Wild Strawberries.

Review #2078: Wild Strawberries.

Cast: 

Victor Sjöström (Professor Isak Borg), Bibi Andersson (Sara - Isak's cousin / Hitchhiker), Ingrid Thulin (Marianne Borg), Gunnar Björnstrand (Evald Borg), Jullan Kindahl (Agda, Isak's housekeeper), Folke Sundquist (Anders, hitchhiker), Björn Bjelfvenstam (Viktor, hitchhiker), Naima Wifstrand (Isak's Mother), Gunnel Broström (Berit Alman), Gunnar Sjöberg (Sten Alman / The Examiner), Max von Sydow (Henrik Åkerman), Ann-Marie Wiman (Eva Åkerman), and Gertrud Fridh (Karin Borg) Written and Directed by Ingmar Bergman (#777 - The Seventh Seal and #1427 - Hour of the Wolf)

Review: 

"One thread goes through the story in multiple variations: shortcomings, poverty, emptiness, and the absence of grace. I didn't know then, and even today I don't know fully, how through Wild Strawberries I was pleading with my parents: see me, understand me, and - if possible - forgive me."

Okay, so sometimes you pick a film because of its reputation. I had a feeling that it was about time again to return to watching an Ingmar Bergman film, particularly one that happens to involve the last performance of another noted name and happens to be a really, really well known film. Bergman wrote the film while spending time in the Karolinska Hospital for problems related to the stomach and general stress. One can only imagine the qualities that come out in writing when also dealing with divorce and shaky relationships with their parents. Bergman stated different things upon the ideas that formed his film, with one book of interviews (Bergman on Bergman, released in the 1970s) relating a detail about a sudden impulse to visit his grandmother's house and experience the idea of going back into his childhood...only for him to say in a later book (Images: my life in film, written by Bergman in 1994) that in reality, he is "forever living in my childhood...living permanently in my dream, from which I make brief forays into reality." At any rate, being released on the cusp of films such as Smiles of a Summer Night (1955) and The Seventh Seal (1957) heightened the attention given to this film, which is considered by some to be one of his most moving films. As you might expect, this was the swan song performance for its lead actor in Sjöström, who as you may remember was an acclaimed director in his native Sweden (Bergman loved The Phantom Carriage (1921) enough to see it at least once every summer and noted its influence on his own work) before he reverted back to acting on a fulltime basis, particularly within the theatre. Regardless of how he came to be in this film (whether as one that came to mind from the screenplay or on the suggestion of a producer), he was on the cusp of turning 78 with this film, which was actually his second collaboration with Bergman, who directed him with To Joy [Till glädje] (1950). Bergman had his doubts about the reliability of Sjöström when it came to his age, but things eventually went well for all involved (interestingly, Bergman's parents seemed to enjoy what they saw when it came to Sjöström, because a letter exists detailing the gratitutde sent by his father about his career). Sjöström died at the age of 80 three years after the release of this film.

What can only really say about certain films of world cinema that other people of better qualification can say? Well, the only words worth saying are the ones you come up with after seeing it for yourself, particularly when it comes to interpretations and what you find from certain imagery. Right and wrong only matter when it comes to watching it in the most comfortable setting possible, not really so much about interpretation (unless you think all films are part of some sort of deep lobbying group, of course). To me, this is a basically a two-sided road movie, since we are talking about a film detailing the road of a man's life and the road to get to an actual location with a group of folks on the road. The road involves contradictions and complications because that is how life goes for people, regret or no regret. Being stuck with the images and memories of the once-lived moments is far more interesting than being stuck in the same ways of the "because it is". Undeniably, Sjöström is the best actor in the film, one with such a commanding presence that runs the gamut of the qualities that come through a great flawed man in contradictions that come in icy coldness (well, the name is a pun, but that doesn't make it corny), one that has to reckon with who they are and what that has created for themselves in the people around them and that in the end, all things must pass. Andersson makes a useful double role of a sweetheart of the would-be past and a hitchhiker sweetheart with their own suitors that is warm and obviously useful comfort to remember in the long run (judging by that final sequence that sees the pilgrimage reach its end). Thulin and her own part to play in this pilgrimage is one of persistence, one of moving confidence in who they are and how that strikes different when matched with Sjöström in nature and in practice that makes the eventual ending all the more useful. What seems obvious for some viewers in looking upon symbolism may seem elusive for others, but as long as one gets an actual feeling emanating from these films of existential questioning, they are on the right track, because the answers that matter are ones that are found in clarity, much in the same way that peace is found only through looking inward rather than running from affirming one's existence. The journey to Lund is not really one for ceremony but instead one for meaning beyond simple ceremonies. There is more to journeys beyond the milage and that involves people beyond words. In short: wild strawberry patches of one's youth in one thing, having the peace of mind to reach for closure is another. The man or woman with a long life to live will have one full of memories to look back upon in pain and pleasure, but the thing that matters most is the fact that we have the choice to move where we want to go with it in affirmation. All things will pass and we have the choice to go where we want to go on the multi-sided road.

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.

Next time: Germany and 1924.

Hour of the Wolf.

Review #1427: Hour of the Wolf.

Cast: 
Max von Sydow (Johan Borg), Liv Ullmann (Alma Borg), Gertrud Fridh (Corinne von Merkens), Georg Rydeberg (Lindhorst), Erland Josephson (Baron von Merkens), Naima Wifstrand (Old Lady with Hat), Ulf Johansson (Heerbrand), Gudrun Brost (Gamla Fru von Merkens), and Ingrid Thulin (Veronica Vogler) Written and Directed by Ingmar Bergman (#777 - The Seventh Seal)

Review: 
"I think we are the sum of what we have read, seen and experienced. I do not think artists are born from emptiness! I am a small stone of a tall building, I depend on each element of the building, next to, above, below."

