DVD/150: VISKNINGAR OCH ROP (Cries and Whispers) (Ingmar Bergman, 1972)

While filming THE TOUCH, Ingmar Bergman had a recurring idea: four women dressed in white in a large red room; he pursued it through his imagination and made it real in the unrelenting and powerful VISKNINGAR OCH ROP or CRIES AND WHISPERS.

Despite financing problems it won a Cannes jury prize and it's worldwide success culminated in the rare occurance of a foreign language film being nominated for five main Academy Awards, winning for Sven Nykvist's stunning cinematography.

In a large, nearly-empty family mansion, ornate clocks tick away Agnes' life as she slowly dies from cancer, watched over by her attentive maid Anna who mourns the death of her own daughter.

The only other occupants are Agnes' married sisters Katrin and Maria who have come to watch and wait...

The oppresive atmosphere conjours up unhappy memories in each sister; Agnes dies and the sisters let their polite masks drop...

Shelf or charity shop?  Haunting the shelf.  Even with Bergman's body of work the 50 year-old CRIES AND WHISPERS remains an unsettling, disturbing film with four extraordinary performances by the actresses he always envisioned playing the roles - although he actually originally wanted Mia Farrow as Anna the maid!  Kari Sylwan appeared in her first Bergman film playing Anna, the only one who shows any real love for Agnes.  His three other actresses each made 10 films with Bergman:  Harriet Andersson is astonishing as the dying Agnes (in her 8th Bergman role), Ingrid Thulin (in her 9th Bergman role) is icily disdainful as the emotionally dead Katrin - the scene where she cuts her vagina with a broken wine glass has lost none of it's horrific intensity - but the most complex role goes to the magnificent Liv Ullmann who delivers wonderfully.  In her 5th Bergman performance, Ullmann as Maria, whose beauty and sensuality covers an immature and petulant interior, is the one you always watch; in flashback she also plays the sister's mother, beautiful but remote.  Only at the end does Bergman allow a flash of happiness, all the more touching coming after all we have witnessed.

Dvd/150: SASOM I EN SPEGEL (Through A Glass Darkly) (Ingmar Bergman, 1961)

The first in Bergman's Faith Trilogy, THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY won the 1961 Oscar for Best Foreign Film and retains an unsettling clarity of vision.

A family of four gather on an austere island: David has returned from finishing a novel abroad but the atmosphere is unsettled, his daughter Karin is recovering from a mental breakdown which involved shock therapy.

Karin's doctor husband Martin watches her closely and reveals to David that she will suffer continued breakdowns.  Also present is Karin's younger brother Minus, unhappy with their father's remoteness.

Karin is already hearing voices telling her people are waiting within the walls for the arrival of God.  She finds in David's diary his confession that he will probably use her breakdowns for a book.

The atmosphere of emotional distrust helps fracture Karen's mental state again...

Harriet Andersson, Max von Sydow, Gunnar Bjornstrand and Lars Passgard all give raw, memorable performances.

Shelf or charity shop?  I can see myself revisiting Ingmar Bergman's devastating reflection on the loss of faith again so shelf...

Dvd/150: GYCKLARNAS AFTON (Sawdust and Tinsel) (Ingmar Bergman, 1953)

Bergman's first real focus on the psychological shadows of desire was in GYCKLARNAS AFTON (Sawdust and Tinsel) set in a ramshackle travelling circus at the turn of the last century.

This also marked the first time Bergman worked with cinematographer Sven Nykvist who keeps Harriet Andersson luminously photographed - she is effortlessly subversive as Anne, the circus rider who is the mistress of the dour ring-master Albert.

When the circus visits the town where Albert's estranged wife and sons live, he makes Anne jealous by saying he wishes to see them.  They ask the town theatre for some costumes but first must endure the disdain of the director and, for Anna, the attention of a letcherous actor.

Albert's wife refuses his offer to return while Anna sleeps with the actor, both actions leave them unhappy.  When the theatre company visit the circus, humiliation and sadness are top of the bill.

Shelf or charity shop?  It's not an easy watch - particularly because of a punchable clown - but as it's part of a Bergman box-set I will keep it - and also because of the magnicent performance by Harriet Andersson's cat...

Dvd/150: KVINNODROM (Dreams) (Ingmar Bergman, 1955)

A lesser-known Bergman that balances light-heartedness with the feelings of longing and loneliness that the director excelled in.

 

The onscreen relationships reflected Bergman's own dwindling affair with Harriet Andersson who plays the mercurial fashion model Doris opposite the more statuesque Eva Dahlbeck as Susanne, a fashion photographer who is using Doris for a new campaign.

 

On a day in Gothenburg, both women confront the limits of happiness.  Susanne suggested the location as that's where her married lover lives and Doris, wandering around the city, meets Otto, an older, wealthy man who lavishes presents on her, doing so because she reminds him of his now-insane wife. 

 

But Otto rejects Doris after a visit from his sarcastic daughter while Susanne's happiness at being reunited with her lover is dashed when his wife appears.

 

Exquisite performances from Dahlbeck, Andersson, Gunnar Björnstrand as Otto and Kerstin Hedeby as his daughter Marianne.

Shelf or charity shop?  Shelf, in a Bergman box-set