In this time and age, it’s pretty much impossible to write a review of Hasse Ekman’s most accomplished film without talking about the shocking secret revealed in the ending. At the time of the premiere, the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet polled the audience after a screening and it turned out that almost half of them didn’t understand the ending. Today it is glaringly obvious… but that poll says something about how deeply buried homosexuality was as a topic in society at the time.

Hanging from the ceiling
The film begins with Dagmar Brink (Eva Henning) leaving a party, agitated; the next morning, a cleaning lady finds her dead, hanging from the ceiling. The police notify Dagmar’s neighbors, Anders and Britt Wikner (Ulf Palme, Birgit Tengroth), that she left them what few possessions she had. Since they didn’t really know this unfortunate girl, the Wikners find it curious. Anders, a writer, becomes interested in the case and believes there must be something sensational behind the suicide. He starts looking into Dagmar’s life, finds books in her apartment by Hjalmar Gullberg, Edith Södergran and Karin Boye (a clue as good as any…), and pieces together her last months.

In the early 1940s, Dagmar was married to an officer, but it only lasted four years. Anders also tracks down Elias Körner (Anders Ek), an artist who lived with Dagmar for some time, but drank away any chance of having a romantic relationship with her. The more Anders learns about Dagmar, the more perplexing he finds her.

Stealing from Citizen Kane
The story has a Hitchcockian quality, infused with mystery. Henning plays the tormented girl in a way that makes us wonder how she could lose herself… in any case, that’s how a 1950s audience must have seen it. To a modern viewer, it seems obvious after a while that Dagmar was gay and unhappily in love. That revelation doesn’t come until the finale, but director Ekman skilfully ties all the loose ends of Anders’s investigation together. He may have stolen the concept from Citizen Kane (1941), but no matter; connecting flashbacks from a person’s life with present events is an effective tool here as well.

The film is a fascinating document from an era when anything that strayed from heterosexuality was considered a disease.

Right from the start, composer Erland von Koch sets the tone; his foreboding score turns into a memorable symbol of Dagmar’s tragedy. The film is a fascinating document from an era when anything that strayed from heterosexuality was considered a disease. The depiction of how healthy but miserable Dagmar looks just because she can’t have what all the straight people have is ahead of its time.

This was Henning’s most memorable role, but she’s part of a fine cast, including Palme and Tengroth as her curious neighbors, Ek as the pretentious seasonal drunk, and Karl-Arne Holmsten as a handsome womanizer.

A few weeks ago, my sister’s neighbor killed himself. A horrifying thing to happen, and one’s mind immediately begins to wonder what happened there. Might be comforting to know that the risk of someone committing suicide because they are gay has become much less likely since the 1950s. At least in this part of the world.

Girl with Hyacinths 1950-Sweden. 89 min. B/W. Produced, written and directed by Hasse Ekman. Cinematography: Göran Strindberg. Music: Erland von Koch. Cast: Eva Henning (Dagmar Brink), Ulf Palme (Anders Wikner), Birgit Tengroth (Britt Wikner), Anders Ek, Gösta Cederlund, Karl-Arne Holmsten, Keve Hjelm, Sven-Eric Gamble, Gudrun Brost.

Trivia: Original title: Flicka och hyacinter.

Last word: “I am convinced that if Dagmar Brink had lived ten or fifteen years later she wouldn’t have had to take her own life. Society’s view of homosexuality has changed. The day will come when this phenomenon will not be seen as dirty or ugly. Had Dagmar Brink been a ‘shallow gal’ the consequences had not been so tragic. Her instinct of purity, her moral code drove her to the edge […] If Girl with Hyacinths helps, to some extent, clear the air in the debate about homosexuals, the work has not been in vain.” (Ekman in 1950, Aftonbladet)