During the inter-war period, as the vision of an ideal social democratic society took shape, Swedish children’s cinema increasingly intersected with ideological currents such as nationalism and moral narratives surrounding childhood. In this context, children’s cinema evolved beyond mere entertainment to become a cultural artefact that articulated national identity, moral values and socially constructed ideals of childhood. While scholarly consensus situates the emergence of Swedish children’s film history in the mid-1940s, I argue that Trollsländan (‘The dragonfly’), directed by Pauline Brunius in 1920, already reflected these ideological demands in both its contextual and textual dimensions. This article examines the film’s production intentions, marketing strategies, critical reception, exhibition practices, narrative structure and representation to provide a deeper understanding of how ‘The dragonfly’ responds to – and negotiates – critiques of prevailing social and moral norms.