Amorosa

The 1980s saw a remarkable number of prestigious heritage film productions by female directors – from the Netherlands, for example, Nouchka van Brakel's recently restored Frederik van Eeden adaptation Hedwig: The Quiet Lakes (1982) comes to mind.

In Sweden, Mai Zetterling was able to finally realise her long-cultivated dream of directing a lavish personal vision of the life of rebellious modernist writer Agnes von Krusenstjerna, whose Fröknarna von Pahlen novels provided the basis for her debut feature Älskande par (1964).

As von Krusenstjerna's novels were often autobiographically inspired, it makes sense that Zetterling often blurs the line between imagination/delirium and a realistic recreation of her socially inappropriate relation with fellow writer David Sprengel who, again, was most probably involved in the creation of the Fröknarna von Pahlen books – which suggests certain parallels to Zetterling's collaboration with her second husband, novelist David Hughes, on her first fiction features... A monument to female subjectivity!