My relationship to The Phantom Carriage is very special....I remember it as one of the great emotional and artistic experiences of my life. I didn't have much awareness of what the film was about, it was the intonation and the magic. It must have been 1933. I'd already been to the cinema a lot, but The Phantom Carriage was the first really big cinematic experience. Even now I can't really make out what it was that captured me so utterly....The Phantom Carriage is still one of my great film experiences. I see it in my cinema every summer. I've had that cinema for over 20 years now. I have always started my season with Sjöström's The Girl from the Marsh Croft (Tösen från Stormynttorpet), which by the way is another marvelously told film from that time, and I conclude each year with The Phantom Carriage.

The Legend of Gosta Berling is the actual end of the great period of Swedish film. When it came out Victor Sjöström had already left for Hollywood and Stiller soon followed. I watch The Legend of Gösta Berling with great enthusiasm. But you have to forget the book and not think that there is an outstanding novel behind it. It is its great energy and unabashed brilliance which allows me to watch this film at any time. It is as fabulous every time....wonderful in its suffering and its beauty and most of all in its passion.

Gustaf Molander made over fifty films and the reason I chose Dollar is mostly by chance. But Hjalmar Bergman wrote it and Ingrid Bergman is so captivating in it. I consider it as quite representative of his many comedies in its balance and its perfection. When I started in Swedish film there was only one dramaturgy that counted and that was the American. I saw a pile of American films and learnt so much. Besides, Stina Bergman, who was the head of the script department at Svensk Filmindustri where I worked, was entirely taken with American dramaturgy. Still today I admire the American directors; Billy Wilder, William Wellman and George Cukor. They're an unbeatable trio. There is no doubt that it was there that Gustaf Molander got his impulse from....Molander's sentimentality was foreign to me but he could be accurate at the same time. He made some good films that have been completely lost in Swedish film history. When I got to know him I was stumbling around and was totally passionate about the French: Jules [sic] Duvivier, René Clair and Marcel Carné. But passion is one thing and relationships another. There is no doubt that I have Gustaf Molander to thank for my necessary basic schooling. His planning, his methodology and his precise feeling for actors. And Dollar is charming and entertaining. It is naturally of its time and is very 30's. But is that a problem?

Of course one could claim that in a line-up such as this one should choose Alf Sjöberg's best film, in all categories, Miss Julie (Fröken Julie). But it is so well-known after its prize at Cannes. And it is really remarkable in all ways. I have the film myself and can still look at it with happy astonishment. I often think of Alf Sjöberg....We were colleagues at the Royal Theatre and I held Alf Sjöberg in great admiration. His stagings of Shakespeare meant that I never attempted any Shakespeare until after Alf's death. Only then did I dare to try it. As a theatre director he was completely outstanding. He could have been that as a film director as well but he was unbelievably ungenerously treated and always looked upon with suspicion. And when he did get chances he often threw them away. He was good at that. Only a Mother is a strong film, both concerning its form and its story. Eva Dahlbeck in the lead is extraordinary. During a long period she was the queen of the Swedish film.

Here is Your Life is a 35 year old film. It is one of the films I see every summer. It is so exuberantly rich, just like many of Jan Troell's other great films. Every time I see it I discover new things in it. It is a film that delivers a great treasure. In a list like this it is obvious that this film is included. Here is Your Life is one of the uncompromising masterpieces of Swedish film history. Troell threw himself at it and he has made it exactly as he wanted to. To make your debut with a film like that is more than admirable.

The first time I saw Elvira Madigan when it came out in 1967 I actually didn't think it was anything special. I think it had a lot to do with the fact that Bo Widerberg at that time couldn't open his mouth without saying something disparaging about me. We had practically never met. But he wrote a book where he aggressively attacked me and I could never understand why. I actually thought he was an extremely good director, not for theatre but for film. I saw Elvira Madigan again last summer when the newly restored version was ready and I saw it was a masterpiece. It is a film that is alive at each moment....I could naturally choose Raven's End (Kvarteret Korpen). That is his great masterpiece, an impeccable film. But it is Elvira Madigan because it is such a beautiful film. I think it is a pity that Bo and myself were never on speaking terms and that Bergman and Widerberg remained an unsolved complication.

Roy Andersson has a not uncomplicated chapter all to himself. I've written this: 'I don't like Roy Andersson's productions. That doesn't prevent me from admiring his fearlessness, his courage and his uncompromising implementation of his visions. Furthermore, he makes the best commercials in the world.' But to exclude Roy Andersson from a list such as this for personal reasons would be a faux pas. I saw Giliap again last summer. The mixed impression remains....Roy Andersson is a talented person and I thought of him recently when I saw a French film, L'humanité (Humanity) by Bruno Dumont. There is something that Roy Andersson strives for in that film, but I am not so sure he will ever achieve it. You have to care about the people in the story. This French director Dumont is obviously obsessed with people, he loves them. Imagine if Roy Andersson could be driven by the same obsession for people as for form!

I want to be short and concise here: 'At times one becomes quite simply happy, nice and grateful by going to the cinema, perhaps for a few moments one even becomes a better person. This is such a film.'

With Mai Zetterling it is a little as it is with Alf Sjöberg. She rushes around and the whole thing is brilliant even when it is not so good. I made a few notes: 'Words that come to me with reference to Mai Zetterling: Unwavering will, tremendous vision, passionate relationship to the medium, boundless generosity, obsession, emotional intelligence. So much talent easily leads to a total loss of balance.' Perhaps it sounds negative, but I think it must be said, because that was what was brilliant about Mai Zetterling. It was never really that good, but even so all the more magnificent!

And then we get to Show Me Love, the last film in the series: 'A young master's first masterpiece. We place unreasonable expectations which hopefully won't be overbearing.'