Sir Arne's Treasure - Production

Production

The first plan for a film adaption of Selma Lagerlöf's The Treasure at Svenska Biografteatern, the dominating production company in Sweden during the silent era, was in 1915, but fell through. In 1917 a stage adaptation of the story premiered at Deutsches Theater in Berlin, and an offer was received from a German film company which wanted to adapt it. After the play was staged in Gothenburg the following year, Svenska Biografteatern decided to go ahead and produce the film themselves. The screenplay by Mauritz Stiller and Gustaf Molander differs from the novel in that it tells the story in a more strictly chronological order, and incorporates some details which were introduced in the German play. Stiller also chose to tone down the story's supernatural elements.

Filming took place from 12 February to 10 May 1919, in the studio area of Svenska Filmbiografen, later AB Svensk Filmindustri, on Lidingö, Stockholm, where the alleys of Marstrand had been reconstructed. Other exterior scenes were shot in the nearby area on Lidingö and Lilla Värtan, as well as around Furusund in the Stockholm archipelago, where the ship had been left over the winter and frozen in. Some filming took place further north in Skutskär, and around Sollefteå in Ångermanland.