VOLUME 06 - NUMBER 02 SUMMER 1970

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o u ~ STAFF -..I editor LL VOLUME 6 NUMBER 2 GORDON HITCHENS I- School of Visual Arts Z SUMMER 1970 managing editor AUSTIN LAMONT W CONTENTS book editor ~ FILM COMMENT thanks the Swedish Film Institute and the DONALD STAPLES ~ Swedish Institute for Cultural Relations for financial assist- ance making possible thi s special issue on Swedish cinema. New York University Our special thanks go also to John Reilly, who went to graphic designer Sweden to gather the materials publ ished herein. Reilly PATIENCE BUNDSCHUH o was formerly a film / television instructor at the New York Butera School of Art Institute of Technology and at Jersey City State College , advertising manager NAOMI WEISS u is now co-director of The Global Village, in New York . editorial assistant ~ FILM COMMENT is particularly proud to offer readers this DIANA MACBETH special issue of articles, as our tribute to Sweden's film -..I heritage. assistants My Three Powerfully Effective Commandments research JONATHAN HOOPS LL by Ingmar Bergman research EUGENE FERRARO page 8 des ign CONNIE JENSEN I- The Snakeskin subscriptions EDITH WEINBERGER Z by Ingmar Bergman The op i nions expressed in FILM COMMENT page 14 are those of the ind ividual authors and W Biography of Ingmar Bergman do not necessarily represent the opinions of the editor, staff or publisher . ~ page 16 ~ Bibliography of Ingmar Bergman FI LM CO MMENT. volume 6 number 2. page 20 Summer 1970 . price $1 .50 . FILM COMM ENT is published quart erly by Fil m Comment Publishing o Swedish Films at Sorrento Corporation . Copyright ' 1970 Film u by Peter Cowie Comment Publishing Corporation . page 22 Su bscription rates in North America : ~ Greta Garbo's Secret $6 for four numbe rs, $ 12 for eigh t nu mbe rs: by Carl-Eric Nordberg e lsewhere $7 for four numbers. -..I page 26 514 for eight numbers. Export or Die by Frederic Fleischer Application to mall al second class postage rates page 36 is pen ding at Boston . Massachusetts. The Young Swedish Cinema in Relation to Swedish Please include your present address with Film Tradition zip code when wri ting about subscriptions by Rune Waldekranz Single copies of most back issues page 38 a re in stock at $2 each , wnte for list DUET FOR CANNIBALS Please address all editorial . subscription and back issue correspondence to by Kirk Bond page 44 FILM COMMENT 100 Walnut Place Brookline Massachusetts 02'46. As I Remember . by Victor Sjostrom Back volumes of FILM COMMENT are being reprinted by page 48 Johnson Reprint Corporation New Film Against Vietnam War I=rom New York I I 1 Fifth Avenue New York NY 10003 . University Students Microfilm edi tions are being published by University Micro films Ann Arbor Michigan 48106 . - by Dinitia Smith page 52 Pl ease write to these companies for comple te sales infor mation. LL Letters Type set by Rochester Monotype I- page 56 Composition Company. Books printed in USA Z page 60 by WilliS McDona ld and Company National newsstand distribution by W B OeBoer . 188 High Street ~ Nutley New Jersey 07110 . ~ library of Congress card number' 76-498. o cover photo: The Museum of Modern Art! u Film Stills Arc hi ve ~ -..I LL

Notice to Readers This issue of FILM COMMENT is the last to be edited by Gordon Hitchens. Mr. Hitchens has been editor of FILM COMMENT since founding it in 1962. The new edito r of FILM COMMENT is Richard Corliss . Mr. Corliss has been an intern at the Film Department of the Museum of Modern Art and a writer on film for Film Heritage, Film Quarterly, The Village Voice , The New York Times and FILM COMMENT . His article , The Legion of Decency, published in FILM COMMENT, volume 4, number 4, was adapted from his master's essay at Columbia University. He is now taking his PhD in Cinema Studies at New York University. Mr. Hitchens' departure has been anticipated and there will be no break in the publ ishing schedule of FILM COMMENT. Goodbye to The Readers of FILM COMMENT By Gordon Hitchens This present issue of FILM COMMENT is the twenty-fourth and last that I edit. I founded FILM COMMENT as a quarterly and so twenty- fou r issues represent si x full years of publish ing . During most of those years there were financial problems . What a struggle it has been!-the best and worse years of my life. But a ye-ar ago I was faced with a simple choice : watch FILM COM- MENT terminate publ ication or sell it. So in June , 1969 , I sold it . During my years with FILM COMMENT, now ending , I managed to publish some excellent film articles on documentary, blacklisting , censorship , propaganda, interviews with film directors, news of the film schools and festivals , reviews and so forth . During those years , FILM COMMENT had struck a certain tone, had aspired to a certain standard and had aquired a certain reputation . I sold FILM COMMENT because I was unsuccessful in renewing sufficient outside independent financial support, despite four earlier foundation grants. But I signed on as a hired-editor with the new owner for a transitional period of four issues, or one year. Now that transition is completed with this present volume 6 number 2. As an ex-merchant seaman (1942-1956) I know that there can only be one skipper per Ship . As editor, I take this final opportunity to thank all the readers of FILM COMMENT for their support during these years. Separately-in letters and in an informal mimeograph report-I will contact FILM COMMENT's several hundred former contributors , as they have a right to the details and background of this sale. For those interested in my own future , I invite letters or telephone calls, at the address below . As a film journalist and ed itor, I will definitely be continuing my customary work elsewhere. Of course, as always , I welcome contributions of articles , photographs , etc ., and with the advance permission of the writers I will be placing film materials as usual in various periodicals and books , in the years ahead . Accordingly I solicit your inquiries and ideas. Let me conclude by saying again how very much I appreciate the interest and support of you FILM COMMENT readers during these past years. Thank you , Gordon Hitc hens Apt. 7B 838 West End Avenue New York , New York 10025 (212 ) RI 9-1652

