--- name: "Isabella Eklöf" canonical: "https://film.one/person/isabella-eklof" fi1m_id: "isabella-eklof" imdb_id: "nm3063074" tmdb_id: 1932374 wikidata_id: "Q31457428" roles: ["Producer","Director"] born: "10 February 1978" reviewed_on_fi1m: 2 average_as: "producer" average_over: 1 updated: "2026-09-17T20:54:48.030624+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Isabella Eklöf ## Identity Isabella Eklöf - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/isabella-eklof - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** isabella-eklof - **IMDb ID:** nm3063074 - **TMDB ID:** 1932374 - **Wikidata ID:** Q31457428 - **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Ekl%C3%B6f, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q31457428, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3063074/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/1932374 Producer and director. Born 10 February 1978 in Östra Ryd, Sweden. ## Details - **Work:** Producer, Director - **Born:** 10 February 1978, Östra Ryd, Sweden - **Active:** 2008–present - **Also known as:** Изабелла Эклёф, Isabella Jenny Karolina Eklöf - **Titles on Fi1m:** 2: 1 directing, 1 producing - **Fi1m score by decade:** 2000s 88 (1), 2020s 76 (1) - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_Ekl%C3%B6f, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q31457428, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3063074/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/1932374 ## Streaming the US now - **HBO Max:** [*Industry*](https://film.one/tv/industry.md) (76) For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country. ## Fi1m on Isabella Eklöf > Isabella Eklöf watches people negotiate sex and power, often from an uncomfortable distance. We value her attention to who gets their way, though the coldness can make it hard to care who suffers. In *Holiday* (2018), the wide, brightly lit images keep us at a distance from a gangster’s girlfriend. Eklöf watches who has power and how it is used, without offering much explanatory backstory. We find that attention worth following, though the coldness can be wearing. This was her first feature as writer and director. Her writing also includes *Border* (2018), whose screenplay she co-wrote with Ali Abbasi and John Ajvide Lindqvist, expanding a short story into a feature about otherness. *Industry* (2020) puts her interest in power among young bankers, with eight episodes directed across the second and third series. We cared about these people because the performances made their ambition convincing. The office politics give that ambition practical consequences throughout the working day. These are strengths of the programme, rather than achievements we would assign to one director alone. It is nevertheless an apt setting for Eklöf: professional advancement gives people a reason to accept behaviour they might prefer to think beneath them. Her second feature, *Kalak* (2023), moves towards more intimate handheld images. Adapted from Kim Leine’s autobiographical novel and set in Greenland, it also credits Eklöf as an editor. The change from *Holiday*’s brightly lit compositions matters: keeping us at a distance is not her only method. Her recurring collaborators include cinematographer Nadim Carlsen, and the variation in the photography is encouraging. The sustained attention to abuse, however, can still make these films demanding company. Our reservation returns us to *Industry*, where the sex and excess are less reliable than the workplace struggles, especially when they crowd them out. The same caution applies to following a director so willing to show difficult sexual material: explicitness alone is no reason to keep watching. We want her patient observation to help us understand the people, even when the camera stays back. *Industry* earns its recommendation through the performances and the complications of ambition. Start there if office politics appeal; approach the features prepared for explicit violence and little reassurance. ## Biography Isabella Eklöf (born 10 February 1978) is a Swedish film director and screenwriter. She attended the National Film School of Denmark and worked as a runner on the 2008 film *Let the Right One In*. Eklöf wrote and directed the 2018 feature *Holiday*. She co-wrote the 2018 film *Border* with Ali Abbasi. Her other directorial credits include the 2023 film *Kalak* and episodes of the series *Servant* (2019) and *Industry* (2020), on which she directed eight episodes across seasons two and three. For *Border*, Eklöf shared nominations for the Guldbagge Award for Best Screenplay and the European Film Award for Best Screenwriter. *Holiday* won awards at Fantastic Fest and four Bodil Awards, including Best Danish Film. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, sv.wikipedia.org, imdb.com, watch.plex.tv, tvmaze.com.* ## On Fi1m (2) ### Directed (1) - *Industry* (2020), Fi1m 76, Director — [page](https://film.one/tv/industry.md) ### Produced (1) — the average rests on these - *Let the Right One In* (2008), Fi1m 88, Location Assistant — [page](https://film.one/film/let-the-right-one-in.md) ## Complete filmography (14) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *The Death of Bunny Munro* (2025), series, Director, Executive Producer - *Kalak* (2024), Director, Writer, Editor - *Industry* (2020), series, Director — Fi1m 76, [page](https://film.one/tv/industry.md) - *Servant* (2019), series, Director - *Holiday* (2018), Director, Screenplay - *Border* (2018), Screenplay - *Notes from Underground* (2011), Screenplay, Director - *I'm My Own Dolly Parton* (2011), Additional Photography - *Welcome to Barbaristan* (2009), Editor, Screenplay, Director - *Let the Right One In* (2008), Location Assistant — Fi1m 88, [page](https://film.one/film/let-the-right-one-in.md) - *Triptych* (2007), Director, Screenplay, Editor - *Lasse Rules* (2007), Director of Photography - *Willy Kyrklund* (2002), Director, Writer - *Mr. Nawashi*, Director, Writer ## Awards ### Other awards — 2 won, 3 nominated - Robert Award for Best Adapted Screenplay 2025: Robert Award for Best Adapted Screenplay (won), for *Kalak* - European Film Award – People's Choice Award for Best European Film 2019: European Film Award – People's Choice Award for Best European Film (nominated), for *Border* - The Carl Theodor Dreyer Prize 2019: The Carl Theodor Dreyer Prize (won) - European Film Award for Best Film 2018: European Film Award for Best Film (nominated), for *Border* - European Film Award for Best Screenwriter 2018: European Film Award for Best Screenwriter (nominated), for *Border* *From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.* --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/isabella-eklof