Raptures

In Jon Blåhed’s claustrophobic 1930s-set drama, the first film to be made using the minority language Meänkieli, a Christian woman trapped in her husband’s sectarian movement quietly fights to protect her family from his bizarre and increasingly dangerous worldview.

At a time when religious extremism is once again on the rise around the world, Jon Blåhed’s simmering drama offers a rejoinder to the dangers of sectarian belief systems. In a remote part of northern Sweden in the 1930s, Rakel lives with her husband Teodor. She is a devout Christian and is initially unsettled when Teodor decides to form his own cult. But her unease soon turns to mistrust and fear as her husband’s worldview becomes more extreme, sharing visions of an imminent apocalypse and promoting sexual congress that challenges Rakel’s strong moral outlook.

Inspired by Bengt Pohjanen’s 1988 novel Dagning, röd! and the Korpela Movement that existed in northern Sweden in the 1930s, Blåhed’s film also draws on his own experiences as the son of a village preacher who grew up in a close-knit religious community in the region. Filmed on location and employing the minority language Meänkieli for most of the film’s dialogue, Raptures offers an authentic portrait of a world gone by. But in the way he charts the rise of Teodor’s cult, Blåhed presents a cautionary tale that highlights the fine line between the tenets of faith and perniciousness of untrammelled belief systems.

– Vanja Kaludjercic

Trailer

Interview

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