In the new HBO series Pray, Obey, Kill, director Henrik Georgsson (Stieg Larsson: The Man Who Played with Fire) explores a 2004 murder investigation involving a Pentecostal congregation in the nonviolent Swedish village of Knutby. Journalists Martin Johnson and Anton Berg explore new angles in the notorious foreign case, a history of sectarian activity, sexual intrigue and murder. Basically, the six-episode miniseries shows what can happen when abuse deprives others of their autonomy.
On 10 January 2004, two members of the congregation, Alexandra Fossmo and her neighbor Daniel Linde, were attacked at their home. While Linde survived the shooting, Fossmo did not. Sara Svensson, also a member of the congregation, confessed to the murder. which eventually led to the discovery that she was having an affair with Fossmo’s husband, Helge Fossmo. Svensson told police that he had won text messages from Helge Fossmo, who said he came here from God, suggesting and encouraging her to devote crimes in order to please the non-secular leader of the devout sect, ‘Sa Waldau. Fossmo sentenced to life in prison for manipulating Svensson, while Svensson enters psychiatric care.
Pray, Obey, Kill provides terrifying interviews with former members of the organization, detailing the sexual, mental and physical abuse they faced, especially from the organization’s leader, ‘Sa Waldau, whom they were forced to serve. assault ancient worshippers.
Georgsson combines those intimate interviews, file photographs and strange photographs of Lynch from a miniature village into a truly desirable vision. Johnson and Berg talk about each and every detail of the case while the camera is recording, involving their audience in the investigation as they take a look to reveal answers. Although the series does not answer all the questions it asks, it delves into the desirable nature of devoted cults and sects.
I spoke to Georgsson about his consequences of the history of Knutby’s murders and also about the demanding situations of editing such dark and stratified documents.
Risa Sarachan: Why did you find it vital to review this case?
Henrik Georgsson: The two hounds of the series, they started running with her first, they started with the studios and so on, and then they gave me up to the project. When it took place in 2004, I was fascinated and when I had the opportunity to direct this story, I sought to do so. When you start to go a little deep into [the story], it becomes stranger, how other people in a group, like that congregation, become a cult or cult. And like the strange things that can happen between humans and the mechanism, brainwashing and all that.
It is a story about listening to oneself and not giving up the will and listening to your inner being and not being too naive and simply obeying authority. So you had themes that are universal. It is not only in this devout context, it may also be a political context, the same kind of problem.
Sarachan: His interviews with church members were so vulnerable that I may not realize how comfortable they were in sharing them. How can you get them to open up like that?
Georgsson: Especially the hounds’ paintings, they did almost every interview on their own. I think their tactic is to make other people dependent on them. They’re honest. They make it transparent from the beginning that they are hounds, they just need the truth. They will respect [their subjects]. They communicate with them several times before [the interview], s spend a lot of time communicating and building those relationships. So I think the other people they interview feel comfortable. They feel [the hounds] are serious. They need to hear the story.
Sarachan: How did you get all these intimate photographs of moments within the congregation?
Georgsson: It comes from a few other people in the congregation. There are some who need to get the fact out.
Sarachan: I was impressed with all the photographs and images used, it was so deep.
Georgsson: Well, when you change, you get the impression there’s not enough [Laughs].
Sarachan: You must have worked with so many curtains to edit.
Georgsson: We have, I don’t know, 150 hours of interviews and maybe so much with personal footage. We also did all kinds of dramatizations with this miniature global and other things. There are many curtains and that’s the great component of Making a Series Like This is writing some kind of script, you do it when you edit at the same time, replace it, then review to restructure it, locating the story as you go. the laughing component in a way, but it can also be frustrating and, in this case, I think that’s the challenge.
On the one hand, it is the account of the members of the congregation and the evolution towards a sect, and on the other hand, it is the journalistic investigation into the pictures of police and prosecutors. This curtain is another. My task is to merge all this into one story. It hasn’t been easy. These are two other stories, in a way, there are attractive parts you want to skip.
Sarachan: The miniature village has added a disturbing touch to the series. What is its creation?
Georgsson: On the one hand, there is only the need for photographs; all you have from the beginning are interviews, talking heads and then footage. Saying something about the night of the murder, for example, is misleading because we didn’t have an image of it. And then there was a desire for anything. At the same time, there is Emma, one of the members who was being interviewed. He says he treated them like it was his dollhouse. He dressed them. She made a decision about who deserves to live with whom, and made a decision about what colors they deserve to have on their walls. There was a connection: we felt it was also like a dollhouse, in a way, the miniature world. There was a guy . . . like you’re in freezing times, you know?It’s still providing a kind of concentration. It also gives you the ability to establish an atmosphere and atmosphere with lighting so you can feel like she was that night when she [Sara Svensson] went there.
Sarachan: While combining all these photographs and creating this story, what is your greatest conclusion about the nature of people?
Georgsson: Yes, I mean the maximum commonly in an unhappy way, I suppose, [about] how far you can go without listening to yourself. I mean, Sara Svensson, this is the brightest example. She said she didn’t need to do this. He didn’t need to kill two of his friends, but he still felt he had to. It’s so hard to perceive that it can go that far. I mean, she’s just an innocent young woman. I mean, just having a gun, the Swedes don’t have guns. Only hunters have weapons. So it’s so far from that user just put their hands on a gun and then use it. Actually, it’s hard to see how he could have done that. Just get out of a car and take that gun, go into space and shoot. And he’s desirable and also unhappy. And then the shepherd who leaves his circle of relatives – his children and his wife because he feels he is not doing the right thing towards God. Actually, I don’t know if I sense it now.
It is desirable how far you can move other people forward, because at the end of the day, other people have a meaning in their lives and belong to anything, to an organization of other people and feel in contact with other people. do that to achieve that, that component that I can understand, but it’s also harmful when you avoid listening to yourself and simply obey authority.
Sarachan: I can’t believe what it was like to paint in this task for a long time and be so immersed in this world. Must it have been very touching?
Georgsson: It probably was and it still is, you know?At the same time, I like to do things like that because you go on globally and check to settle for that, to perceive it. And he’s very attractive, I think he’s still. It haunts you a little bit. During the night, you wake up and think about it. And in this case, you know, it’s like a nightmare.
This interview edited and condensed for clarity.
I have a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where I discovered my love of writing in a tortuous way while creating my own paintings as a theater student.