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Playing with Borders: Film Music and Social Criticism in Swedish Comedies by Hasse and Tage

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The Palgrave Handbook of Music in Comedy Cinema

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Abstract

This chapter discusses five films between 1964 and 1981 by two of the most popular comedians of all time in Sweden but practically unknown to a global audience: Hans ‘Hasse’ Alfredson and Tage Danielsson, often branded as Hasse&Tage. They mixed social and political criticism with humour, and their films can be genre-classified as a sort of political art-comedy since they used many familiar devices in the European art cinema. Their films thematise the industrialised countries’ urgent problems: climate, global capital destroying the countryside, and the modern society’s treatment of the ordinary people. They relate to Scandinavian comedy film music by using songs to comment on the narrative and societal challenges. Hasse&Tage often parodied other genres and styles through music. This is one of the salient characteristics of the film music in their films; others discussed are comic experiments through blurring the diegetic/non-diegetic border and playing with hierarchies through expressive contrast between visuals and music.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The Swedish Welfare State, like in the other Nordic countries (the Nordic model), builds on the premise that taxes primarily finance welfare. Welfare is defined broadly and encompasses everything from kindergarten, schools, health care, universities, social security, elderly care, and so on.

  2. 2.

    Examples of crazy films by Knäppupp are I rök och dans (Dance in the Smoke, 1954, dir. Yngve Gamlin and Bengt Blomberg), and Ratataa eller The Staffan Stolle Story (Ratataa or The Staffan Stolle Story, 1956, dir. Hasse Ekman).

  3. 3.

    Examples of comedies on migration are Jalla! Jalla! (2000, dir. Josef Fares), and Farsan (Balls, 2010, dir. Josef Fares).

  4. 4.

    See the Introduction of this volume for more details.

  5. 5.

    On the Marx Brothers, see Beth Levy’s chapter in this volume.

  6. 6.

    On Mel Brooks and John Morris, see Ron Sadoff’s chapter in this volume.

  7. 7.

    For the Swedish reader, it can be interesting to know that the workers are played by Lunds studentsångare (Lund University Male Voice Choir), under the lead of Folke Bohlin.

  8. 8.

    Paul Britten Austin translated the lyrics into English, and this version, ‘Where Angels Tread’, was recorded by Roger Whittaker in 1972.

  9. 9.

    For the reader not familiar with the concept of schlager: Wikipedia defines it as ‘Schlager music is a style of European popular music that is generally a catchy instrumental accompaniment to vocal pieces of pop music with simple, happy-go-lucky, and often sentimental lyrics. Typical Schlager tracks are either sweet, sentimental ballads with a simple, catchy melody or light pop tunes. Lyrics typically centre on love, relationships, and feelings’. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlager_music (accessed 15 July 2022).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lund University, Lund, Sweden

    Ann Kristin Wallengren

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  1. Ann Kristin Wallengren
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Correspondence to Ann Kristin Wallengren .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Media and Journalism, Linnaeus University, Kalmar/Växjö, Sweden

    Emilio Audissino

  2. Department of Media and Culture Studies, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Emile Wennekes

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Wallengren, A.K. (2023). Playing with Borders: Film Music and Social Criticism in Swedish Comedies by Hasse and Tage. In: Audissino, E., Wennekes, E. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Music in Comedy Cinema. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-33422-1_22

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