of importations from Stockholm and while it featured still photographs from the films Dawn of Love, The Secret of the Monsastery and A Fortuned Hunter, it marked that the storylines we're to be adaptations from the literature of Ibsen, Bjornsen and Selma Lagerlof and that the principal players had come from the Swedish theater, which aptly describes the way in which actress Greta Garbo would be introduced to Swedish film audiences two years later.


Swedish Silent Film director Ivan Hedqvist, who had acted for Svenska Biografteatern in Kristianstad, during 1919 directed the film "The Downy Girl"(Dunungen) from a novel and play by Selma Lagerlof, the film having starred Jenny Tschernichin-Larssen, Mia Grunder in her first appearance on the silent screen and Renee Bjorling in her first screen appearance for Svenska Biografteatern. The cinematographer to the film was Julius Jaenzon. As an adaptation of the work of Selma Lagerlof the film well meets the criteria if being included as an example of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film. The following year Ivan Hedqvist directed the film "Carolina Rediviva" scripted by Esther Julin and starring Rene Bjorling, Lia Noree and Hilda Bjorgstrom. Paul Rotha attributes the decline of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film simply, uncomplicatedly to their production being discontinued, "In fact, it may be said truthfully that the Swedish Film declined and it died a natural death by reason of its national characteristics of poetic feeling and realism". Paul Rotha typified Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film production with, "They are realized with exceptional visual beauty, being characterized by their lyrical quality of theme and their slowness of development. For their enviornment, full use was made of the natural landscape value of Sweden, whilst their directors were marked by poetic feeling."

Among the films produced by Filmindustri Skandia during 1920 photographed by Raol Reynolds and directed by Rune Carlsten was the film "The Bomb" ("Sunshine and Shadow", "Bomben"), starring Karin Molander and Gosta Ekman. Actress Karin Molander had starred in the lost film "Surrogatet" during 1919, the being no surviving copies of the film. A short film lasting only slightly over a half hour, it was directed by Einar Braun for Filmindustri Scandia, Stockholm. Rune Carlsten in 1920 wrote and directed the Swedish Silent Film film "A Modern Robinson" ("Robinson i skargarden") with actress Mary Johnson. The cinematographer to the film was Raoul Reynolds. Actress Mary Johnson married Norwegian actor Einor Rod after having appeared with him in the film. Director Rune Carlsten that year also directed Mary Johnson with Tora Teje and Hilda Castegren in "Family Traditions" ("Familjens traditioner") which he coscripted as well, his co-author having had been being Sam Ask. The film was produced by Svensk Filmindustri and photographed again by Raoul Reynolds. Einar Froberg was behind the camera duting 1920 to direct the film "Lunda Indians", photographed by Hellwig F. Rimmen. The running time of the film was three quarters of an hour.

