Giliap (1975)

Giliap is a 1975 Swedish drama film directed by Roy Andersson, starring Thommy Berggren as a man who takes a job as a waiter at a run-down hotel. It was a financial and critical failure, and it led to Andersson's not making another feature film for 25 years. Andersson has admitted that the film contains flaws, and he claims that the main reason for them was that he was not completely in control of the production, and therefore he had to compromise in several scenes. He has also suggested that the audience was not ready for the film, expecting it to be more similar to his previous film A Swedish Love Story: "I think they didn't understand what I was doing. Later, when Kubrick came out with Barry Lyndon, people accepted that - it's the same mood. But these things take time." The film is notable for its stylised settings, resembling what would later be seen in a more refined form in Andersson's Songs from the Second Floor and You, the Living.

Synopsis

A man arrives in a Swedish small town to work as a waiter at the run-down Hotel Busarewski (a play on the Swedish word "buse" - "crook"). He is installed in a small room, and soon begins to serve customers under the supervision of a strict, wheelchair-using manager suffering from an exaggerated self image.

Actors