Summer with Monika (1953) on Netflix
Harry Lund packs glassware in Stockholm and Monika Eriksson sells vegetables nearby. They meet at a cafe; when home and work grow unbearable, they escape in his father's boat to the archipelago.
- Netflix4.4/5
- IMDb7.5/1018,081 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes100%
Trailer
Plot summary
Monika Eriksson talks to Harry Lund at a cafe near the Stockholm warehouse where he packs glassware and she sells vegetables. She asks him to a movie after his shift, and the two spend the evening together. At home, Monika has had enough of her father's drinking and violence, so she packs her belongings and leaves; Harry takes her in for the night aboard his father's docked boat. The next morning he argues with his boss and quits his job. With nothing holding them in the city, the pair take the small boat out into the Stockholm Archipelago to spend the summer alone.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Summer with Monika (1953)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Exploitation presenter Kroger Babb bought the US rights in 1955, cut Ingmar Bergman's film to 62 minutes, stressed its nudity, retitled it Monika, the Story of a Bad Girl and sent out suggestive postcards of the nude Harriet Andersson.
- A September 1955 Time magazine article, "Sin & Sweden", about secularized Swedish life, fed a Cold War-era US debate marked by conservative hostility to anything like socialism, and this with commercial interests drove the exploitation market's idea of "Swedish sin".
- Ingmar Bergman was romantically involved with Harriet Andersson and made the film as a showcase for her talent; it launched her to stardom.
