His early movies were mostly comedies. His biggest success was Hon dansade en sommar (1951, aka. One Summer of Happiness), which earned him a nomination for the Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1952 and caused some controversy at the time because it containined nudity. In 1958 he directed Mannekäng i rött, the first in a series of murder mysteries, considered by some to be a precursor of the Italian giallo films. His 1953 film of Peder Sjögren's second novel, Bread of Love (Kärlekens bröd), based on Sjögren's experiences as a volunteer in the Finnish Continuation War of 1941-44 angered the author, was banned in Finland and incurred the wrath of the Russians at the Cannes Film Festival. In spite of all this, Sjögren grudgingly admitted that as a study of men under severe pressure it was impressive .
The popularity of his mystery movies declined and in the 1970s and 1980s he made mostly low budget thrillers - some in collaboration with Mats Helge - which got mostly bad reviews.

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