Göteborg Film Festival Turns Its Stage Into an Interrogation Room to Test Truth

When the lights dim and the red curtains rise at Sweden's premier film-TV gathering, the audience expects a showcase of cinema's finest. This year, however, the marquee promises something altogether different: an interrogation room built inside the festival's heart, where volunteers step up to a polygraph and confront the elusive notion of honesty. The concept emerged from a desire to blur the line between fiction and fact, to let the festival's central debate on truth spill out of panels and onto the floor. In a modest, steel-clad chamber, the hum of a machine mixes with the echo of whispered confessions, while a seasoned specialist, Ørjan Hesjedal, monitors the needle's dance. He is no actor but a real-life interrogator, trained to read the subtle tremors that betray a hidden story. Visitors-curious cinephiles, skeptical critics, even a few nervous filmmakers-are invited to sit in the chair, place their fingers on the electrodes, and answer a series of questions that range from the mundane to the deeply personal. The experience is less about catching liars than about exposing how easily our perceptions can be swayed by a flickering screen or a well-crafted narrative. Around the room, spectators watch through a glass partition, their faces a mixture of intrigue and unease. The tension is palpable, mirroring the suspense of a thriller's climax. As the polygraph's line spikes and steadies, the audience is reminded that truth in cinema is often a crafted illusion, a performance that can be as convincing as any testimony. When the session ends, the participants emerge with a fresh perspective on the stories they consume and the stories they tell themselves. In turning its stage into a space for interrogation, the Göteborg Film Festival invites everyone to ask not only what is being shown on screen, but what lies beneath the surface of every narrative.