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SOME RECENT ISSUES Of TDR: FILM AND THEATRE RETURN OF THE LIVING THEATRE Susan Sontag on Film and Th eatre-Stan Vanderbeek: a manifesto on expandi ng ci nema-Michael Kirby on film in An interview with Judith Malina and Jul ian Beck-Stefan the ne w theater-Ingmar Berg man , \" Eac h Film is My Last\" B recht, Irwin Si lber, Patrick McDermott on the Li vi ng -interviews with Vilgot Sjbman , Peter Weiss, Roger Blin , Th eatre-th e Living Th eatre 's notes for Pa radise Now- Peter Brook , Lindsay Anderson , Barbet Schroeder, Roger three essays on T ransactiona l Analysis-O 'Horgan begin- Planchon , Vito Pandolfi, Pa ve l Hobl-Alain Virmau x, \" Artaud nings-an interview wi th Joe Chaikin-Colin Blakely and and Film \" -documents : scenarios and arguments by Ari- Margaret Croyde n on Peter Broo k-a photo study by Max tonin Artaud-articles by Milton Cohen, Josef Svoboda- Wald man of Manuel Alum 's The Cellar (T43) two lectures by Vsevolod Meyerhold-Viet Rock, a play by Megan Terry (T33) NATURALISM REVISITED r------------------------ Martin Ess lin, \" Naturalism in Contex(\" -E vert Spri nchorn on Strindberg- Andrew Sarris , \" Film: the Il lusion of Nat- I Nam. ----\"-Zip _ __ urali sm \" -Lee Baxanda ll , \" Th e Revolutionary Mome nt\" - two major essays by Rolf Fj elde-J ohn Lahr on Pin ter and i Addr.ss Chekhov-Georgii Tovstonogov on Three Sisters-S imo n Trus sler, \" Br itish Neo-Naturalism \" -Brian Jo hn ston on 51.,. _____I CilY _________ Ibsen and Hegel-a portfol io of Naturalist scene design 1876-1965-plus previously untranslated wo rks by Ib sen Politics and Performance issue only . .. 52 .00 0 an d Strindb erg (T42) One year subscription 56.00 0 Two year subscript ion LIBERATION/VIOLATION Sa c\". iss ues. each (specify ) . . ..... SII .00 0 Five back iss ue s .. . . 52 .00 0 An interview w ith Jerzy Grotowski-Marc Fumaroli on T en back issues ... S8 .00 0 Barba 's Kaspariana-Er ic Bent ley on Pirandello-an auto- .. ... SIS .OO 0 interview and three plays by Fernando Arrabal-Jean- Jacques Lebel on the necessity of violation- Stefan Brecht T330 T34 0 T3S 0 T36 0 T37 0 T38 0 T39 0 T40 0 T41 0 and Dan Isaac on Th e Ridiculous Th eatre- interviews with T42 0 T43 0 '-' Polit ic s and Performance \" 0 Charles Ludl am and John Vaccaro-Jan Kott on his Orestes-Ann Halprin 's Myths (T41) (Foreign postage , except Canada and Mexico , SO cents per year) PREPAYM ENT APPRECIAT ED Allow six weeks 'or delivery Tota l payment e nclosed $ _ _ __ The Dra ma Revi ew , Dept. B, 32 Wa shington Place , New York , N ,Y. 100CJ ~-----------------------~





MY THREE POWERFULLY EFFECTIVE COMMANDMENTS: This article was translated from Swedis h by P. E. his now almost holy individualism , his artistic sub- Burke and Lennart Swahn. jectivity , can all too easily cause ulcers and neurosis . Exclusiveness becomes a curse that he eulogises. Experience should be gained before one reaches The unusual is both his pain and his satisfaction . forty , so a wise man has said . After forty it is per- missible for one to comment . It is possible that I have made a general rule from my own idiosyncrasies . But it is also possible that I venture to say that the reverse might apply in my the conflict of responsibility has been intensified and case. No one under forty was more certain of his the moral problems made so difficult because of theories and no one more willing to elucidate them dependence on popular support and also due to than I was. No one knew better or could visualize unreasonable economic burdens. more . Anyway, I now find that I need to clarify what I have But now that I am somewhat older I have become been thinking , what my standards are and what rather more cautious. The experience that I have constitutes my position . This will be a personal and gained , and which I am still sorting out , is of such not an authoritative pronouncement on film art, with a kind that I am unwilling to express myself on the some quite subjective notes on the technical and art of the filmmaker . I know for a fact that my work ethical problems of the filmmaker. involves technical skill and mental ability, but I know, too , that even my greatest experience will be unin- Script teresting to others, except perhaps to the potential filmmaker . Often it begins with something very hazy and indefinite-a chance remark or a quick change Moreover , it is my opinion that an artist 's work is of phrase, a dim but pleasant event, yet one the only real contribution that he can make to a that is not specifically related to the actual situa- critical discussion of art. Thus I find it rather un- tion . It can be a few bars of music , a shaft seemly to get involved in such discussion , even with of light across the street . It has happened in explanations or excuses. my theatrical work that I have seen' performers in fresh make-up in yet unplayed roles . No , the fact that the artist remained unknown was a good thing in former times . His relative anonymity was All in all these seem to be split-second impressions a guarantee against irrelevant outside influences, that disappear as quickly as they come , yet material considerations and the prostitution of his nevertheless leave an impression behind just like talents . He broug ht forth his work in spirit and truth a pleasant dream . as he saw it , a.nd he left the judgment to the Lord . Thus he li ved and died without being more or less Most of all they are a brightly coloured thread important than any other artisan . Eternal values. sticking out of the dark sack of the unconscious. immortality and masterpieces were terms not appli- If I begin to wind up this thread and do it carefully, cable in his case . a complete film will emerge. His work was to the glory of God . The ability to I would like to say that this is not a case of create was a gift and an accomplishment . In such Pallas Athene in the mind of Zeus, but an uncon- a world there flourished natural assurance and in- nected phenomenon , more a mental state than vulnerable humility-two qualities that are the finest an actual story , but for all that abounding with hallmarks of art. fertile associations and images. But in life to-day the position of the artist has be- All this is brought out with pulse-beats and come more and more precarious; the artist has rhythms that are very special and characteristic become a curious figure, a kind of performer or of the different films. Through these rhythms the athlete who chases from job to job. His isolation , picture sequences take a separate pattern , ac- cording to the way they were born and mastered by the motive. FILM COMMENT 9

