It's more than 50 years soon since 79-year-old Lasse Hallström started his career as a director. In front of a cheering Cirkus and with his wife Lena Olin and children Johan and Tora Hellström in attendance, the Swedish Hollywood star was hailed for his career.
Letter from Bergman
Lasse Hallström told in his speech of thanks, among other things, about a letter Lena Olin had received from Ingmar Bergman.
Say hello to Lasse and tell him to damn well not go to America and that meat grinder. He'll never get out of it.
But Lasse Hallström didn't listen to the master director.
I threw myself into it and it ground and ground. The mills in America are so much bigger, but I think I slipped out unnoticed and I think I did quite well, said Hallström.
"Roa and röra"
Lasse Hallström has had the USA and Hollywood as his playing field since the late 1980s, with big films like "Gilbert Grape", "Cider House Rules", and "Chocolat".
I wanted to both entertain and move. It has been my motto, said Hallström in his speech of thanks.
But it all started in Sweden where he, after making entertainment TV in the early 1970s, renewed the Swedish romantic comedy with films like "A Guy and a Girl" and "I'm Pregnant".
At the same time, he made most of ABBA's now classic music videos that set the group's visual identity in the mid-1970s.
Lasse Hallström also made two films about Astrid Lindgren's fairy tales about the children in Bullerbyn before "My Life as a Dog" became the big breakthrough – and led to both several Oscar nominations and a career in North America.
Hallström has worked more in Europe in recent years. Two years ago, the film "Hilma" about the artist Hilma af Klint was released, and the latest project was the crime series "The Darkness", with Lena Olin in the lead role. The series premiered in November.
