11/04/2006

Vilgot Sjöman, one of Sweden’s finest and most controversial film personalities, passed away last Sunday morning in Stockholm at the age of 81.

The writer/filmmaker who studied film at UCLA in 1955 and trained with Ingmar Bergman in the early 1960s, made over 20 films between 1962 and 1995, including a 5-part documentary following Bergman during the filming of Winter Light in 1963. But he will be remembered mostly for his 1968 pioneering quasi-documentary I Am Curious (Yellow), which became a hallmark document about Swedish society during the sexual revolution, mixing sex and politics in a totally revolutionary way.

Leif Pagrotsky, Sweden’s Cultural Minister, said of Sjöman: "He is with Ingmar Bergman, the filmmaker who contributed the most to making Sweden famous around the world. He touched and irritated, both as a filmmaker and as a novelist. Vilgot Sjöman was always provocative, with determination, humor and sharpness. He infuriated many by mixing sex and politics in a new way at the time. More recently, I remember Vilgot mostly for his battle for film’s artistic integrity in the debate about advertising cuts on TV".