Stora skälvan

Stora Skälvan 1972 (The Big Chill) by director Leif Krantz, famous in Sweden for his contribution to youth oriented suspenseful TV series. This Series is about a group of bored teenagers who are forced to spend the summer holiday on a small fishing isle and who decide to gather inside a shipwreck by the shore, every night. They chat, play guitar and sing (yeah, this is the 1970's) and drink coffee and soda. But it all boils down to an agreement that any one that can, shall tell the others the creepiest or most unsettling experience they have had. So, every episode is an individual story!

In the first one, a dreamy "twilight zone" kind of story - "The Disappearance", the girl Kia meets a strange flirting boy no one ever seen, and the boy acts strange and make her do naughty things, as stealing a posh looking boat and driving out to some isle, but when they have a boat accident, the boy disappears mysteriously. Was he ever real? In the second entry "Falcons", maybe the most suspenseful and rather beautiful one, is about the boy Tor who while deciding to climb an interesting mountain ridge, somebody starts shooting at him with a rifle! Terrified he does not know what to do hanging by his hands off a cliff. After a manhunt sequence in the forest it shall not be revealed why this happens, but the message is very beautiful actually. As no 3 we have a rather comical episode "The Fortress" which is about a young history nerd who gets himself locked inside the name building encountering ghostlike figure, and the fourth - "The Black Boat", a rather paranoid and actually realistic story about alcohol smugglers of the archipelagos.

In no 5, "10 000 cold" (10 000 SEK) with the pretty 17 year old girl Maria (played by Maria Lindberg who starred in Krantz earlier series!), is about the agony this girl feels as her father suddenly demands her to bring, all alone, all that money in a bag to an associate in the southern city of Gothenburg. She feels like everybody on the train wants to peek into her bag, and as she looks and dress kind of sexy for her age, some guys start to approach her for another reason then she thinks. Finally arriving, Maria messes things up by delivering the money to a creepy looking total stranger. Maria shows her acting experience here and is truly pulling off a fun one-girl-show!

The legendary last episode, "The Ambush", was about a fear pretty much any teenager, back then or in present day, experience when groups of youngsters seem to be ready for nasty things when grownups are not near. The fear of being caught by another gang in a gang war in the forest, and being humiliated, abused and tortured mentally and physically. The episode is not as creepy as it sounds, but the psychological threat is there and pretty realistic. It shows that violence can get overhand with any person.

But the TV audience never got to view this last episode. To our disappointment, it was turned down by the TV censor-board. Stora Skälvan (The Big Chill) was aired once and I think, repriced in a non public TV channel in the late 1980's, but not until now do we have the chance to view this legendary and actual unique portrait of Swedish teenagers in the land of free, with the carefree atmosphere the young experienced void of techniques and commercialism. There are some light nudity here, one topless shot and girls walk around without bra of course and swim unashamed as they appear. Violence is mild and there is absolutely no sex here, of course. Apart from a spooky funny intro song for each episode, the stories are backed up by some really groovy sounds from a free soft sounding rock band that adds a dreamy dimension to some of the episodes. Leif Krantz' series are all highly watchable and of course I wish they could be sold outside Scandinavia with English subtitles!

This TV show is probably the least memorable of the hit delivering director Leif Krantz's efforts. Several of the child actors participating in the previous - and rather formidable - shows "Kullamannen" ("The Man from Kullen" 1967) and "Kråkguldet" ("Crow's Gold" 1969) reappear as teenagers.

To begin with, the title "Stora skälvan", "The Willies", is totally misleading as it is nothing like a scary movie. Awkward, dull and repetitious.

There is no straightforward story or plot. Each episode is presented as a sort of bonfire tale told by a member of a crowd of teenage buddies. With the exception of the very last episode, which according to the other reviewer here was not aired due to censorship, the stories are absolutely pointless, badly acted, and badly shot. Even the direction displays surprisingly obvious shortcomings. Krantz cannot have been wholeheartedly committed to this enterprise. The reason for canceling episode ¤6 is not clear to me, but the theme here is somewhat reminiscent of "Lord of the Flies", and that might have disturbed the political double standards of the day. I wish to salute Krantz for not yielding to the pressure of the left-wing establishment of the era.

I seem to discern a chord of sexual frustration: half a dozen handsome fifteen-year-olds who hang out together at a seaside summer location, partly semi nude too, and none of them shows any kind of tendresse or erotic interest towards another member of the group. That's bloody odd. Especially when considering how open-minded Sweden of the 70s was.

A series definitely best remembered as a trifle, and best preserved inside the vaults of the Govenmnet Television fortress at Oxenstiernsgatan in Stockholm.