Swedish Silent Film director Solve Cederstrand directed his first film, "A Fateful Incognito" (Ett odesdigert kognito), starring Tage Alquist and Signe Selid in 1920. The film was written by Axel Essen and photographed by Kurt Jager, who went on to direct the film "Elaman maantiella" (1927) in Finland. Children were allowed to public exhibition of the 1920 film "The Shoemaker Prince",directed by Hjalmer Davidsen and scripted by Jens Locher for Palladium film. The film starred Maja Cassel as Princess Charlotte and Oda Larsen. In her paper The Excavation of New Swedish Childen's Film History, scholar Taichi Niibori, Stockholm University, asks if Pauline Brunius, wife of Swedish Silent Film director John Brunius was the "Founding Mother" of the Swedish Barnfilm with the film "Dragonfly" (1920) in a chapter on the Ambiguity of Generic Identity in exhibition strategies, that its "textural aspect symbolises the contemporaneuous concept of children's films". It is a short film of 21 minutes running time. Brunius often made short films with child actors in the leading parts.
Scripted by Hjalmer Bergman as an adaptation of his 1917 work "Friarna pa Rockesnas", the 1921 film "Fru Mariannes fare" was directed by Gunnar Klintberg, the cinematographer to the film having had been Robert Olsson. The film starred Astri Torsell, Ingrid Sunblad, Aslag Lie-Erde and Gota Klintberg. Gunnar Klintberg continued by directing Astr Torsell in two more Swedish Silent Films, "The Love Circle" [Elisabet) with actresses Julia Hakanson and Gota Klintberg and in "Lord Saviles Brott", adapted from the work of Oscar Wilde. Gunner Klintberg's wife, actress Gota Klintberg had appeared with Signe Kolthoff during 1919 in the film "Jefthas dottar", directed by Robert Dinesen.
Swedish Silent Film director Ivan Hedqvist in 1921 directed the film "Pilgrimage to Kevlaar" (Valfarten till Kevlaar). Ragnar Hylten Cavailius, who scripted the photoplay of the film, appears on film as a supporting actor. Ivan Hedqvist followed the film in 1924 with "Life in the Country" (Livets pa Landet), photgraphed by Julius Jaenzon and starring Renee Bjorling, Einar Hanson, and the beautiful Mona Martenson. The film us considered a lost silent film with only fragments from newsreel footage.

Mona Martenson during 1922 was on the Swedish stage at Dramaten , under the direction of Olof Molander, performing Hjalmar Bergman's one act play "Mr. Sleeman is Coming". Greta Garbo that year would give her first on stage performance there, at Dramaten, in the play "The Adventure" (La Belle Adventure".

Bo Florin, Stockholm University, descries a financial crisis in Svensk Filmindustri during 1922, to the extent that its affect was the company only having made three films during 1923. Florin points out that a staggering 90% of all silent films shown in Sweden were in fact American and that this loomed over the perhaps immanent departure of director Victor Sjostrom.

Formerly a journalist, Gustaf Edgren in 1922 had founded his own film company, Varmlandsfilm, making his screenwriting and directorial debut with the film "Miss at Pori" (The Young Lady of Bjorneborg/Froken pa Bjorneborg) starring actresses Rosa Tillman, Elsa Wallin and Edith Ernholm in her first film. The photographer was Adrian Bjurman. Adrian Bjorman was again the photographer for Gustav Edgren during 1923 for the film "People of Narke (Narkingara), which Edgren wrote and directed. Starring in the film were Anna Carlsten, Gerda Bjorne, and Maja Jerlstrom in her first appearance on screen. The film was also produced by Edgren's company Varmlandfilm, which would continue to produce only the flms of Gustaf Edgren.

Aparrently actress Karin Swanstrom was required to give co-directing screen credit to her screenwriter Oscar Rydqvist to the first film she was to direct, "Boman at the Fair" (Boman at the Exbhition, Boman pa Uttstallingen", 1923). Photographed by Gustav A Gustafson, the film starred Ingeborg Strandin and was the only film in which Karin Gardtman was to appear.

Although it joins the narrative of film history in a chapter concerned with the decline of Swedish Silent Film and its Golden Age, author Forsyth Hardy describes the work of Inga Tiblad and Einar Hanson in the 1923 Gustaf Molander film "Malapirater" as "pleasant acting". The film is a comedy. Ragnar Widestedt in 1923 directed Agda Helin and Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson in the film "Housemaids" (Hemslavirmor) written by Ragnar Hylten-Cavallius.

Frederick Andersson in 1923 directed the film "En rackarunge" with actresses Elsa Wallin and Mia Grunder. Gustaf V, King of Sweden, is listed as being in the film. It was photographed by Swedish cinematographer Sven Bardach. Sven Bardach had earlier that year photographed his first film, "Andersson, Petterson och Lundstrom", under the direction of Carl Barklind. The film stars Vera Schmiterlow and Mimi Pollock, both aquaintances of Greta Garbo, Inga Tiblad, and Gucken Cederborg.

