Stockholm, 5th December 1977
ABBA-The Movie (Swedish-Australian: color)
By Kell - Variety (New York) Wednesday, 14 December 1977
A Polar Music International AB (Sweden) / Reg Grundy Productions (Australia)
production, AB Svensk Film (Stockholm) release.
Features entire cast.
| Directed by: | Lasse
Hallström, Bob Caswell |
| Camera (Eastmancolor): | Jack Churchill, Paul Onorato |
| Producers: | Stig Anderson, Reg Grundy |
| Editors: . | Lasse
Hallström, Malou Hallström, Ulf Neidemar |
| Costume designer: | Ing-Marie Nilsson |
| Music by: | Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, Stig Anderson |
| Reviewed in: | Stockholm, Sweden, 3rd December, 1977 |
| Running time: | 94 minutes |
Cast:
| ABBA |
Themselves: Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Agnetha Fälskog,
Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus |
| Station manager | Bruce Barry |
| Disc Jockey | Robert Hughes |
| Bodyguard | Tom Oliver (Tom Oliver also plays the roles of the butler / taxi
driver / barman / golf caddie.) |
| ABBA manager | Stig Anderson |
ABBA-The Movie
is a Scandinavian, plus other European territories, saturation-booked release to
coincide with EMI’s release of the Swedish pop group’s latest Polar Records LP
ABBA-The Album. The record features
the four new songs introduced in the film, the later otherwise mostly using
group’s established hits as performed on various Australian stages during ABBA’s
all-time record breaking concert tour Down Under last Winter.
Film, of course, also opens immediately in Australia. It will be released
worldwide as an English-speaking, English-singing feature, and looms as a winner
in ABBA-conscious territories. It should also do nicely in the U.S. if release
is timed carefully with ABBA attack on the record market there.
ABBA-The Movie
is a handsomely-produced smooth, fast and wittily-edited musical entertainment
that, in Lasse Hallström’s script and direction, is both a bit of a documentary
of ABBA’s Australian tour and of its four personable performers’ background and
work methods and a slight but funny story about an Aussie disk-jockey’s chasing
of the group and being most of the way thwarted in his attempts to do a taped
in-depth interview with the Swedes.
The professional Australian actors perform with obvious gusto. So does ABBA as a
group whereas Benny Andersson, Björn Ulvaeus, Anni-Frid Lyngstad and Agnetha
Fältskog have not wished to attempt any acting. Apart from glimpses of them in
dressing rooms, on balconies and at airport receiving adoring crowds of fans,
they are seen mostly doing their stage work.
ABBA, of course, stands for easy on the ear pop music of rock derivation,
carefully-honed arrangements, catchy lyrics of no great substance and a stage
presentation that has audiences on their feet and cheering loudly. The two girls
do a lot of hip-wriggling and bottom-pushing of rich sex appeal, but at the same
time remain as cool as any ziegfeld girl of the past. The cleanness of ABBA’s
act and their obvious bourgeois appeal is never in doubt.
Top marks to all technical credits, including Jack Churchill’s and Paul
Onorato’s amazing control of the Panavision filming even in the tightest of
spots, and the editing job done collectively by director Lasse Hallström, his
wife Malou Hallström and Ulf Neidemar.
