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All Things Fair

1995 Swedish film directed by Bo Widerberg

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 16, 2026
Entity authorityQ1675604
Source-derived summary

All Things Fair (Swedish: Lust och fägring stor, literally "Desire and Great Beauty") is a 1995 Swedish period drama film, written and directed by Bo Widerberg as his final film. It tells the story of a sexual relationship between a teacher and her 15-year-old student in Malmö, Sweden during World War II. Widerberg's son Johan stars as the boy Stig and Marika Lagercrantz plays his teacher Viola. The original title is taken from the Swedish hymn "Den blomstertid nu kommer", which is traditionally sung in schools before closing for the summer holiday.

All Things Fair was released to cinemas in Sweden on 3 November 1995. The film won several domestic and international awards and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Plot

In 1943 in the midst of World War II, Stig is a 15-year-old boy in his third year at a Malmö school, having moved with his family to the area from Stockholm two years prior. He is close with his older brother Sigge, a boxer who will soon be leaving for duty on the front lines. One day during class, Stig gets into trouble for passing notes and is asked by his teacher Viola to stay behind. She demands to see the note, which reveals the boys' ignorance about sex in embarrassing detail. As punishment, Viola has Stig wash the blackboard and get rid of the flies in the classroom.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “All Things Fair” as 1995 Swedish film directed by Bo Widerberg. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Things, Fair and Swedish.

Editorial reviewBest approached as a cultural-object dossier: authorship and date matter, but circulation and reception often explain the wider significance. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1995, 1943—that can be checked directly. The authority record carries competing date values—1995-11-03, 1996-09-05—which should remain separate until their references and qualifiers are resolved. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Things, Fair and Swedish providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “All Things Fair”, the useful work is to connect “1995 Swedish film directed by Bo Widerberg” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1675604. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1995 and 1943.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “All Things Fair”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow All Things Fair primary sources, All Things Fair archive and Things research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “All Things Fair”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from All Things Fair” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.