Swedish Silent Film director Per Lindberg directed his first film during 1923, "Norrtullsligan", written by Hjalmer Bergman and starring Tora Teje, Stina Berg, Linnea Hillberg and Nils Asther. Peter Cowie, in his volume Scandinavian Cinema, commended the film by writing it "belongs among the most courageous and enjoyable films of the European decade. Films prior to 1923 had presented individual female characters of flesh amd blood, but the Nortell Gang established a precedent....The screenplay by Hjalmer Bergman transcends the familiar image of women as decorative objects." Hjalmer Bergman was in fact the brother-in-law of director Per Lindberg. Per Lindberg directed a second film scripted by Hjalmer Bergman during 1923, "Anna Klara and her Brothers" (Anna Klara och hennes broder), it having starred Anna-Britt Ohlsson, Hilda Bjorgstrom, Karin Swanstrom, Linnea Hillberg and Margit Manstad in what would be her first appearance on screen. The film was photographed by Ragnar Westfelt.

The first two films directed by Sigurd Wallen are presumed lost, with no surviving copies existing. Wallen directed "Anderssonkans Kalle" during 1922 with Anna Diedrich and Stina Berg, the photographer to the film Adrian Bjurman. The following year Wallen directed "Anderssonkans Kalle pa Nya Upptage" photographed by Henrik Jaenzon and starring Edvin Adolphson, the debut film of actress Mona Martenson. Swedish Silent Film director Sigurd Wallen during 1923 directed the lost silent film "Friaren fran Landsvagen", which , co-scripted with Sam Ask and photographed by Henrik Jaenzon, had starred Edvin Adolphson, Jenny Hasselquist, and Mia Grunden. Edvin Adolphson in fact had directed a short film during 1923 starring Hilda Castegren, "Gronkopings veckorevy" his first appearance in Swedish movie theaters as a film director. Castegren had previously worked for Rune Carlsten and Gustaf Molander.

Swedish Silent Film director Bror Abelli in 1923 directed his first two films, including the film "Janne Modig", starring Ture Ottoson in the titular role.

The periodical Motion Picture World during 1927 reminded its readers that actress Sigrid Holmquist had already been introduced to audiences in the United States. "Sigrid Holmquist , once called the 'Swedish Mary Pickford' is another foreign star, very popular with american public, who might named. She is at present making some color art pictures at Tiffany." The periodical Motion Picture Classic countered with a full page portrait of the actress photocaptioned with ,"Sigrid Holmquist is one of the dozen or more 'Swedish Mary Pickfords' - every country has one to fifty." After her first silent film made in the United States, "Just Around the Corner" (Frances Marion, 1921, seven reels) in which she started with actress Margaret Seddon for Cosmopolitan Pictures, most of the filmscmade in Hollywood by Swedish actress Sigrid Holmquist are presumed to be lost silent film , with no surviving existing copies, including two of her earliest, the lost silent film "The Prophet's Pradise" (Alan Croslnd, 1922), and the lost silent film "My Old Kentucky Home" (Ray C. Smallwood, as well as including the films "A Gentleman of Leisure" (Joseph Heneby) (1923) and in all probality the film "The Light That Failed" (George Melford, 1923) in which she starred with actress Jacqueline Logan; all filmed in the United States before Greta Gabo, Mona Martenson, and Vera Schmiterlow had entered the Royal Dramatic Training Academy. Before having left Sweden, actress Sigrid Holmquist had debuted in three comedies directed by Lau Lauritzen during 1920 for Palladium, among which were "Karleck och bjornjakt" and "Flickorna i Ave". Swedish Silent Film director Lau Lauritzen continued during 1921 to film the presumed to be lost film 'Silkesstrumpen" starring actresses Oda Rostrup and Winifred Westover an American from California that had appeared in the "Bodakungen" directed by Gustaf Molander. The cinematographer to the film was Hugo J. Fischer. There are no existing copies of the film that survive. Lau Lauritzen also that year continued with the presumed to be lost film "Karleck och Hypnotism", also for Palladium, starring actress Kiss Andersson.
During 1924 Sigurd Holmquist appeared with actress Jane Novak in the lost silent film "Two Shall Be Born" (William Bennet), filmed for the Vitagraph Company of America by Edward Paul.

