Director Gustav Johansson unveils the next chapter of Volvo’s “Made By Sweden” campaign with a sweeping four minute-plus film, Vintersaga, which takes us into the depths of a Swedish January–the month when the country shows its harshest side with rain, snow, cold, wind and a timid sun.
It is also the period that defines Swedes the most. While people from all over the world flock to Sweden during the warm summer periods and enjoy the hours of extended daylight, only the residents choose to stay there voluntarily when the great melancholy rolls in. With the darkness and cold comes a special creativity that affects everything from the music the Swedes create to the cars that they build.
Johansson sought to capture visually the feeling of vemod–one of the most Swedish words, which does not have a clear or direct translation in English. Vemod is a complex emotion and a cultural phenomenon, comprising a tender sadness or melancholy mixed with a feeling of longing. Vemod is not an outward feeling, but more of a slow fretting inside of somebody. It is something that is sad, yet beautiful.
Shot over a period of 11 days, “Vintersaga” sees the bleak Swedish January transformed into a breathtaking and affecting vision through the lens of the Swedish people. Set to the pulsating title track “Vintersaga,” performed by Swedish singer/songwriter Amanda Bergman and produced by Oskar Linnros, the powerful combination of audio and visual stirs a transformative, almost haunting, emotional experience in the viewer.
From claustrophobic snow-topped forests to vast seaside panoramas, the sleek Volvo slips through the soaring scapes, as quintessentially Swedish as the background itself.
Agency is Forsman & Bodenfors, Stockholm.
