| ABBA: The Movie | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Lasse Hallström |
| Produced by | Stig Anderson Reg Grundy |
| Written by | Lasse Hallström Robert Caswell |
| Starring | Anni-Frid Lyngstad Benny Andersson Björn Ulvaeus Agnetha Fältskog Robert Hughes Tom Oliver |
| Music by | Stig Anderson Benny Andersson Björn Ulvaeus |
| Cinematography | Jack Churchill Paul Onorato |
| Editing by | Lasse Hallström Malou Hallström Ulf Neidermar |
| Studio | Polar Music Reg Grundy Productions |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | 15 December 1977 (Australia) 16 December 1977 (Sweden) |
| Running time | 97:00 |
| Country | Australia Sweden |
| Language | English Swedish |
| Box office | SEK 5,347,122 |
ABBA: The Movie is a 1977 film about the pop group ABBA's Australian tour. It was directed by Lasse Hallström, who directed most of the group's videos. The film has become a cult film among ABBA fans. Its release coincided with the release of ABBA: The Album, the group's fifth studio album, and features many songs from that album as well as many of their earlier hits, and one, "Get on the Carousel", unavailable anywhere else.
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The film has a very loose plot which is little more than a vehicle to link together the concert footage. It concerns the adventures of Ashley Wallace (Robert Hughes), a naïve DJ on Radio 2TW, who normally presents a through-the-night country and western-themed show. In spite of this, he is sent by the station's boss (Bruce Barry) to get an in-depth interview ("Not an interview, a dialogue", demands his boss) with the group, whose fame and stature neither he nor Ashley have the first clue about, which is to be aired on the day ABBA leave Australia. Needless to say, Ashley, who has never done an interview before, singularly fails, mainly because he has forgotten to pack his press card, although the fact that he is unable to buy a ticket doesn't help matters either. Armed with his trusty reel-to-reel tape recorder, Ashley is forced to follow the group all over Australia, beginning in Sydney, and then travelling, in order, to Perth, Adelaide, and Melbourne, experiencing repeated run-ins with the group's very protective bodyguard (Tom Oliver), as well as his increasingly exasperated boss.
Eventually, Ashley has an unbelievably lucky chance encounter with Stig Anderson, the group's manager, who agrees to an interview. After attending a concert, Ashley sleeps in and misses the appointed interview time. Just as Ashley is about to give up (by this time, he doesn't even care that his press card—which has also been traveling across Australia, continually forwarded by the postal service—has finally arrived!), he steps into an elevator and finds himself face-to-face with ABBA. They agree to give him an interview, and he leaves Melbourne just in time to meet the deadline for the radio show to go out on-air. He puts together the final edit in the back of a taxi on the way back from the airport, as ABBA depart Australia for Europe. With only minutes to go, Ashley makes it back to the radio station where, having set the tape up on the studio's playback machine, he relaxes at his control desk to listen as the interview—which he worked so long and hard to obtain—is broadcast over the airwaves Down Under.
Hallström indicated that the film's script and plot concept was "conceived on the plane on the way to Australia". Initially, 16 mm film was to be used but producers upgraded the project to 35 mm Panavision technology.[1]
Mostly filmed in Australia some additional scenes were filmed in ABBA's native Sweden (but still set in Australia) - noticeably different from Australia are the street signs and the traffic flowing on the right-hand side.[2]
Margaret Geddes of Australian newspaper The Age concluded that the film was "slick, competent and even for the non-convert entertaining."[3]
ABBA: The Movie was first released in December 1977. The film was also presented in several Eastern Bloc nations, including the Soviet Union where it was screened at two movie houses in Moscow.[4]
To date four releases of the film have been made: a single-disc DVD, a two-disc special edition DVD, a single disc Blu-ray, and a now defunct single-disc HD DVD. All releases above feature a restored print with bonus material. The initial DVD, including digital restoration, was released by SBS in Australia on 2 October 2005.[5]
A theatrical re-release of the film occurred across Europe during July and August 2008 in the UK, Ireland, The Netherlands, Norway, Germany, and Austria.[6]
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