Scandinavian Film & TV: October 2024

This month’s column is a Nordic preview of the BFI London Film Festival. The strength and diversity of Nordic film and TV are on display when the BFI London Film Festival kicks off in October.

To a Land Unknown, The Apprentice and Families Like Ours, which have all been featured in the column, are just some of the Nordic creativity on display at this year’s festival, with To a Land Unknown also being featured in the awards category In Competition. But beyond these titles, several others can be enjoyed at this year’s festival.

In Sex, which picked up nine nominations and eight awards at the Berlin International Film Festival, Norwegian director Dag Johan Haugerud tackles the complicated dilemma of two male colleagues, both in heterosexual relationships, developing affection for each other and starting an intimate relationship.

Icelandic director Rúnar Rúnarsson’s When the Light Breaks is a stylised film shot on 16mm film, something rare in today’s modern filmmaking. It’s a love story which also touches on loss and acceptance. It picked up nominations at both Cannes and Munich film festivals.

Sex. Photo: BFI London Film Festival

Mikko Mäkelä is based in London and describes himself as a Finnish-British filmmaker, named by IndieWire as one of 25 LGBTQ Filmmakers on the Rise in 2019. His second feature film Sebastian tells the dark story of an aspiring writer living in London who begins a double life as a sex worker to research his debut novel.

In the alternative documentary Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989, the Swedish director Göran Hugo Olsson uses over 30 years of public service broadcasting archive and manages to create a portrait of how the conflict was portrayed on Swedish TV during that period.

For the younger audience, Sweden’s Stina Wirsén and Linda Hambäck bring us the 5-minute animation Who’s Wrong, a show-and-tell day-in-class story. And from Denmark, a brave knight is pushed to the edge in a 2-minute non-dialogue animation short from directors Luciano A. Muñoz Sessarego, Magnus I. Møller and Peter Smith.

The BFI London Film Festival runs 9-20 October across several London venues.

Anders Lorenzen is a Danish blogger and film and TV enthusiast living in London.