Bertil Guve

As children in the loving Ekdahl family, Fanny and Alexander enjoy a happy life with their parents, who run a theater company. After their father dies unexpectedly, however, the siblings end up in a joyless home when their mother, Emilie, marries a stern bishop. The bleak situation gradually grows worse as the bishop becomes more controlling, but dedicated relatives make a valiant attempt to aid Emilie, Fanny and Alexander.

Rational, exacting, and self-controlled theater director, Henrik Vogler, often stays after rehearsal to think and plan. On this day, Anna comes back, ostensibly looking for a bracelet. She is the lead in his new production of Strindberg's A Dream Play. She talks of her hatred for her mother, now dead, an alcoholic actress, who was Vogler's star and lover.

A quick overview of Swedish film history, featuring a breathtaking cavalry of scenes from about 170 films.

A 1981 TV film by Hallström about a 35-year-old footballer (played by Swedish pop star Robert Broberg) looking back over his life.

Through the eyes of ten-year-old Alexander, we witness the delights and conflicts of the Ekdahl family, a sprawling bourgeois clan in turn-of-the-twentieth-century Sweden.