Random Thoughts

Storm Weather (Oväder). Ingmar Bergman. 1960. ⭐⭐⭐⭐★★.

This is a TV play shown on the occasion of Strindberg’s 111th birthday or something equally spurious. It features nobody from Bergman’s usual coterie of actors, so perhaps they’re all taken from Bergman’s theatre ensemble?

As theatre actors most of them deliver their lines very crisply and precisely, but there’s one guy who has no “k”s in his diction and is quite nasal… Very difficult to follow.

Fortunately this copy from the Bergman Pirate has English subtitles.

Of the TV theatre pieces so far, this is the most “just point some cameras towards the stage” one. I really like it, though… in parts. The guy who plays “The Guy” isn’t very interesting. And has bad diction.

This post is part of the 87 Bergman Things series.

The Virgin Spring (Jungfrukällan). Ingmar Bergman. 1960. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐★.

This is Bergman’s first Oscar win? It’s not difficult to guess why (spoiler warning: God turns out to be real; i.e., instant US appeal). Even so, it’s rather good.

Sven Nykvist is back as the cinematographer, and that really shows. Every scene is a perfect little tableau.

And Ulla Isaksson, who wrote the recent Brink of Life Bergman film, wrote the script, so apparently Bergman was really impressed. But it’s the last film he would direct that wasn’t based on his own script for decades. The next one is…. Oh! In 1986! And it’s written by Ulla Isaksson again!

And it is a stark and unexpected film. Less of Bergman’s usual ticks and more strangeness.

This post is part of the 87 Bergman Things series.

Behind The Magician (Bakomfilm Ansiktet). Ingmar Bergman. 1958. ⭐⭐⭐⭐★★.

Same narrator as the previous “behind” featurettes.

This one’s quite informative.

This post is part of the 87 Bergman Things series.

The Magician (Ansiktet). Ingmar Bergman. 1958. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐★.

We’ve now reached the point where a Bergman film can be immediately identified by just looking at any random frame from his movies, so I guess we’ve gone past the “early” bit of his career.

It’s all so programmatically present in this one: All the characters being metaphors for Bergman’s own life (Bergman’s both the tortured artiste Vogler and the huckster selling the artistiness here, I think?); the religious affectations; the stylised repartee…

I mean, it’s brilliant, but…

This post is part of the 87 Bergman Things series.

Brink of Life (Nära livet). Ingmar Bergman. 1958. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐.

At a time when very few men had ever been present at an actual birth, Brink of Life came as a shock for many viewers. The newspapers reported people fainting (the record being set in Bergen in Norway, where eight people passed out during the same screening!).

This was a very controversial film, because it deals with women giving birth.

It’s not produced by Bergman’s usual technical staff (even if it features his usual cast of actors (is this the first one where Erland Josephson appears?)), and it’s really grainy and scratchy.

The obvious comparison is to the much later Cries & Whispers film: Much anguish in and around sick beds. I’ve never seen this film before, but if I remember Cries & Whispers right, it’s stylistically a very different film.

Isn’t that perceptive commentary?

Eh, whatchagonnado.

Anyway, this is pretty brilliant. It’s a bundle of emotions, but it’s also funny (especially the Eva Dahlbeck parts (and I love that Max von Sydow plays her dotty husband)). The actors are all wonderful and play extremely well off each other.

It won all the awards at Cannes that year.

And it’s one of those extremely rare films that fails the reverse Bechdel test, which is always refreshing.

This post is part of the 87 Bergman Things series.