This pr imitive life-cell stri ves from the beginning we rela x and accept it with our will and intellect. to achieve form , but its movements may be lazy We prepare the way into our imagination The and perhaps even a little drowsy . If in this primitive sequence of pictures plays directly on our feelings state it shows itself to have enough strength to without touching the mind. There are many reasons transform itself into a film , I then decide to give it why we ought to avoid filming existing literature, life, and I begin work on the script. but the most important is that the irrational dimen- sion , which is the heart of a literary work , is The feeling of failure occurs mostly before the often untranslatable , and that in its turn kills the writing begins. The dreams become merely cob- special dimension of the film . If, despite this, webs; the visions fade and become grey and we wish to translate something literary into filmic insignificant ; the pulse-beat is silent ; feelings terms , we are obliged to make an infinite number become small , tired fancies without strength and of complicated transformations-which most often reality . give limited or no result in relation to the efforts expended . I have thus decided to make a certain film , and now begins the complicated and qifficult mastered I know what I am talking about because I have work-to transfer rhythms , moods, atmosphere, been subjected to so-called literary judgment. This tensions, sequences, tones and scents into words is about as intelligent as letting a music critic and sentences in a readable or at least understand- judge an exhibition of paintings or a football able script. reporter criticize a new play. This is difficult but not impossible . The only reason for any and everyone believing himself capable of pronouncing a valid judgment The vital thing is the dialogue , but dialogue is on motion pictures is the inability of the film a sensitive matter that can offer resistance. We to assert itself as an art form , its need of a have learned (or should have learned) that the definite artistic vocabulary , its extreme youth in written dialogue of the theater is like a score relation to the other arts , its obvious ties with that is almost incomprehensible to the ordinary economic realities , its direct appeal to the feelings . person Interpretation of theatrical dialogue de- All these factors cause the motion picture to mands a technical skill and a certain amount be regarded with disdain . The directness of of imagination and feeling , qualities so often expression of the motion picture makes it suspect lacking in the theatrical profession . in certain eyes , and as a result any and everyone thinks himself competent to say anything he likes One can write dialogue, but the directions on in whatever way he likes on film art. how the dialogue should be handled , the rhythms and the tempo , the speed at which it is to be I myself have never had ambitions to be an taken , and what is to take place between the author. I do not wish to write novels, short stories, lines-all that must for practical reasons be left essays, biographies or treatises on special sub- out because a script containing so much detail jects. I certainly do not want to write plays for would be unreadable. the theater . Film-making is what interests me. I want to make films about conditions, tensions, I can squeeze directions and locations, charac- pictures, rhythms and characters within me and terisations and atmosphere into my film-scripts that in one way or another interest me . I am in understandable terms , provided I am a tolerable a film-maker , not an author. The motion picture writer and the reader has a fair reading ability, is my medium of expression, not the written word . which is not always the case . The motion picture and its complicated process of birth are my methods of saying what I want However, I now come to essentials, by which to my fellow men . I find it humiliating for my I mean montage, rhythm and the relation of one work to be judged as a book when it is a film . picture to the other-the vital \" third dimension \" It is like calling a bird a fish , and fire, water . without which the film is merely a dead product of a factory. Here I cannot give \" keys \" or an adequate Consequently the writing of the script is a difficult indication of the empos of the complexes involved , period , but it is a useful one as it compels me and it is quite impossibie to give a comprehensible to prove logically the validity of my ideas. While idea of what gives life to a work of art. I have this is taking place I am caught in the difficult conflict often sought a kind of notation that would give of situations . There is a conflict between my need me a chance of recording the shades and tones to find a way of filming a complicated situation of the ideas and the inner structure of the picture . and my desire for complete simplicity . As I do not intend my work to be solely for the edification (Thus let us state once and for all that the of myself or for the few but instead for the public film-script is a very imperfect technical basis for in general, the demands of the public are impera- tive. Sometimes I try a daring alternative, and a film) it has been shown that the public can appreciate the most advanced and complicated developments. In this connection I should draw attention to another fact that is often overlooked . Film is not For a very long time I have wanted to use the the same thing as literature . As often as not film medium for story-telling. This does not mean the character and substance of the two art forms that I find the narrative form itself faulty, but are in conflict . What this difference really depends that I consider the motion pir:ture ideally suited on is hard to define but it probably has to do to the epic and the dramatic. with the self-responsive process. The written word is read and assimilated by a conscious act and I know, of course, that by using film we can in connection with the intellect , and little by little bring in previously unknown worlds , realities it plays on the imagination or feelings . It is beyond reality. completely different with the motion picture. When we see a film in a cinema we are conscious that an illusion has been prepared for us , and 10 SUMMER 1970

It is of great importance for our long-suffering element is lacking , the spark that brings the whole industry to produce fine dreams, light frolics , thing to life. This intimate spark of life appears, germs of ideas, brilliant dazzling bubbles. or fails to appear, according to its will . This spark of life is crucial and indomitable . I do not say that these things never materialize, only that they are all too infrequent and all too For instance, I well know that everything for a half-hearted . scene must be prepared down to the last detail , each branch of the collective organization must Studio know e xactly what it is to do . The entire mecha- nism must be free from fault as a matter of It happens when I stand there in the half-light course. These preliminaries mayor may not take of the film studio with its noise and throng , the a long time , but they should not be dragged dirt and wretched atmosphere, I seriously wonder out and tire those participating . Rehearsals for why I am engaged in this most difficult form the take must be carried out with technical preci- of artistic creation . sion , with everyone knowing e xactly what he is to do. The rules are many and burdensome. I must have three minutes of usable film \" in the can \" every Then comes the take. From experience I know day . I must keep to the shooting schedule, which that the first take is ' often the happiest as it is so tight that it excludes almost everything but is the most natural. This is because with the essentials . I am surrounded by technical equip- first take the actors are trying to create something ; ment that with fiendish cunning tries to sabotage this creative urge provides a spark of life and my best intentions. Constantly I am on edge, comes from natu ral identification . The camera I am compelled to live the coifective life of the registers this inner act of creation , which is hardly studio. Amidst all this must take place a process perceptible to the untrained eye or ear but which that is sensitive and that really demands quietness, is recorded and preserved on the sensitive pho- concentration and confidence . tographic film and on the sound-track . I mean : working with actors and actresses. I believe it is precisely this sudden act of creation by an actor that keeps me in films and holds There are many directors who forget that our me fascinated with the medium . The development work in films begins with the human face . We and retention of a sudden burst of life gives can certainly become completely absorbed in the me ample reward for the thousands of hours aesthetics of montage, we can bring together of grey gloom , trial and tribulation . objects and still-life into a wonderful rhythm , we can make nature studies of astounding beauty-but The actor must unconditionally identify himself with the approach to the human face is without doubt his part. This identification should be like a the hallmark and the distinguishing quality of film . costume that is slipped on . Lengthy concentration , From this we might conclude that the film star continuous control of feelings and high-pressure is our most expensive instrument and that the working are completely out. The actor must be camera merely registers the reactions of this able in the purely technical sense (and if possible instrument . In many cases the opposite can be with the director's help) to take on and take seen : the position and movement of the camera off the character he is playing . Mental tensions is considered more important than the player, and lengthy exertions are fatal to all filmic expres- and the picture becomes an end in itself. But sion . this can never do anything but destroy illusions and be artistically devastating . The director should not deluge! the actor with instructions like autumn rain , but rather he should In order to give the greatest possible strength make his points at the right moments. His words to the actor's expression , the camera movement should be too few rather than too many. For must be simple , free and completely synchronised his performance the actor is little helped by the with the action . The camera must be a completely director's intellectual analysis. What the actor objective observer and only on rare occasions wants are exact instructions at the moment and may it participate in the action . certain technical corrections without embellish- ments and digressions. I know that an intonation , We should realize that the best means of expres- a look or a smile from the director can often sion the actor has at his command is his appear- do far more good to the actor than the most ance . The close-up , if objectively composed , per- penetrating analysis. This mode of directing fectly directed and played , is the most forcible sounds like witchcraft , but it is nothing of the means at the disposal of the film director, while sort; it is only a quiet and effective method of at the same time it is the mo st certain proof control over the actor by his director. Indeed, of his competence or incompetence. The lack the fewer the discussions, talks and explanations, or abundance of clos e-ups shows in an uncom- the more the affinity, silence, mutual understand- promising way the nature of the film director ing , natural loyalty and confidence. and the extent of his interest in people. Morality Simplicity, concentration , full knowledge , technical perfection must be the pillars supporting each Many imagine that a commercial film industry scene and sequence. lacks morality or that its practices are so definitely based on immorality that an artistically ethical However, in themselves they are not enough . standpoint cannot be maintained . Our films are assigned to businessmen , who at times regard All these factors exist-and it is necessary for them to do so-but still th e one most important FILM COMMENT 11 I

