Roy Andersson’s “Songs from the Second Floor” by Ursula Lindqvist

Roy Andersson’s “Songs from the Second Floor” by Ursula Lindqvist

Swedish filmmaker Roy Andersson’s celebrated and enigmatic film Songs from the Second Floor, his first feature film in twenty-five years, won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 2000. The “songs” of the film’s title refer to Andersson’s artistic ruminations on the state of mankind from his office on the second floor of Studio 24 in Stockholm. The film presents a series of forty-six tableaux—long, deep-focus shots with a still camera, mostly in studio settings, using older visual tricks such as trompe l’oeil. The tableaux showcase seemingly trivial tragicomic situations designed to provoke thoughts about existential guilt, broken relationships, and the failure of social institutions to treat people as human beings. Lindqvist draws from interviews with Andersson and his team that provide a behind-the-scenes look at how the film was made and investigates its philosophical and artistic influences, providing a nuanced reading of a film that has both befuddled and entranced its viewers. This first book-length study in English of Andersson’s work considers his aesthetic agenda and the unique methods that have become hallmarks of his filmmaking, as well as his firm belief in film’s revolutionary function as social critique.

"[O]ne of the greatest strengths of this book is how Lindqvist maintains a lively conversational style that engages the readerFurther, that so much of her book is based on personal interviews and archival material is both a testament to the depth of the background research and perhaps the book's most impressive quality."

* Scandinavian Studies *

Ursula Lindqvist is assistant professor of Scandinavian studies and film and media studies at Gustavus Adolphus College.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780295998251
ISBN 10	0295998253
Title	Roy Andersson’s “Songs from the Second Floor”
Author	Ursula Lindqvist
Series	Nordic Film Classics
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	University of Washington Press
Year published	2016-06-01
Number of pages	216
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.