Julkalender 1995 - Jul i Kapernaum

Jul i Kapernaum (Christmas in Kapernaum) was SVT:s julkalender 1995 and twice as long as the rest of them. The second half of it is devoted to puppet sketches. We get to visit Magister Munter at the school (who teaches the children that the English sentence I buy pink sheets is funny to a Swede), see short films at the cinema at Bio Rio and hear about when Fru Dito time travelled in her shower. (I might get back to those in later entries to this blog, but for this one, I want to focus on the main plot.)

Legend has it that a star came to rest on the place where the town Kapernaum later was built. Many thousands of years later, the evil king Sirius in his hunt for treasure, found it and trapped it underground. He killed everone, but a young man managed to flee and tell everyone. Sirius was locked up and the man left Kapernaum, only to return when it was time to release the star.
  

När tiden är inne,                         When time has come,
för lugn i sinne.                             For peace in mind
När staden skälver                        When the town is shaking
och jorden gnäller.                        And the ground whines
För julefrid,                                   For christmas peace,
öppna porten i tid.                         Open the gate in time.
Den som ingen sakna,                   The one no one misses,
hämta stjärna som vakna           Collects the wakening star

~ Jul i Kapernaum

1000 years later, the 10 years old orphan girl Amanda lives in an abandoned circus wagon in the middle of Tittutgränd in Kapernaum. She is sometimes lonely, but often plays around with the mayor Klopstock and Krampus. Besides them, Krampus has an aunt named Innocentia and there is also a lady who owns the café called Rosa. In Kapernaum also lives Assar Skoog who owns a pawnshop.

Skoog in many aspects resembles Ebenezer Scrooge from Charles Dicken's book A Christmas Carol. His brother died and Assar drove away his wife and newborn baby. Assar is extremely greedy and loves to make people pawn their most valuable things. He also mutters "Humbug!" from time to time.

Viktor, is the heir of the young man who fled king Sirius and he suddenly shows up in Kapernaum, scaring the life out of Skoog (like the three ghosts of christmas do to Scrooge). Amanda finds the gate to the underground and Viktor sets after her. They free the star and ride off for new adventures at the end. The battle against king Sirius and his troll guard is a little forced and lame, but the actors (even the children) are all good and the characters loveable.

Jul i Kapernaum belongs in the fantasy genre, but it is also a musical of sort. I have always been pretty sad that they never released the music on a cd because there were some pretty good ones in this. It felt even stranger when SVT chose to release the soundtrack of Mysteriet på Greveholm the following year even though it only contained instrumental music. (Snälla SVT, kan ni inte åtminstone lägga upp sångerna på Spotify nu?!) I remember having to rewind the VHS over and over because I wanted to listen to the music.To this day, I still remember Amanda's song (and no, it is not mainly due to her and I sharing first name!)

This calendar is sadly forgotten, but the Swedes voted for it to be part of the julkalender classics that SVT puts on their Öppet Arkiv site every christmas. Rewatching this now, made me think that it is actually even more relevant today. The awakening star creates havoc with the climate, making the town hot and everyone wonder what has happened to the weather. It is also worth mentioning Klopstock's line from the last episode: "Igår var Kapernaum nära sin undergång. Minnet av det som skett den här julen får aldrig blekna. Om historien hålls vid liv finns det möjlighet att inte upprepa misstagen (Yesterday, Kapernaum was close to its destruction. The memory of what has occured this christmas must never fade. If history is kept alive, there is a possibility to not recreate the misstakes.)" Definitely something to think about...


Picture was borrowed from here.