them w ith apprehension , as motion pictures have same, however we reckon . First, on the point to do with something as unreliab le as art. of fusion , comes the area between belief and submission , wh ich can be called the artistic obvi- If man y may regard our activity as dub ious , I ous . I wish to assert at th is point that this is must emphasiz e that its morality is as good as by no means my only goal , but merely that I any and so absolute that it could almost cause try to keep to the compass as well as I can . us embarrassment. However, I have found that I am like the Englishman in the tropics who shaves In order to strengthen my will so that I do not and dresses for dinner every day. He does not slip off the narrow path into the ditch , I have do this to please the wild animals but for his a third good and juicy commandment, which runs: own sake. If he gives up his discipline then the jungle has beaten him . THOU SHALT MAKE EACH FILM AS IF IT WERE TH Y LAST. I know that I shall have lost to the jungle if I take a weak moral standpoint or relax my mental Some may imagine that this commandment is punctiliousness. I have , therefore , come to a an amusing twist of word-play or a pointless certain bel ief that is based on three powerfully aphorism or perhaps simply a beautiful phrase effective commandments. Briefly, I shall state their about the complete vanity of everything . However, wording and their meaning . These have become that is not the case. the very fundamentals of my activity in the film world . It is reality . The first may sound indecent but really is highly In Sweden film production was interrupted for moral . It ru ns : a whole year some years ago . During my enforced inactivity, I learned that because of commercial THOU SHALT BE ENTERTAINING AT ALL TIMES . complications, and through no fault of my own , I could be out on the street before I knew it. Th is means that the public that sees my films and thus provides my bread and butter has the I do not complain about it , neither am I afraid right to ex pect enterta inment, a thrill , a joy, a or bitter; I have merely drawn a logical and highly spirited ex perience . I am responsible for providing moral conclusion from the situation : that each that ex perience . That is the only justification for film is my last. my activity. For me there is only one loyalty-that is my loyalty However, this does not mean that I must debase to the film on which I am working . What comes my talents , at least not in any and every way , (or fails to come) after is insignificant and causes because then I would break the second com- neither an x iety nor longing . This attitude gives mandment, which runs: me assurance and artistic confidence. The material assurance is apparently limited but I find that THOU SHALT OBE Y THY ARTISTIC CONSCIENCE artistic integrity is infinitely more important. There- AT ALL TIMES . fore I follow the principle: each film is my last. This is a very tricky commandment because it This conviction gives me strength in another way. obviously forbids me to steal , lie , prostitute my I have seen all too many film workers burdened talents, kill or falsify. However, I will say that down with an xiety, yet carrying out to the full I am allowed to falsify if it is artistically justified , their necessary duties. Worn out, bored to death I may also lie if it is a beautiful lie , I could and without pleasure, they have fulfilled their also kill my friends or myself or anyone else work. They have suffered humiliation and affronts if it would help my art, it may also be permissible from producers, the critics and the public without to prostitute my talents if it will further my cause , flinching , without giving up, without leaving the and I should indeed steal if there were no other profession . With a tired shrug of the shoulders, way out. they have made their artistic contributions until they went down or were thrown out. If one obeyed one 's artistic conscience to the full in every respect then one would find oneself I do not know but perhaps the day will come doing a balancing act on a tight-rope, and one when I shall be received ind ifferently by the public , would become so dizzy that at any moment one perhaps together with a feeling of disgust in could fall down and break one 's neck . Then all myself. Fatigue and emptiness will descend upon the prudent and moral bystanders would say: me like a dirty grey sack , and fear will stifle \" Look , there lies the thief, the murderer, the everything . Emptiness will stare me in the face . lecher, the liar. Serves him right. \" Not a fhought that all means are allowed except those which When this happens I shall put down my tools lead to a fiasco , and that the most dangerous and leave the scene , of my own free will , without ways are the only ones that are passable, and bitterness and without brooding whether or not that compulsion and dizziness are two necessary the work has been useful and truthful from the parts o f ou r activity. Not a thought that the joy viewpoint of eternity. of creation , which is a thing of beauty and a joy forever , is bound up with the necessary fear Wise and far-sighted men in the Middle Ages of creation . used to spend nights in their coffins in order never to forget the tremendous importance of One can incant as often as one desires, magnify every moment and the transient nature of life one 's humil ity and diminish one 's pride to one 's itself. heart's content, but the fact still remains that to follow one 's artistic conscience is a perversity Without taking such drastic and uncomfortable of the flesh as a result of years and years of mortification and rad iant moments of clear ascet- measures, I harden myself to the seeming futility icism and re sistance . In the long run it is the and the fickle cruelty of film -making , with the earnest conviction that each film is my last . 11111111 12 SUMMER 1970



the Artistic creation has always, to me, manifested itself as hunger . I have acknowledged this need with a na certain satisfaction but I have never, in all my life, asked myself why this hunger has arisen and craved by Ingmar Bergman appeasement. In recent years, as it diminishes and is transformed into something else , I have become 14 SUMMER 1970 anxious to find out the cause of my \" artistic activity. \" A very ear ly childhood memo ry is my need to show off my achievements : skill in drawing , the art of tossing a ball against a wall , my first effort at swim- ming . I remember I felt a very strong need to draw the attention of the grown-ups to these manifestations of my presence in the world . I felt I never got enough