It never hurts to reach for someone who wants to question the human condition with films. Ingmar Bergman was most certainly a director with enough ambition and detail to accomplish films that have lingered as iconic for Swedish cinema. He had a troubled childhood under strict parenting and unhappy school years, but he developed an interest in the theater and film from an early age, most notably when he acquired a magic lantern (an early type of image projector). Studies in university were mostly dominated by theater and film-watching, and he eventually found himself rewriting scripts for film that led to his true screenwriting debut with Torment (1944) and his eventual directorial debut with Crisis (1946). Bergman felt that art had to expose humiliation and how we as beings do it to each other, since it is "one of the most dreadful companions of humanity, and our whole social system is based to an extent on humiliation." Over the course of nearly sixty years, Bergman would work on numerous films (with all but the last four being for television) that have received notice (from directors past and present to winning three Academy Awards for Best International Film), ranging from Wild Strawberries (1957), The Virgin Spring (1960), and Fanny and Alexander (1982).

The original script (known as "The Cannibals") had been done in 1964, but he later revised the script after a bout of pneumonia made him think of the budget it would take to execute it. Instead, he did the film Persona (1966), but he eventually re-worked the script, which would take inspiration from works such as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera The Magic Flute (which Bergman would later adapt into a film in the following decade) alongside Bergman's own nightmares. It is a film that threatens to unravel before one's very own eyes in self-destruction for the artist and in a way the audience. How long can it be before one's creativity starts to turn into madness, particularly if one can't sleep (as is the case for night owls like myself). It is a Gothic nightmare that accomplishes a good deal of what it wants to do in Bergman's own manner that segues into psychological horror. Whether it is reaches you on a level that inspires chills is up to how much patience one has with its moments into surreal territory that seems at times like a retelling of the vampire legend (Bergman was an admirer of Dracula (1931), incidentally). If one is looking for a straight story in 88 minutes, this may not be the one for you. If viewed on its own terms as something to pick apart like a surgeon on the table or an artist looking upon what they have created and having it look back on them, then this works itself out quite nicely. In terms of acting, von Sydow and Ullmann make up our primary focus for the film and each do fine with what they are given, since both each worked with Bergman ten times (this, along with Shame (1968) and The Passion of Anna (1969) are argued by some to be a trilogy involving violence upon ordinary lives and guilt). One shouldn't be surprised to hear this about von Sydow, who was quite versatile in playing heroes and villains in both European and American cinema in over seven decades of work. In this, he makes quite a contemplative focus in terms of a tortured artist, one with plenty of brooding conviction in his dealing with the real and unreal involving demons and insomnia. Ullmann, the Norwegian actress of international fare and along with eventual director of her own films, accompanies our focus as the other side of the coin with von Sydow in her own type of despair and struggle in trying to keep herself intact from falling off the edge, beginning and ending the film with poignancy. The others do fine in accompanying the quiet terror that builds in garnering curiosity in a subtle haunt. The sequence involving von Sydow and a kid, a involving overexposed photography is likely the most memorable part, at least if one isn't going with just images, which could involve a ceiling or a sequence with a little person in the closet. On the whole, this is a film with plenty of despair as a sketch upon the things that haunt us in and out of our dreams when it comes to creativity and the encompassing companionship that one tries to seek out (or vice versa) to alleviate the creature that lurks in the dark of humiliation in the hour of birth and death. It may require a bit of patience to push it forward, but it is generally a fair piece by Bergman with enough curiosity factor to make it a good sell for world cinema to view at least once.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

The Seventh Seal.

Review #777: The Seventh Seal.

Cast
Gunnar Björnstrand (Jöns, squire), Bengt Ekerot (Death), Nils Poppe (Jof), Max von Sydow (Antonius Block), Bibi Andersson (Mia, Jof's wife), Inga Landgré (Karin, Block's wife), Åke Fridell (Blacksmith Plog), and Inga Gill (Lisa, blacksmith's wife) Directed by Ingmar Bergman.

Review
The Seventh Seal has been heralded as a classic of world cinema, so much so that it is hard to talk about it when others (with significantly more knowledge of film) have talked about the movie extensively. But in any case, these reviews are just my opinion, which you can take/not take for value. Welcome to Season 6 and 2016. 

The Seventh Seal (known in Sweden as Det sjunde inseglet) happens to be the first Swedish film reviewed on Movie Night, and it comes from Ingmar Bergman, who directed movies for over 50 years until his death in 2007. The movie can be grim (especially at the beginning and end), but it also has its insertions of humor and warmth (particularly with Poppe and Andersson, who represent hope even in times of death). The acting is well done, especially by Max von Sydow, who seems perfectly natural and makes for a performance anyone could root for in any decade. The most memorable scene is when Death first appears to Sydow's character, and Ekerot's look is especially chilling. Another memorable scene is the procession of the flagellants, and the expressions of the cast as the haunting scene proceeds around them. The dance of death ends the movie much in the way that everyone inevitably has to face, with no one being able to escape death. The movie looks great as well (due to the cinematography by Gunnar Fischer), having a stark and an appearance. Ultimately, this is a movie that doesn't cheat its audience, because it is a movie that makes one think without having to be spoon fed info, or just being a grim tale. Sure, it is a bleak movie with death, but it also has its touches of hope amidst the darkness that engulf us all.

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.