The Square

(A young Swedish diplomat falls in love with a North Korean traffic police officer in an animated film about an impossible romance in the darkest of dictatorships.)

Isak Borg is stationed in Pyongyang. When he falls in love with a female traffic police officer, the authorities are far from pleased. Borg is under constant surveillance, so whenever they meet, it is with the full knowledge of the security police. When the time comes for Borg to return home, their farewell is complicated by the fact that the woman has been banished from the capital to her home village. An interpreter becomes a guardian angel, risking his own life to help them. Bonus points for the Swedish diplomat being named after an icon of our film history: Isak Borg from Bergman’s Wild Strawberries.

• Freddy Olsson