attention from my fellow men. So , when reality was the new music gives us the suffocating feeling of no longer sufficient, I began to fantasize , entertain mathematical air rarification-although painting and my playmates with tremendous stories about my sculpture are sterile and languish in their own secret adventures. They were embarrassing lies that paralyzing freedom-although literature has been hopelessy failed against the level-headed scepticism transformed into a cairn of words without message of the world . I finally withdrew and kept my dream or danger. world to myself. A young child wanting human con- tact and obsessed by his imagination had been hurt There are poets who ne ver write poems because and transformed into a cunninB · and suspicious they form their lives as poems , actors who ne ver daydreamer. appear on stage but play their lives as marvelous dramas. There are painters who never paint because But a daydreamer is not an artist outside his dreams . they close their eyes and create the most beautiful paintings on the inside of their eyelids. There are The need to get people to listen , to correspond , filmmakers who live their films and would never to live in the warmth of a community was still there . misuse their talents to materialize them in reality . It became stronger the more I became imprisoned in Joneliness . In the same way , I think that people today can dispense with the theater because they exist in the It is fairly obvious that the cinema became my means middle of a drama, the different phases of which of expression. I made myself understood in a lan- incessantly produce local tragedies. They do not guage that bypassed the words-which I lacked- need music because every minute their hearing is and music-which I did not master-and painting , bombarded with veritable sound hurricanes that which left me indifferent. With cinema , I suddenly have reached and passed the level of endurance . had an opportunity to communicate with the world They do not need poetry because the new idea of around me in a language that is literally spoken from the universe has transformed them into functional soul to soul in phrases that escape the control of animals bound to interesting but, from a poetical the intellect in an almost voluptuous way. point of view, unusable problems of metabolic dis- turbance. With all the child 's repressed hunger, I threw myself into my medium and for twenty years I have indefati- Man (as I experience myself and the world around gably and in a kind of frenzy brought about dreams, me) has made himself free, terribly and dizzyingly mental experiences, fantasies , fits of lunacy, free. Religion and art are kept alive for the sake neuroses , religious controversies and sheer lies. My of sentimentality , as a conventional politeness to- hunger has been eternally new. Money, fame and wards the past, a benevolent solicitude of leisure'S success have been amazing but , at bottom , insignif- increasingly nervous citizens. I am still talking about icant consequences of my rampagings. In saying my own subjective vision. I hope, and am perfectly this Ido not underestimate what I may perchance have sure, that others have a more balanced and objec- achieved . I think it has had , and perhaps has, its tive conception . importance. But security for me is that I can see the past in a new and less romantic light . Art as If I take all this tediousness into consideration and self-satisfaction can , of course , have its impor- in spite of everything assert that I wish to continue tance-especially for the artist. to make art , it is for a very simple reason (I disregard the purely material one). Today the situation is less complicated , less in- teresting, above all less ·glamorous. That reason is curiosity. A boundless , insatiable , perpetual regeneration, an unbearable curiosity that To be quite frank I experience art-not only the film drives me on , that never lets me rest, that completely art-as being meaningless. By that I mean that art replaces that past hunger for community. no longer has the power and possibility to influence the development of our lives. I feel like a long-term prisoner suddenly confronted with the crashing, shrieking , snorting of life. I am Literature, painting , music, film and theater beget seized by an ungovernable curiosity. I note , I ob- and bring forth themselves. New mutations, new serve , I keep my eyes open. Everything is unreal, combinations arise and are destroyed , the move- fantastic, frightening or ridiculous. I catch a flying ment seems-from the outSide-nervously vital , the grain of dust-perhaps it is a film. What significance artists ' magnificent zeal to project to themselves, does it have?-none at all , but I find it interesting , and to a more and more distracted public , pictures and consequently it is a film. I wander round with of ,a world that no longer cares what they like or my grain of dust and in mirth or melancholy I am think. In a few places artists are punished , art is preoccupied. I jostle among the other ants, together considered dangerous and worth stifling and direct- we accomplish a colossal task. The snakeskin ing . On the whole , however, art is free , shameless , moves. irresponsible and , as I said : the movement is intense This and only this is my truth. I do not ask that it almost feverish, like , it seems to me , a snakeski~ shall be valid for anyone else , and as a consolation for eternity it is, of course , rather meager. As a basis full of ants. The snake itself has long been dead , for artistic activity in the coming years it is com- eaten, deprived of its poison , but the skin moves , pletely sufficient, at least for me. filled with meddlesome life. To be an artist for one's own satisfaction is not If I now find that I happen to be one of these ants always so agreeable . But it has one great advan- I must ask myself whether there is any reason t~ tage: the artist co-exists with every living creature continue the activity . The answer is in the affirma- that lives only for its own sake. Altogether , it makes tive . Although I think that the theater-stage is a a pretty large brotherhood existing egoistically on beloved old courtesan who has seen better days- the hot, dirty earth under a cold and empty sky. 11111111 although I and many others find the Wild West more stimulating than Antonioni or Bergman-although FILM COMMENT 15

Biography company with no member exceeding twenty-three Ingmar Bergman years of age. Ingmar Bergman was born in Uppsala on July 14, In 1944-50 Bergman made various films ; of these 1918 and brought up rather severely in a vicarage ; three were outstanding for their independence: THE it is obvious that the Lutheran strain runs deeply DEVEL'S WANTON or PRISON [FANGELSE] , 1949; TO- in his art. After preliminary schooling , Bergman WARDS JOY [TILL GLADJE] , 1949; and ILLICIT INTERLUDE studied history as art and literature at Stockholm or SUMMER INTERLUDE [SOMMARLEK], 1950. THE University. His twofold talent as dramatist and direc- DEVEL'S WANTON was described by a Swedish critic tor was demonstrated early at the university's as \"a confounding and inspiring embroidery on the theatre , where he displayed \" the greatest artistic theme that life is a hell that moves in a cruel and pugnacity ,\" as one critic wrote in 1942 after the voluptuous arc from birth to death .\" Another critic premiere of Bergman 's own drama, Oeath of Punch wrote : \" It is possible to judge Bergman without hav- [Kaspers OOd] . ing seen the films preceding THE DEVEL ' S WANTON . It is impossible to judge Bergman without having seen In the beginning of his career Bergman had a dif- THE DEVEL 'S WANTON .\" A third critic exclaimed ecstat- ficult time: he received poor reviews, he was consid- ically that \" for the first time in twenty-five years ered difficult, bizarre, incomprehensible, preten- Sweden is again leading the way in the universal tious . It was not until SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT at development of the film .\" But at that time the rest Cannes in 1965 that he won general recognition in of the world still only knew of one Bergman : Ingrid . Sweden and abroad . Many years of effort preceded the fi rst major success . TOWARDS JOY [TILL GLADJE], 1949, belongs to the despondent mood of Bergman 's earlier period . The Bergman had his first public success in the theater film 's thematic conclusion is that nothing endures in 1940 with Macbeth . A lover of and practitioner except art-in this instance, great music-\" the joy in legitim ate theatre prior to cinema , Bergman has that is beyond suffering and understanding.\" staged one hundred plays, including Strindberg , Pirandello , O 'Neill , Hjalmar Soderberg , HJalmar ILLICIT INTERLUDE [SOMMARLEK] 1950-51 , stated Bergman and many modernists . As a result of these Bergman , \"was written with my heart\" and was prolific and successful activities, Bergman was based on a short story he wrote when seventeen. asked in 1942 to join the Svensk Filmindustri as a The film was called by one critic as \" probably the script writer. He has worked there almost continu- best of Bergman 's films until THE NAKED NIGHT or ously ever since . His films number thirty in all. SAWDUST AND TINSEL [GYCKIARNAS AFTON] made in 1953, where the theme is illusion . As Albert , the In 1943 Bergman presented his fi rst screen-play betrayed lover says , \" 'to be a cuckold is nothing ; TORMENT [HETS] , but the direction was entrusted to it is to know that is terrible. ' \" Alf Sjbberg . Th e film became an international suc- cess. The script was later adapted for the stage by Rune Waldekranz explains the sequence where Al- Peter Ustinov and produced in Oslo , London and bert tries to shoot himself but the revolver misfires. New York . Mai Zetterling , later a film director, In his frustrated outrage , he must shoot the circus starred in the film . bear in its cage , \" the symbol of Albert's own captiv i- ty in life's cruel , tragicomic circus.\" But the film In Bergman 's first directorial assignment , C RISIS failed commercially. Ironically, Bergman observed: [KRIS] , 1946, he dealt with man 's loneliness. The film \" The reviews were altogether disastrous, the public failed economically and received mi xe d reviews . failed , the producer was counting his losses, and I myself will probably have to wait another ten years Bergman 's capacity for work was enormous. Not until my next experiment in this genre .\" only was he making films but was engaged as chief producer at most of Sweden 's best-known CIVIC A LE SSON IN LOVE [EN LEKTION I KARLEK] 1953-54 , is , theaters, producing c lassics and modernists with according to critic and director Jarn Donner, a great authority and craftsmanship . In 1944 , he was se lf- analysis , just like WILD STRAWBERRIES , \" but in known as Sweden's youngest chief producer , at age a playful way. \" DREAMS or JOURNEY INTO AUTUMN twenty-si x, and with a carefully selected repertory [KVINNODROM] 1954 , was called by Donner \" one of Bergman 's most interesting failures .\" But Eric Rohmer , critic of Cahiers du Cinema, wrote : \" It IS perhaps at once the' most successful in form and the most disdainful of the ordinary laws of dramatic construction of Bergman's films .\" SMI LES OF A SUMMER NIGHT [SOMMARNATTENS LEENDE] 1955 , is widely recognized as one of Bergman 's finest achievements. The Cannes jury noted its \" po- etic humor.\" French critic Henri Agel stated that Bergman \" is a Scandinavian Renoir at once by his sensuality-powerfu l and bitter-his exaltation of women , and his smile of universal derision.\"· And Bergman said: \" A joy for the moment, a romantic story, playing with all the cliches of the comedy of errors-the old castle, the young lovers, the elope- ment. But whether I make a comedy or a farce, a melodrama or a drama, every film-e xcept for those films made to order-are taken from my private life.\" In Sweden SMI LE S OF A SUMMER NIGHT was consid- ered the wittiest and most elegant since Mauritz 16 SUMMER 1970 . ..

