As most people know, Sven Nykvist is more famous as a cinematographer than a director, but this film is certainly a good one (I haven't seen any of his other films). Stellan Skarsgård is brilliant as the man who cannot watch his wife and child starve anymore and therefore kills one of his master's oxen and the ramifications of this action are horrible. Besides Skarsgård the film features other fine Scandinavian actors: Ewa Fröling, Max von Sydow, and Liv Ullman. Like I said, it's a good film, but as a viewer I sometimes felt an odd distance to what was going on in the movie, I don't know why I felt that, but (possible spoiler follows) the desperation in the situation after Helge has been sent to jail could have been handled better by Nykvist. Still, a fine film with fine performances by the cast. (6/10)