Raptures: Swedish historical drama about an apocalyptic cult is hindered by tame execution

• Reviewed from the 2025 International Film Festival Rotterdam

​​Growing up in Northern Sweden, filmmaker Jon Blåhed was surrounded by rumours about a strange chapter in the region’s history. The son of a preacher, Blåhed became fascinated with the Korpela movement, a short-lived Christian sect which emerged in the 1920s and became notorious for apocalyptic beliefs, heavy drinking and permissive sexual behaviour. In Sweden, the story of the sect is still surrounded by generational shame. Now, for his debut feature, Blåhed has used this true story as the basis of a drama, which attempts to offer a more nuanced picture of this curious episode.

Raptures approaches the subject through the eyes of Rakel (Jessica Grabowsky), a devoutly Christian teacher living in an isolated village near the Finnish border, with her husband Teodor (Jakob Öhrman) and young stepdaughter. An abrupt opening reveals that Teodor, and much of the village, are in thrall to Toivo Korpela (Samuli Niittymäki) a travelling preacher with subversive beliefs about democratising access to religion. Rakel has doubts, and is initially relieved when Korpela leaves town, spooked by condemnation from church officials. Soon however, Teodor becomes convinced that he has been chosen to serve as a prophet of this alternative doctrine and, enthusiastically encouraged by his congregation, he becomes the figurehead of an increasingly radical cult.

Raptures is the first feature to be shot predominately in the minority language of Meänkieli, a linguistic peculiarity which adds a layer to the film’s critique of the elitism of early 20th-century Swedish society. The villagers are seen as primitive by outsiders, such as the “fancy gentlemen from Uppsala”, representatives of the ominously named State Institute for Radical Biology who arrive at Rakel’s school to measure her students’ heads, speaking to them in a language they don’t understand. Patronised by the mainstream, the villagers turn their gaze inwards, embracing a belief system advocating for the joys of the flesh – drinking, loud music and extra-marital sex – and which decrees that on judgement day a crystal arc will carry them to Palestine. 

Although slick and engaging, Raptures never submits fully to the wild-eyed paroxysms promised by the title. Blåhed’s direction is accomplished, but over-reliant on handsome period drama conventions, such as a bland, emotion-signalling score and overly neat interiors and costumes. The strangeness of the story calls out for more mess and chaos, more grime and atonality. One exhilarating scene, in which a religious gathering escalates into a drunken party, the congregation dancing, denouncing sinners and occasionally sacrificing a member to police waiting outside the doors, has an edge of unhinged hysteria which reaches beyond the tasteful control of the rest of the film. In moments like this, as we witness the shifting loyalties which underpin fanatical belief, chilling parallels to today’s extremist movements become undeniable.