SVT Dokumentär

To what extent does a director stay objective and anonymously hidden behind the camera? The Danish director Jon Bang Carlsen knows for sure that the choices he makes in his films aren’t accidental. Several excerpts from his own work show that events in his personal life have a major influence on his work. In fact, he appears to be using images that he recognizes in particular. It’s a revelation for this filmmaker, who used to think he could stay objective and invisible. Topics such as doubting his faith, his runaway father and impressions from a carefree childhood are recurring themes in his diverse oeuvre. Showing us individual scenes, Carlsen comments in voice-over on the images and muses about his life and work.

A documentary that follows two young women raising children and supporting drug habits through prostitution in Iran ruled by religious fundamentalists.

For almost half of his life, Kenneth Viken has been in prison, and he does not know how many times he has been released, only to soon return . In January 2016 he is released again.

Documentary about wheel-chair bound stand-up comedian Jesper Odelberg. He was born with cerebral palsy and largely uses this as his material, but mixes his comedy with an overall serious message about inclusion and understanding.

D Carleton Gajdusek won the Nobel Prize for the discovery of Prions - the particles that would emerge as the cause of Mad Cow disease - while working with a cannibal tribe on New Guinea. He was a star of the scientific world. Over his years working amongst the tribes of the South Seas, he adopted 57 kids, bringing them to a new life in Washington DC. His adoptions were hailed as wonderful fatherly beneficence. But, at the height of his career, rumours began to spread he was a paedophile. Gajdusek would argue that if sex with children was okay in their own cultures, he wasn't wrong to join in. How could a great mind like Gajdusek's lose insight so totally, and why would the scientific community to which he was a hero be so quick to leap to his defence and dismiss the allegations? (Storyville)

Lars Nordlander often bases his lyrics on his own life. He has written lyrics to Monica Zetterlund, Lill Lindfors, Lill-Babs, Tommy Körberg and Björn Skifs for more than 40 years.

Mats Öberg, born 1971 in Umeå, Sweden, has been living in Stockholm for many years, where he moved when he entered the Royal Academy of Music, where for two and a half years he studied individual music and, among other things, studied with the pianist Stefan Nilsson. Frank Zappa is one of Mats Öberg's idols. Together with drummer Morgan Ågren, Mats formed the group Zappatetoot early on, which only played Zappa covers. Then when Frank Zappa played in Stockholm in 1988, Mats and Morgon had the opportunity to meet him and also sit in the band. It was the beginning of a continued collaboration which meant that they both got to participate in the projects Zappa's Universe and Zappa at Lincoln Center in 1993.

Monica & Carl-Axel Dominique have been married for over 60 years and have played music for as long as they can remember. They have worked with some of Sweden's biggest names. Tom Alandh finally gets the chance to make his documentary about them, something he has wanted to do for two decades.

Pia Sjögren was the subject of three documentaries by director Tom Alandh, beginning in 2001. He first saw her on the street selling newspapers, homeless, addicted to drugs, trying to make enough money for the day. Since then, she has become clean, and now gives lectures about her experiences, sharing her knowledge. This is the fourth film about her, filmed between 2011-2020. At the start of this installment, Pia has recently begun having heart and breathing issues, her own daughter is in prison for narcotics, and her mother, who we were introduced to in previous installments, continues to struggle with rapidly decreasing eyesight.

With the refugee influx in 2015, Ronneby gained 3,000 new inhabitants and the schools 1,000 new students. Tom Alandh traveled to Ronneby to find out how this has affected society and its inhabitants and their real and perceived security.

For 20 years, Rikard Viking Flinga was in Texas' harshest prisons, convicted of murder. Rikard Viking Flinga is a Swedish citizen but has never been to Sweden. But in early March 2000, he was transferred there to start a new life.

Another film about Martina Schaub, now thirty years old.

A film about Jan Troell who turns 90 this summer. We get to see Jan Troell's own pictures, but also a conversation about childhood happiness and the joy of creation.

Filmmaker Johan Palmgren returns to Slussen in Stockholm and captures both major crises and small observations this special year.

A film about dreams and opportunities, not about problems.

'Martina och jag', from 2008, was intended to be the last film about Martina Schaub, a woman with Down's Syndrome. But now, another ten years later, director Tom Alandh returns to Martina's world once more. She has been a part of Tom Alandh's filmography since she was five, and now at fifty, new challenges present themselves.

He was 19 years old and promising gymnast. But one volt went wrong, one in a hundred thousand, and he broke his neck. Never go again, the doctors thought. And never again breathe on your own, without a respirator.

Stefan Nilsson chose to end his life on May 25, 2023, just months after being diagnosed with ALS. This follow-up documentary by Tom Alandh brings to the surface the issues revolving euthanasia when there seems to be nothing left to do.