Walpurgis Night is a 1936 film from Sweden directed by Gustaf Edgren.
A businessman, Johan Borg, is stuck in an unsatisfactory marriage with his icy wife Clary. Johan wants children and Clary doesn't, and besides that, Clary doesn't seem to like him very much. One afternoon Clary cancels on agreed plans to go out with her husband, saying that she's going to a friend's place for the weekend. This triggers a nasty argument that ends in the breakup of their marriage. Left alone and depressed, Johan turns to his lovely secretary, Lena (20-year-old Ingrid Bergman in one of her first starring roles), who is desperately in love with him.
What Johan doesn't know is that Clary wasn't going out of town to spend the weekend with a friend. She was actually visiting a back-alley abortionist. This plays out against a background theme of Sweden's low birthrate and how Swedish women need to pop out babies for the good of the nation.
The movie is named for Walpurgisnacht, a common spring festival in northern Europe. Victor Sjöström appears as Lena's father, Fredrik Bergström. Johan is played by Lars Hanson, who was a star in the late silent-film era in Hollywood before talkies sent him back to Sweden.
Tropes:
- An Aesop: Swedish women need to have babies, to maintain the country's population, and if a woman hesitates to have children it must be because she's a selfish schemer.
- As You Know: When Lena says she has to go be with her father, Johan says "Yes I read that the editor will be 60 tomorrow," letting the audience know that Lena's dad is the newspaper editor from the opening scene.
- Back-Alley Doctor: Dr. Smith, the back-alley abortionist who aborts Clary's pregnancy, and then is arrested, Clary just barely escaping arrest herself. Apparently he isn't even a real doctor as the newspaper headlines of the story use Scare Quotes and call him a "Doktor".
- Blackmail: The Back-Alley Doctor's henchman, Frank Roger, has the card with Clary Borg's name on it. He demands 5,000 kroner or he'll reveal her secret.
- Blackmail Backfire: The blackmailer trying to extort 5,000 kroner from the Borgs dies, but not in the usual way—he tries to get more money out of Johan, a struggle ensues after the blackmailer pulls a gun, Clary picks up the gun, and Clary shoots the blackmailer.
- Book Ends: The film opens on April 30, with Walpurgis Night coming up and the guys at the newspaper talking about how Sweden needs more babies. It ends the same way, apparently on the next April 30 with the guys still talking about how Sweden needs more babies.
- Conversation Cut: Frederik, talking in the newspaper office about Sweden's declining birthrate, says "The root cause of the whole problem is the lack of love." Cut to Johan saying "Yes that's right, the lack of love!" to Clary, as he wonders why their marriage has gone stale.
- Driven to Suicide: After a new boyfriend dumps her, and cites his son as the reason why, Clary kills herself (offscreen). She leaves behind a note confessing to the Frank Roger murder and exonerating her husband.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Abortion, infidelity, blackmail, murder, and a stint in the French Foreign Legion—after all that, Johan comes home and marries Lena.
- Entertainingly Wrong: One of Frederick's reporters tells him that Roger the blackmailer was killed, that Johan Borg was there, and that there was a torn slip of paper from "B33", the unknown patient that went to Dr. Smith for an abortion. Frederick knows that his daughter Lena is dating Borg and draws the logical but completely wrong conclusion that Lena was the one who went to Dr. Smith for an abortion.
- Good Girls Avoid Abortion: And selfish bitches have them, which is why Clary gets hers. An extremely patriarchal doctor gives Clary the Good Girls Avoid Abortion speech, saying that she's healthy and perfectly able to bear children and that being a mom is worthwhile and ennobling. Clary isn't interested so she goes to a back-alley doctor.
- Legion of Lost Souls: What does Johan do, when he flees Sweden, after his wife killed Roger the blackmailer? He joins the French Foreign Legion, of course. He's seen in some remote outpost near the end of the film, looking depressed.
- The Lost Lenore: Frederik's wife is, apparently, long dead. On Walpurgis Night he pulls out her picture and reminisces about going out and celebrating when they were young. Later, after he finds out that Lena is dating a married man, he takes out his wife's picture again and vows to protect their daughter.
- Love Triangle: Johan, his lovely secretary Lena, and his inconvenient wife Clary.
- Sexy Secretary: Ingrid Bergman! Johan is obviously attracted to gorgeous Lena, but can't make a move because he's married. Lena for her part is besotted with her boss, but resolves to quit her job to remove herself from temptation.