Stiller's EROTI KON , made in 1920. It became an en o r- BRIN K OF LIFE [NARA LlVET] 1958, is adapted from a mous success abroad as well. Bergman had created short story by Ulla Isaksson , The Friendly, The Dig- the perfect comedy of manners . \" It is an arabesque nified. The scene is a maternity hospital where three on an essentially tragic theme-of man 's insuffi- pregnant women are waiting delivery in the same ciency-as an illustration of the incurable loneliness ward . As in THE SEVENTH SEAL , the action of BRIN K of the soul. \" It became a model for some of the OF LIFE covers twenty-four hours . \" I want the style French nouvelle vague films. The critics of Cahiers to be as bare as possible ,\" ex plained Bergman in du Cinema were among the first to promote Berg- Cahiers du Cinema . The film ends on a hopeful note, man abroad , and in retrospect they were screening as C .A. Lejune remarked in the British monthly , Films his earlier films at the Cinematheque Fran c; aise . And Filming .' \" The hospital is not only a microcosm but a confess ional , a place where patients shuffle As the ultimate proof of his belated success Berg- off the past and start again .\" BRINK OF LIFE was man was awarded two prizes at Cannes in 1956, awarded two prizes at Cannes in 1958: one for best which opened the markets abroad for his films . direction and one for best female acting . During 1956-1960 Bergman worked also as chief producer at the Civic Theatre in Malmo , at the THE MAGICIAN [ANSIKTET] , known in Britain as THE southernmost tip of Sweden opposite Copenhagen , FACE , 1958, was met with disdain by British intellec- where he produced a great many plays, among them tuals, and Jean-Luc Godard was extremely nega- Peer Gynt, Le Misanthrope and Faust-with roles tive in Cahiers du Cinema . Bergman sub-titles the ideal for Max von Sydow, who had just joined Berg- film \" a comedy.\" Vogler, the main character, played man 's artistic team . by Max von Sydow, throughly disguised by a black wig and beard , is a magician and charlatan . As In 1957 Von Sydow created a memorable portrait Bergman has written : \" A beard is a bad mask; and of the Crusader in THE SEVENTH SEAL. The film was one probably deceives better with a clean-shaven based upon a short play by Bergman written many face.\" years before , A Fresco [TRAMALNING] . In his mono- graph on Bergman , Peter Cowie wrote of THE SEV- Max von Sydow remarked in an interview with Marie ENTH SEAL: \" The horror and suffering painted on Seton : \" The real thing Bergman has been thinking the walls of the churches which he visited when of in THE MAGICIAN is himself, the artist. Vogler ' s young are reproduced not only on the frescoes reactions when he is forced, are like those of Berg- being portrayed by the artist in the porch of the man .\" And Peter Cowie: \" One has the impression church .. . but in the very incidents of the film it- of a man [Vogler] being subjected to scrutiny and self-the corpse on the hills by the sea , the proces- unable to retain any privacy whatsoever , of an artist sion of the flagellants, the burning of the witch , the watching his work being examined by disdainful final dance against the sky.\" critics ... thus Vogler triumphs , even without his disguise.\" The film is based on the theme of the dance of death , from a church mural , but it is inspired also by Carl The decorative effects in THE MAGICIAN are fascinat- Orft's Carmina Burana and Picasso's picture of the ing , particularly during the attic sequence. Berg- two acrobats with the two jesters and the child . The man's love of Grand Guignol horror has been inher- main motif of the film comes from Albrecht Durer's ent in him since youth . The film was awarded the The Knight, Death and the Devil. The film was shot critics ' prize at Venice in 1959. at Hovs Hallar on the southwest coast of Sweden THE VIRGIN SPRING [JUNGFRUKALlAN) , shot mostly in in exactly the same place as parts of Bergman 's the forest of Dalarna during the summer of 1959, recent THE HOUR OF THE WOLF [VARGTIMMEN], filmed has been attacked vigorously but has also been ten years later. praised as brilliant. The film is based on a thir- teenth-century legend and Swedish folk song called THE SEVENTH SEAL had an enthusiastic reception both The Daughter of Tore and Vange . It is a parable in Sweden and abroad . It was awarded a Cannes of good and evil. \" In telling this Norse legend Berg- prize in 1957. But in the United States Bergman was man has not only reflected the whole human experi- still largely unknown . ence guilt and forgiveness but traced mankind 's emergence from primitive shadows to Christian WILD STRAWBERRIES [SMULTRONSTALLET] 1957, de- truth ,\" commented an English critic. Scripted by picted Professor Isak Borg , seventy-eight , played by Swedish writer Ulla Isaksson , THE VIRGIN SPRING the great director, Victor Sjostrom . Borg is sum- received an Academy Award in 1960, \" yet only in moned from his home in Stockholm to the university American journals and three English magazines has town of Lund to receive an honorary doctorate for the film been awarded the proper scrutiny and praise his services to science. Steve Hopkins commented which it deserves,\" says Peter Cowie. THE VIRGIN in a Swedish magazine: \" For Bergman 's men [and SPRING received also the critics ' prize at Cannes in women] , loneliness [is] self-imposed and self- 1960. evident, the consequence of their unwillingness to make any kind of emotional commitment. \" In 1959 THE DEVIL ' S EYE [DJAVULENS OGA) 1960 , is subtitled Sjostrom was awarded the prize of the American \"A rondo capriccioso with music by Scarlatti. \" The film critics for the best performance of the year, only plot is drawn from an Irish proverb and relates how two months before his death . Satan , angered by a sore eye , sends Don Juan from Hell to seduce the twenty-year-old daughter In WILD STRAWBERRIES , Ingrid Thulin had her first of a pastor and his wife. But Satan 's plans misfire, major role after having been scandalously miscast for Don Juan falls genuinely in love with his intended in earlier Swedish films . She has belonged to the Bergman team ever since, together with Gunnar victim . The stye IS cured ultimately when the girl 's Bjornstrand , Eva Dahlbeck , Max von Sydow, Bibi virginity is vanquished on her wedding night. Andersson , Gunnel Lindblom and several other em- inent performers. WILD STRAWBERRIES received the THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY [SASOM I EN SPEGEL) 1961 , Golden Bear in Berlin in 1958. is the first of a trilogy that Bergman completed by FILM COMMENT 17

