SWE 1923 | Director: Per Lindberg | Script: Hjalmar Bergman | Camera: Ragnar Westfelt | Cast: Tora Teje, Linnéa Hillberg, Inga Tidblad, Egil Eide, Renée Björling | Production: Bonnierfilm | b/w | DCP | 86 min | silent with live accompaniment of music | swedish INT with english SUB | Swedish Film Institute

Blasé men, condescending family members, and especially, pushy bosses: Men and Other Misfortunes (the apt English title of the novel on which this film is based) determine the lives of young office workers Pegg (played with fine irony by Tora Teje), Baby, Eva and Emmy, in Per Lindberg's occasionally comedic NORRTULLSLIGAN. The rigours of long days spent typing at small desks without a break are followed by convivial evenings in the shared flat, where they dance, laugh, dream, and eat exuberantly. The four women can rely on each other and the office secretaries who finally go on strike. The film is based on the emancipatory novel by Swedish writer and pioneer of the women's movement, Elin Matilda Elisabet Wägner (1882-1949), who sharply criticised Lindberg's decision to align the end of the film with the social norms of the time. (Milena Gregor, Arsenal - Institute for Film and Video Art, 2022)

Maud Nelissen on the music for NORRTULLSLIGAN

„[...] the music for this film needs to be warm, intimate, lyrical, subtle, and at some points humoristic. There is no big drama happening, if the film shows its intimacy, warmth and humanity even more, and opens up ‘hidden’ corners, helped by my music, I will be satisfied
as a composer.

The Dutch composer/pianist Harry Bannink and the Dutch accordionist Harry Mooten, who played together numerous times for Bannink’s compositions have been of great importance for certain elements in my music. Bannink’s music is for me ‘the’ equivalent for warmth and humanity in music [...]

The music now will be composed for Accordion, Piano and Soprano/Alto saxophone.“