Swedish Silent Film director John Lindlof in 1924 directed the film "Man of Adventure" (Odets Man) with Inga Tiblad and Uno Henning, photographed by Gustav a Gustafson and written by J. Evicius. Knut Lambert who appears as an actor in the film and subsequently several later films, directed the lost film "Equal Among Equal" (Lika mot lika) in 1906, it having been the first film in which actress Tollie Zellman was to appear. Lambert appears with Tollie Zellman in the film as an actor with his wife Helfrid Lambert. There are no surviving copies of the film.

Sigurd Wallen during 1924 directed Inga Tiblad with Einar Froberg in " Grevarna pa Svanta" photographed by Henrik Jaenzon. Mostly known for being a theater director it was the first of only a handful of films Froberg had appeared in and the only film script that he had written. Froberg had directed an earlier film, "Lunda-indianer" starring Ture Sjogre and Malte Akerman, during 1920, his only time behind the camera, and had directed his own play, "Individerna Forbund' in Stockholm during 1919. Gustaf Molander appeared on stage in Stockholm in Froberg's play "Erna" under the direction of Gustaf Linden at The Drama (Dramaten) during 1922.

Ivar Kage in 1924 directed Gosta Hillberg and Edvin Adolphson in the film "When the Lighthouse Flashes" (Dar fyren blinken) for Svensk Ornfilm. The script was written by Esther Julin who had earlier adapted the novels of Selma Lagerlof to the screen for Victor Sjostrom. A fairly obscure or nonprolific photographer, Hellwig Rimmen during 1924 photographed the only film that he was to direct, "Hogsta Vinsten", it having starred actress Hilma Bolvig. The running time to the film was a half hour. Rimmen had began filming in Sweden under the direction of Einar Fronerg during the only film he was to direct, the 1920 film "Lunda-Indianer".

Actor Bror Berger directed one Swedish Silent Film the 1924 "Den Forgylida lergoken", based on the play by Emil Norlander. The film stars actresses Anna-Lisa Lindzen, Gunnilla Ehrenmark, Anna Herzman, and Stina Gutterman.

In the world Swedish Literature, during 1924 the author Birger Sjoberg published the novel Kvartetten som sprangdes (The Quartet That Split Up) which was later adapted for the screen three times, the directors including Arne Bornebusch,Gustaf Molander and Hans Alfredson.

Gustaf Edgren in 1924 directed the film "The King of Trollebro" (Trollebokungen) an adaptation of the Maja pa Stadt's 1917 novel scripted by Solve Cederstrand and photographed by C.A. Soderstrom, the film having starred actresesses Signe Ekloff, Gunvor Winberg, and Anna Carlsten, wife of Rune Carlsten.

Rune Carlsten directed a handful of Swedish Silent Films before distinguishing himself as a director of Swedish Sound Film, in 1924 their having included the film "The Young Nobleman" (Ung greven tar flickan och priset) starring Karin Swanstrom. In 1925 Rune Carlsten married beautiful Dora Soderberg, daughter of novelist Hjalmer Soderberg, author of the 1905 novel "Dr. Glas" and the 1912 novel "The Serious Game".

Included in the number of Swedish Silent Films that are lost, with no surviving copies known to exist is the film "40 Skipper Street" (Skeppargatan 40), directed by Gustaf Edgren during 1925. The film brought Mona Martenson and Einar Hanson together on screen , it also having featutred actresses Magda Holm and Karin Swanstrom. The photoplay was cowritten by director Gustaf Edgren with HUgo CLareus and Solve Cederstrand.

