I just finished Bergman's "Autumn Sonata" last night, the night before that was Woody Allen's "Vicky Cristina Barcelona." I remember reading that Allen was once called "America's Bergman." Unfortunate though flattering comparison for him. His admiration for, and imitation of, Bergman is evident. The Allen film was like being at Disney World compared to Bergman. Though in fairness Allen's film was meant to be a comedy. The other doesn't contain a single laugh, not even a smile. Ingrid Bergman does a good job with the role. I believe it was the only time that the two Swedish Bergmans worked together, one of the last major roles of the actresses career, if not the very last. Back when the word "actress" was not a gender slur.
Watching an Ingmar Bergman film is almost always difficult. I had seen this film before but had not ever sat and watched it all the way through. It is psychologically taxing to watch. The emotional distances and damage that we inflict on one another, the trying experience of family and how we all grow out of shape from that experience. The inner wounds we all develop in relation to it. The private pain. The yearning for resolution.
Liv Ullmann, longtime collaborator with Bergman, was perfect for the role. Her roles in "Persona" and "Hour of the Wolf" are also among my all time favorites from cinema. I'm sure there were others but I'm too lazy to look anything up today.
I have never had a large family and have never been entirely envious of those who do. It seems like a burden, though I also see the joy in is as well. I suppose I just shy from the emotional responsibilities of it. With friends you at least have some choice in the matter, though admittedly not always as much as you'd like, or sometimes need. That's what my friends have told me anyway.
With the Woody Allen film the narration fluctuates between unnecessary, annoying or entirely distracting. It's as if a narrator, and one not of your choosing or liking, is telling you about a film you'd like to watch, describing each scene. The only down side is that he's doing so while you're trying to watch the film. Too much of the information was just unnecessary. It was not a bad film but Woody Allen has done much better. I know many people did not care for his "British trilogy." I only saw "Match Point" and thought that it was passable, but not great. His efforts to examine character seem so superficial in comparison to Bergman, even mawkish at times.
I go now to get my morning coffee. I hadn't meant to write a movie review, or two. I'm not sure what I had meant to do.
A few days ago I pulled a muscle in my ear, near where the jaw attaches to the skull, nothing has felt right since. There is excruciating occasional pain because I've done nothing at all, made no movement. It is inexplicable and I must somehow endure.
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"I feel that life is divided into the horrible and the miserable. That's the two categories. " -Woody Allen, Annie Hall
"In various contexts I'd made it into a sort of private game to have a diabolic figure hanging around. His evil was one of the springs in my watch-works. And that's all there is to the devil figure in my early films.... Unmotivated cruelty is something which never ceases to fascinate me; and I'd very much like to know the reason for it. Its source is obscure and I'd very much like to get at it." - Ingmar Bergman, Torsten Manns Interview
"In various contexts I'd made it into a sort of private game to have a diabolic figure hanging around. His evil was one of the springs in my watch-works. And that's all there is to the devil figure in my early films.... Unmotivated cruelty is something which never ceases to fascinate me; and I'd very much like to know the reason for it. Its source is obscure and I'd very much like to get at it." - Ingmar Bergman, Torsten Manns Interview
(Ingrid Bergman)
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