Mai Elizabeth Zetterling (1925-94) is among the most exceptional postwar
female filmmakers. Born in Sweden, she lived in England and France for
most of her life, making her directorial debut in 1964 with the Swedish
art film Loving Couples after a fraught transition from working in
front of the camera as a successful actress.
Critics have compared her work to that of Ingmar Bergman, Luis Buñuel,
and Federico Fellini, but Zetterling had a distinct style--alternately
radical and reactionary--that straddled the gendered divide between high
art and mass culture. Tackling themes of sexuality, isolation, and
creativity, her documentaries, short and feature films, and television
works are visually striking. Her oeuvre provoked controversy and scandal
through her sensational representations of reproduction and
motherhood.
Mariah Larsson provides a lively and authoritative take on Zetterling's
legacy and complicated position within film and women's history. A
Cinema of Obsession provides necessary perspective on how the breadth
of an artist's collected works keeps gatekeepers from recognizing their
achievements, and questions why we still distinguish between national
and global visual cultures and the big and small screens in the #MeToo
era.