Prejudice & Pride, the latest documentary by Swedish filmmaker Eva Beling, offers an exploration of the lesser-known queer history of Swedish cinema. Beling’s fascination with Swedish cinema was piqued during a conversation with Jan Göransson, head of press at the Swedish Film Institute, when she learned about a queer entourage in the 1910s and 1920s. The discovery led her to plough through memoirs and order up every film available at the National Library, resulting in a stunning tapestry of queer Swedish cinema, from the world’s earliest gay romance to the new wave of transgender films.
The documentary highlights the fascinating and largely unexplored connections between German and Swedish cinema in the early 20th century, where both nations’ cinema were collaborating extensively. The groundbreaking work of pioneering director Mauritz Stiller and Swedish actor Nils Asther is featured prominently in the film, with their personal relationship and queer entourage providing a window into Swedish queer history. The film reveals how Stiller made Vingarne (The Wings) in 1916, which may be the world’s first gay romance on screen.
The film also examines the influence of queer writers on Swedish cinema. Selma Lagerlöf, a queer writer, wrote the script for Stiller’s The Saga of Gösta Berling, and her work, especially her novel Thy Soul Shall Bear Witness! and its subsequent film adaptation, The Phantom Carriage, was a notable influence on Ingmar Bergman’s cinema. The documentary raises interesting questions about how these writers may have been the root of the queerness in Bergman’s own films.
Prejudice & Pride also explores the idea of the queer gaze and how queer audiences decode narratives in a different way from straight audiences. The documentary analyses Greta Garbo’s performances, particularly in Queen Christina (1933), through the lens of the queer gaze. Beling credits Stiller for casting actors with an androgynous way of being and putting them in his films, leading to Garbo’s success.
