Considered at the time of its release as the crowning glory of Sjostrom’s work in Sweden, The Phantom Carriage is based on a novel by Salma Lagerlof. The story of David Holm, who is clubbed to death in a graveyard on the stroke of midnight at the turn of the year, and who is resurrected by an embodiment of death (a coach driver who emerges from the waves) to relive the crises and errors of his past existence, is narrated in a complex weave of flashbacks and superimpositions.
Sweden, 1921.
English titles.
Black and white.
Silent.
73 mins.