During 1925, Pauline Brunius was appearing on stage with Gosta Ekman in the play "Dalin och Drottningen", written by her brother in law, August Brunius. August Brunius has recently been described by one biographer as having been "the first professional Swedish critic", his having had begun writing essay on the theater in 1917.

Swedish Silent Film director Ragnar Ring during 1925 directed the film "Tre Kroner", following it the next year with the film "Butikskultur", photographed by Gustaf Berg.
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Swedish Silent Film director William Larsson during 1925 directed the film "Broderna Ostermans huskors" with Jenny Tscherichin-Larsson and Frida Sporrong; the film is presumed to be lost with no surviving copies existing as is its 1932 remake directed by Thure Alfe, in which actress Fida Sporrong also appeared. During 1925 William Larsson also directed "For hemmet och flickan" with Jenny Tchernichin Larsson and Elsa Widborg in what was to be the first film in which she was to appear. The former was photographed by Arthur Thorell, the former by Henrik Jaenzon. "For hemmet och flickan" is presumed to be lost, with no surviving copies existing and carried the first screenplay written by Weyler Hildebrand, who went on to direct Swedish sound films.

Swedish Silent Film director Sigurd Wallen during 1925 directed the film "Her Little Majesty" (Hennes lilla Majestat) starring actresses Margita Alfven, Stina Berg, Gucken Cederborg, and Olga Andersson in the first feature film in which she was to appear. With a photoplay scripted by Henning Ohlson, the film was photographed by Axel Lindblom.

Swedish Silent Film director Hjalmar Peters wrote and directed the 1925 film "Ett kopmanshus skargarden", adapted from the novel by Emilie Flygar-Carlen and starring acresses Anna Carlsten and Rosa Tillman.

Olaf Molander, to bring the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film to an anticlimax rather than a crescendo, directed only three silent films, the first in 1925, the next the following year and one the year following that. About the 1925 film, "Lady of the Camelias"(Damen med kameliorna) Forsyth Hardy writes,"The film derived some distinction from the delicately composed interiors and the touching performance of Tora Teje gave in response to Molander's skilled direction." Peter Cowie writes, "Although the film betrays the theatrical loyalties of its director, the camera observing most scenes from a single, rigid, set up, Molander knows how to rein in the histrionics of his players (Nils Arehn, for example creates an excellant Georges Duvall) and he copes well with the outdoor scenes." Photographed by Gustaf A. Gustafson, the films stars Ivan Hedqvist, Hilda Bjorgstrom and Lisskulla Jobs in the first film in which she was to appear. Not incidentally, during 1925 Olaf Molander directed "Kameliadamen" on stage at the Royal Dramtic Theater, Stockholm.

During 1926 Olaf Molander directed August Strindberg's play "Advent" at the Royal Dramatic Theater, Stovkholm. Olaf Molander chose August Strindberg's short story "Ett Dockhem" for his second of three Swedish Silent Films, adapted for the screen in 1926 from a screenplay by Per Axel Branner as the film "Married Life/Getting Married" (Giftas), photographed by Gustaf A. Gustafson. Scholar Jesper Larsson, in his paper "Tora Teje, Reception and Swedishness" writes that actress Tora Teje "was deemed to be stiff and unsuited for the screen". Jesper Larsson intuitively or sagaciously recognizes the reception of the star image of Tora Teje as "an extension of how American films reproduced ideas about consumption and luxury" veering from the concept and aesthetic of the golden age of Swedish Silent Film and its "distillation of a distinctive national style...often set in historical times or rural Sweden." Also appearing in the film "Married Life" are actresses Hilda Borgstrom and Margaret Manstad.

