Lennart Olsson

When disillusioned Swedish knight Antonius Block returns home from the Crusades to find his country in the grips of the Black Death, he challenges Death to a chess match for his life. Tormented by the belief that God does not exist, Block sets off on a journey, meeting up with traveling players Jof and his wife, Mia, and becoming determined to evade Death long enough to commit one redemptive act while he still lives.

Early in the 20th century, middle-aged lawyer Fredrik Egerman and his young wife, Anne, have still not consummated their marriage, while Fredrik's son finds himself increasingly attracted to his new stepmother. To make matters worse, Fredrik's old flame Desiree makes a public bet that she can seduce him at a romantic weekend retreat where four couples convene, swapping partners and pairing off in unexpected ways.

Monika and Nadja are sisters and ballet dancers. Lately, Monika has lost some of her interest in ballet. Instead, she marries the businessman Ragnar. But eventually, she discovers that the comfortable life she has does not suit her, and returns to the ballet academy.

A knight returning home with his squire Jons after a ten-year crusade to the Holy Land finds a country paralyzed by the Black Death, a newly burned witch, a blacksmith and his runaway wife, an actress, a Virgin Mary with her child and the knight's faithful wife. All approaches the realm of the dead in a single "tragicomic long dance of death". The narrator begins with: "In a church in southern Småland is our spectacle painted on the wall just to the right of the entrance to the porch. The unknown painter has on the church wall depicted a number of people in formal long dance toward death."