Erik Balling

Director

Biography

Erik Balling (29 November 1924 – 19 November 2005) was a Danish TV and film director. He created two of Denmark’s most popular TV-series, Matador and Huset på Christianshavn.

His feature film Qivitoq (1956) was nominated for a Golden Palm at the 1957 Cannes Film Festival, and for an Oscar as Best Foreign Language Film.

Together with Henning Bahs, he also created the hugely popular series of Olsen Gang feature films.

Balling started working for the largest and oldest Danish film production company, Nordisk Films Kompagni, in 1946. He later became the boss of the company.

His made his directing debut with Adam & Eva (1953), which was nominated for a Bodil-award as Best Film.
In 1956 he directed Kispus, which was the first Danish movie filmed in color.

The most popular films directed by Balling were the feature film comedies about a trio of small-time crooks, the Olsen Gang. There were 13 episodes of this movie series between 1968 and 1981, starting… read more