Actress Tora Teje returned to the stage and Dramaten during 1926 to bring August Brunius' play "Messeniernas fall" to Swedish Theater under the direction of of Olaf Molander. Mimi Pollack gives an account that she and Greta Garbo looked up to Tora Teje while at drama school and attempted to imitate her, which may account for Garbo's languishing fatigue of disinterest while portraying characters- Tora Teje at the time was austere while being devoted to religion and lofty. Pauline Brunius, on the other hand was to become Tora Teje's bitter rival.

During a year that he directed "Peer Gynt" by Henrik Ibsen at the Royal Dramtic Theatre in Stockholm, Olaf Molander continued during 1927 with "Only a Dancing Girl" (Bara en danserska), starring Lili Dagover, Karin Swanstrom, and Anna-Lisa Ryding, which he wrote and directed. The cinematographer to the film was Hugo Edlund.

Sigurd Wallen during 1926 directed the film "Ebberods Bank", the assistant director to the film Rolf Husberg. The film starred acresses Stina Berg, Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson and Carina May in her first of three screen appearances. The film is presumed to be lost, with no survivivng copies.

There are no surviving copies of the lost silent film "My Wife Has a Fiancee" (Min Fru har en Fastman, 1926) directed by Theodor Berthels who coscripted the photoplay with wife Greta Berthels. SWedish silent film actress Jenny Hasselquist stars in the film with Thora Ostberg and Tyra Leijman-Uppstrom. It was one of two films produced by Thebe Film. THe following year Theodor Berthels directed the film "Arnljot" (1927) from a manuscript written by his wife Greta Berthels. Both appear onscreen in the film with actress Thora Ostberg. The photographer of the film was Adrian Bjurman. The film is also presumed to be lost, with no surviving copies.

Petschler-Film during 1926 produced the film "Brollopet i Brana" directed by Eric A. Petschler and written by Esther Julin and Lars Tessing. The film, photographed by Gustav A. Gustafson, teamed Edvin Adolphson, Mona Martensen and Emmy Albin. The film "Hin och smalanningen" directed by Erik A Petschler for Petschler Film during 1927 is presumed to be lost, with no known surviving cooies of the film. Co-written by Petschler with Sam Ask as an adaptation of the 1888 play by Frans Hedberg, the film starred actresses Jenny Tchernichin-Larsson, Anita Dow, Birgit Tengroth and Greta Anjov. Screenwriter Sam Ask appears on screen as an actor. The film was photographed by Gustav A. Gustafson.

"Mordbrannerskan" (1926), directed by John Lindlof, photographed by Gustaf A. Gustafson and starring Vera Schmiterlow and Brita Appelgren was the first film in which Birgit Tengroth was to appear.

Actress Vera Schmiterlow, fondly remembered for being a friend of Greta Garbo, during 1927 under the direction of Sigurd Wallen with actress Stina Berg in the film "The Queen of Pellagonia" (Drottninggen av Pellagonia". Scripted by playwright Henningen Ohlsson, the film was photographed byAxel Lindblom.

Swedish Silent Film director Gustaf Edgren in 1927 directed "The Ghost Baron" (Spokbaronen) starring Karin Swanstrom and photographed by Adrian Bjuman, which was followed by "Black Rudolph" (Svarte Rudolph) in 1928, starring Inga Tiblad amd Fridolf Rhudin, both films having been written by Solve Cederstrand. The assistant director to the film "Black Rudolph" had been Gunnar Skogland. It was the first film in which actress Katie Rolfson was to appear.

Vilhelm Bryde directed his only film during 1927, "A Husband By Proxy" (En Perfekt Gentleman) a comedy scripted by Hjalmar Bergman starring Gosta Ekman, La Jana and Karin Swanstrom. The film was produced by Minerva Film. Bryde had acted in a more than a dozen Swedish Silent Films beggining with "Erotikon", directed by Mauritz Stiller.

Screenwriter Ragnar Hylten Cavailius directed a half dozen films over two decades included in his more than fourty years of contributing scripts to Swedish Silent and Swedish sound films. Included among them during 1928 was the film "Hans kungl. Hoget shinglar" starring actresses Karin Swanstrom, Brita Appelgren and Maria Paudler. The film was scripted by Paul Merzbach.