the autumn of 1962 . Others in the trilogy are WINTER Cornelius , and all his women, in a lovely setting from LIGHT and THE SILENCE. THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY the 1920 's. Again , as in THE NAKED NIGHT , we en - describes twenty-four hours in the life of a family counter the recurrent theme during Bergman 's most spending their holiday on an isolated island in the recent years : the humiliation of the artist who is Baltic . The daughter is a latent schizophrenic whose unable to defend himself against his critics. Color father sees in her deterioration the idea for an artis- plays an important role in Bergman ' s study of the tic novel with which to achieve belated literary fame. artist and his exploiters , it is always present as a The existence of God is presumably demonstrated contrapuntal element through the entire scale, em- by the meaningless suffering of this young woman phasizing the mood in the tragicomic episodes as (Harriet Andersson) , who finally succumbs to her well as in the gay farcical ones , and finally the color mental illness . But the film ends in hope: \"Love is literally explodes in a magnificent display of fire- God.\" At the end the father has a serious talk with works. The press called ALL THESE WOMEN \" a virtuo- his son for the first time. The boy exclaims: \" Father so number in color \" and \" an ironical clown trick , talked to me ,\" which refers to more than his earthly filled with a wonderfully wicked and striking humor. \" father. This film was modelled on a string quartet- It was selected for the initial program at Ven ice in Johan Sebastian Bach 's Suite No. 2, D-Minor for 1964 . violin-cel/o. Bergman has thus restricted cast to four players. THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY won Bergman his By 1963, Bergman had come a 'iong way from his second successive Oscar for the best foreign film early apprenticeship. That year, he was appointed of the year (1961) in the United States. The film is director of the Royal Dramatic Theater of Stockholm , dedicated to his wife , the famous Estonian-born the most prominent position of its kind in Sweden. pianist Kabi Laretei . During the next three years, which were devoted to guiding and stimulating theatrical activity in Sweden, In 1961 Bergman directed Stravinsky 's A Rake 's Bergman found little time for work on films. He Progress at the Royal Opera House in Stockholm , completed only one film during that period . His where he once , in 1940-42 , had been working as reSignation as a director of the theater in 1966- an assistant , mostly as a prompter and an \" errand despite his plans to resume stage productions -there boy\" to fetch sandwiches and beer from a nearby in the future-gave Bergman more time for his usual cafe. And even earlier, when Bergman was twelve, film work . he used to sit in the audience , fascinated , following his favorite composer , Wagner , with the score in PERSONA, made in 1965-66, was Bergman 's twenty- his lap . Thus , years later, in 1961 , the critics naturally seventh film , started just before his forty-seventh and unanimously hailed Bergman 's production of birthday, and he reminded critics with a laugh that A Rake 's Progress as \"a day to go down in opera he has been \"making films for twenty of cinema 's history.\" \" He received generous offers from all the seventy years .\" The title of the film suggests the world's opera stages .But he preferred Sweden . As masks worn in the classical drama. PERSONA depicts he has often explained , Sweden is where his roots man 's different roles in life and his difficulties in are, the Swedish landscape and nature, his tech- finding and fulfilling his roles-whether on the stage, nical team well trained and trimmed through the in the studios or in his own life . years, and the famous ensemble of performers who he has gathered around himself. PERSONA focusses on two women-Elizabeth , the successful actress, and Alma, the nurse. Quite sud- WINTER LIGHT [NATTVARDSGASTERNA] 1962 , is the sec- denly, and for no apparent reason , Elizabeth stops ond film of Bergman 's trilogy . It deals with a minister speaking and moving . During her convalescence in who is without love and faith , and who in his church a summer house at the Baltic she is nursed by Alma . goes merely through the motions of a ritual. A Swed- Elizabeth callously exploits the young nurse's trust- ish critic wrote : \" Few of Bergman's recent films ing kindness; her own candid erotic confessions and have been so closely connected with his earlier her sensuality are stimulating Elizabeth 's recovery . films ; I am thinking of THE DEVIL ' S WANTON [FANGELSE], Alma is brought to a dream-like state wherein she where it is said . those who are doubtful might is taking over Elizabeth 's identity and also her nau- seek shelter in church , and those who are frightened sea and suffering for having failed to play the roles might take their lives. This is exactly what the fisher- of her life. Afterwards, Elizabeth with her new man [played by Max von Sydow] does, he takes his strength returns to the theater and her husband, life ... Absurd but logical. \" and Alma continues her simple and trival life, ap- parently in no way influenced by her experience . THE SILENCE [TYSTNADEN] 1963, is the third of the trilogy and the biggest international success among THE HOUR OF THE WOLF [VARTIMMEN] was made in Swedish films for years. THE SILENCE was intensely 1966. As always during the past years, Bergman discussed from a moral point of view allover the scripted the film himself. It was made partly in the world . Among other awards , it received the German Svensk Filmindustri studios and partly on location Bambi , equivalent to the American Oscar. Ecstatic at Hovs Hallar on the southwest coast of Sweden Swedish critics said that THE SILENCE was a master- in the same place as THE SEVENTH SEAL ten years piece. Lasse Bergstrom commented: \" On the very earlier. The film is discussed by Professor Robert highest Bergman level . . . will fascinate and shock.\" Rosen in FILM COMMENT, volume 6, number 1. Jurgen Schildt stated: \" The audience was shocked , Bergman is seductive and suggestive , reverberant THE RITE , made in 1968 , was shown at the New of remarkable inspiration , bold and intense in his imagery, in short, the same visual magician who York Film Festival in September 1969 . It is the most conquered us in WILD STRAWBERRIES .\" recent of Bergman 's films presently in distribution . ALL THESE WOMEN [FOR ATT INTE TALA OM ALIA DESSA It continues the director's increasingly intense, con- KVINNOR] 1964 , was Bergman's first film in color . It tells the gay story of the brilliant cello virtuoso , centrated emphasis on small casts-in this case four characters-in austere settings , engaged in subtle introspective action , expressed by means of closely- observed dialogue scenes. 11111111 18 SUMMER 1970

