Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: A Stranger Knocks/En Fremmed Banker På (1959) - Jacobsen's erotic post-WWII drama

4/01/2017

A Stranger Knocks/En Fremmed Banker På (1959) - Jacobsen's erotic post-WWII drama

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A moody-blue poster for Johan Jacobsen's A Stranger Knocks that indicates the depressive intimacy it portrays

A war-made widow welcomes a stranger who comes knocking into her lonely existence, and soon they become lovers. - But there are things she doesn't know of her lodger.

A Stranger Knocks is a disillusioned, Danish post-war tale with a couple of fine actors' performances from Birgitte Federspiel (Babette's Feast/Babette's Gæstebud (1987)) and Preben Lerdorff Rye (The Woolen Stocking Peddler/Hosekræmmeren (1971)). Its pace is to the dragging side, but it has two sensational sex scenes that will still make audiences' eyes open wide and possibly gasp. It is not exactly a film with a lyrical charm to it, - some of its writing is palpable when it shouldn't be, - but it is still a good one.
A Stranger Knocks is written by Finn Methling (Be Dear to Me/Ingen Tid til Kærtegn (1957)) and directed by great Danish filmmaker Johan Jacobsen (Jenny and the Soldier/Soldaten og Jenny (1947)).

Here is a Danish video of director Jacobsen and the film with a longer clip from it

Cost: Unknown
Box office: Unknown
= Unknown
[A Stranger Knocks was released 21 April (Denmark) and runs 83 min. Regrettably, no information about its production or release is to be found online at this point, but it is likely, due to its quality, low budget and crowd-drawing content, that it was at least a box office success. It won 3 Bodil awards (Danish critics' awards): For Best Film, Actor and Actress. During its first decade, it was also screened in Sweden (1959), USA (1965), France (1965), Colombia (1967) and Mexico (1969), with Danish re-releases in 1966 and 1981. A primary selling point was, and remains, its "shocking" (various posters) sex scenes. In Denmark, it was forbidden for persons under 16 until 1970. 66 IMDb-users have given A Stranger Knocks a 6.6 average rating.]

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