Like Ragnar Hylten Cavailius, a screenwriter from the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film that later had had a limited foray into directing films, Sam Ask wrote and directed the 1928 Swedish Silent "Erik XIV", it having starred Sophus von Rosen, Eva Monk af Rosenchold, Lisa Ryden and Gosta Werner. Nothwithstanding, despite the film "Erik XIV", author Peter Cowie sees 1928 as the beginning of a "barren period" ensuing after Charles Magnusson was "eased out of" Svenska Filmindustri by Ivar Kruger with Olaf Andersson as head of the firm. Charles Magnusson had folded, and left his position at Svenska Filmindustri during 1928, but the present author feels that perhaps author Peter Cowie is either mistaken or exaggerating when he claims that it had precipitated a "veritable exodus of talent"- the directors Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller admittedly were in the United States, but contrary to Cowie's volume Scandinavian Cinema, actor and actress Greta Garbo and Lars Hanson had undoubtedly left Sweden prior to the departure of Charles Magnusson, as had Einar Hanson, leaving only the screenwriters Hjalmer Bergman and concievably Tancred Ibsen. And yet the spirit of Cowie's passage views him as essential as a founder and catalyst, which he was.



Peter Cowie, in his volume Scandinavian Cinema chronicles the end of the silent era in Sweden as being a time of less output, "Swedish film production declined through the 1920's, reaching a nadir in 1929, when a mere six features were released."

Danish Silent Film

Victor Sjostrom

Victor Sjostrom Gustaf Molander

Swedish Silent Film Stars on the Theater Stage

Actress Harriet Bosse was married to both playwright August Strindberg, actor Gunnar Wingard, who appeared at the Swedish Theatre, Stockholm, particularly in the 1911 stage version of Gosta Berlings Saga and Swedish film director and actor Edvin Adolphson (Long ago, I found a copy of her correspondence to Strindberg at UniLu, Harvard University while I was talking to Bishop Stendhal about his almost having married Ingmar Bergman's sister). Harriet Bosse appeared in the film "Sons of Ingmar" directed by Victor Sjostrom. Victor Sjostrom not incidentally, had returned to the stage in 1914 and 1915 under the direction of Gustaf Collijn for August Strindberg's play "To Damascus".

Silent Film

August Strindberg and Anna Hoffman Uddgren

Scott Lord Swedish Silent Film: Thomas Graal's Best Film (Mauritz Stille...

Bengt Forslund, in his article "Through a Glass Darkly, the silent era of Swedish Film", reminds us that Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller "made farces, comedies and melodramas, as well as medieval legends and romantic sagas, social films and realistic dramas." Interestingly enough Forslund tries to relate their affinity as having arisen not from a singleness of desire, or from a solidarity, but it having come rather from their disparity, from their having "little in common as individuals". This led to each learning the others technique of filmmaking. Peter Cowie, in his volume Scandinavian Cinema, sees the film as self-reflexive, writing "'Thomas Graal's Best Film' works primarily as a comedy of manners, but it also functions effectively as a satire on filmmaking, evene at this early stage of the industry's development. The implication is that cinema stands beyond reality, and as a medium attracts only the 'hammy' situation and the exagerrated personality." Peter Cowie notes that onscreen Victor Sjostrom and Karen Molander are the "ideal screen couple" and that Gustaf Molander, although only inevitably married to Karin Molander for eight years, wrote "scintillating" dialougue intertiles for her. Cowie points out that the film distinguishes Mauritz Stiller as one of the first directors to use a "film-within-a-film-format". Mauritz Stilleris particularly noted for having has directed Victor Sjostrom in two comedies for A.B Svenska, “Wanted A Film Actress” (“Thomas Graal’s Basta Film”, 1917) with actress Karin Molander and Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson and “Marriage ala mode” [“Thomas Graal’s First Child/ Thomas Graal’s Basta Barn”, 1918) also starring Karin Molander and Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson. The running time to the former, a film noted by Forsyth Hardy as one of the first comedies about filmmaking, was ninety minutes, the latter eighty nine minutes. Rune Carlsten and Henrik Jaenzon both appeared on screen in the film Thomas Graal’s Best Film, which was written under a pseudonym by Gustaf Molander. Molander continued as writer and director of “Thomas Graal’s Ward/ Thomas Graal’s mindling”, photographed by Adrian Bjurnman.

Louise Wallenberg, in her article Woman on Screen I, 1910's-1960's, feautured in the volume Now About All Those Women in the Swedish Film Industry, alludes to the director as spectator while evaluating Mauritz Stiller's view of his characters with his estimation of the while an invisible observer, his early comedies to "depict modern women who try to put an end to their as ribed position as wife and mother only to end up going ack to being docile and loving partners, they clearly express a desire to break free from conventional marital relations and gender roles. In this manner Stiller's comedies are indeed profeminist as they engage with public discourses and notions about women's societal positioning and personal subjecthood, and freedom in a society that is (still) strongly formed by patriarchal values." Wallenberg adds to this her estimation of Karin Molander as a protagonist in the later full feature comedies of Mauritz Stiller writing that they were "also worthy of mention since he gave his female actors agency and lots of space to maneuver next to his male leads."

Silent Film

Victor Sjostrom

Victor Sjostrom

Mauritz Stiller

Scott Lord Swedish Silent Film: Thomas Graal’s Basta Barn (Mauritz Still..

Peter Cowie, in his volume Scandinavian Cinema, writes, "The domestic relationships and erotic byplay in Stiller's comedies posses an application and validity beyond their immediate setting- and generation." In his volume Eighty Years of Cinema, Peter Cowie opines, "There is a spirited mischievousness about the performances of Victor Sjostrom and Karen Molander in 'Thomas Graal's First Child' that makes other acting of the period seem academic and ponderous.

Scholar Laura Horak, Carlton University, in the Journal of Scandinavian Cinema, points to Mauritz Stiller having between 1913-1918 directed "feminism comedies" and having "used comedy to explore controversial issues and contest the melodramatic tenor of sexual debates by modelling a light-hearted, cosmopolitan attitude towards social change".

Directed by Mauritz Stiller during 1918, the photoplay to ""Thomas Graal's Basta Barn" (Marriage ala Mode) was written by Gustaf Molander and the cinematographer to the film was Henrik Jaenzon. Starring with Victor Sjostrom and Karen Molander was actress Jenny Tschernichin-Larsson. Gustaf and Karin Molander were married from 1909 to 1919. Gustaf Molander continued as a writer and director of the third film in the series, "Thomas Graal's Myndling", photographed by Adrian Bjurman and starring Vera Schmiterlow, Gull Natrop, Tekla Sjoblom- although Molander was criticized for later directing comedies it may be that he was more recognized for continuing films in the series of adaptations by Victor Sjostrom of the works of Selma Lagerlof, making him more of a protogee of Victor Sjostrom and Mauritz Stiller by his having included himself in the Golden Age of Silent Film, which again he quickly absconded from after the advent of sound film.

It almost goes with out saying that that year Victor Sjostrom would gain worldwide recognition for Mauritz Stiller and himself with the protypical first classic film of the Golden Age of Swedish Silent Film, "The Outlaw and His Wife", which he directed and in which he starred on screen. He and Stiller both would soon be directing adaptations of the author Selma Lagerlof

Mauritz Stiller would not attempt to direct comedies in the United States before returning to Sweden, adhering to the "genre" he and Sjostrom had established together and adhering to the exoectations of genre by more than once returning to actress Pola Negri
Victor Sjostrom playlist Mauritz Stiller Love and Journalism (Mauritz Stiller)