Erik Hell and Ingrid Thulin in a scene from Bergman 's THE RITE , made for Swedish Television . Ingrid Thulin , Gunnel Lindblom and Birger Malmsten in Bergman 's THE SILENCE . Liv Ullmann, left, and Bibi Andersson , in Bergman's PERSONA.

WORKS WRITTEN BY INGMAR BERGMAN IN En Ko rtare Berattelse Om Ett Av Jack Uppskararens Tidi- SWEDISH gaste Barndomsminnen (short story) . 40-tal , Nr 3, 5 pages, Stockholm 1944. Plays: Ja ck Hos Skfidespelarna . Bonn iers : Svensja T ea tern nr 46 1, Fisken, Fars for film (a humoristic novel on film making) . Stockholm 1946 . Print ed as a serial . Biografbladet , Nrs 1950 / 4 , 1951 Spring , Moraliteter ( Rakel Och Biografvaktmastaren . Dagen Slutar 195 1 Su mm er , 1951 Autumn , Stockholm . Tidigt, Mig Till Skrack). Bonnie rs: Svenska Teaten nr 468 , 257 pages, Stockholm 1948. WORKS WRITTEN BY INGMAR BERGMAN IN Staden (a play for broadcasting ). Radiotjan st : Svenska Ra- ENGLISH diopjaser, 48 pages, Stockholm 1951 Tramfilning (a play for broadcasting) . Radiotja nst : Sve nska Plays: Radiopj ase r 1954 , 20 pages , Stockho lm 1954 . Wood Painting [Tramalning) . Tran slated by Randolph Tramf3lning (play edition ). Bo nniers: Ugg lebockerna ( En ak- Goodman and Leif Sjoberg , The Tulane Drama Review, tare for amatbrer) Notes on production by Hasse Abramson , November 196 1, Volume 6, Number 2. 11 booklets in cardboard box , Stockholm 1956 , Screenplays: Screenplays: Four Screenplays of Ingmar Bergman (S MILES OF A SU MMER En Filmtriologi (S~SOM I EN SPEGEL , NATTVAR DSG iiS TERNA , TYS TNADEN ) . Norstedt , 165 page s, Stockholm 1963 . NIGHT , THE SEVEN T H SEA L , W ILD STR AWB ERRIE S , THE MAGI- PERSONA , Norstedt , ca . 100 pages, Stockholm 1966. CIAN) . Tran slated by Lars Malmstrom and Da vi d Kushner , Addenda (a few exa mples of Berg man 's articles in Simon and Sch uster , 329 pages , New York 1960 . periodicals) Ingm ar Bergm an : A Film Tril ogy: ( THR OUG H A GLASS DARKLY, THE COMMU NIC AN T S, W INTER LI G HT ) , Translated by Paul Britten Au sti n , The Orion Press, 14 3 pages , New York , 1967. Addenda: Ea ch Film Is My La st. Tra nslated by P. E. Burke an d Lennart Swahn , Svensk Filmindu stri , Kungsgatan 36 , 8 pages, Stock holm 1952 0) 90 WORKS WRITTEN BY INGMAR BERGMAN IN GERMAN Screenplays: WI E IN EINE M SPIEGEL [THROUGH A GLASS DA RK L Y) . Tr ans lated by T abitha von Bonin , Ci nemathek 1, Marion von Sc hroder VerI. , 85 pages , Hamb urg 1962. DAS SI EBENTE SIE GEL [THE S EVENTH SEA L) . Translated by Ta- bitha von Boni n , Cinemathek 7, Marion von Sc hroder Ver I. , 85 pages , Hamburg 1963 . DAS SC HW EI GEN [THE SI LEN C E) . Tr ans lated by T abitha von Bon in , Cine mathek 12 , Marion vo n Sc hroder VerI. , 62 pages , Hamburg 1965. WILDE ERDBEEREN [WILD STRAWBERRIES) . Tran slated by Irene vo n Sc hering , Edit ion Suhrkamp 79 , 99 pages , Frankfurt am Main 1961 . W ILDE ERDBEEREN (Spectaculum , Texte moderner Filme , Vol . I) . Tran slated by Iren e von Schering , Su hrkamp Ver lag , 55 pages , Frankfurt am Ma in 196 1. WORKS WRITTEN BY INGMAR BERGMAN IN FRENCH Screenplays: LE S ILENCE . Tr anslated by Jacques Ro bnard . L 'Avant-Scene du Cinema nr 37 , 54 pages , Paris 1964 . Ingmar Bergman Oevres (SO MMARLEK , LA NUIT DE S FORA IN S , SOU RIRE S D ' UN E NUIT D ' ETE' , LE SEPTIEME SC EAU , LES FRAI SES SA UVAG ES , LE VISAGE) . Trans lated by C , 'G . Bjurstro m et Maurice Pons, Robert Laffont , 453 pages, Paris 1962. Une Triologie (CO MME DAN S UN MIROIR , LES COMMUNIA NT S , LE SILEN C E) , Trans lated by J. Robnard , Robe rt Laffon t, 271 pages, Paris 1964 , Addenda: Qu 'est-ce Que \" Faire Des Film s\"? Sve nsk Filmi ndustri , Kungsgatan 36 , 11 page s, Stock ho lm 1956. WORKS WRITTEN BY INGMAR BERGMAN IN SPANISH Screenplays: CO MO EN UN ESPEJ O . Translated by Fe liu Formosa , Co lecci6n vox imagen , Se ri e cine Nr . 12, Ayma S. A . Editora , 130 pages , Barcelona 1965 . 20 SUMMER 19 70

MATERIAL FOR BERGMAN FILMS WRITTEN BY Ingmar Bergman by Tommaso Chiaretti , Canesi , 201 pages, OTHER HANDS Rome 1964. Nara Livet (\"Det Vanliga Vardiga \") by Ulla Isaksson , Raben Ingmar Bergman published by Centrofilm , Universita di Torino , Nr. 33 , Autumn 1963, 74 pages . och Sjogren-VI , Partisanserien nr. 114 , 111 pages, Stock- holm 1958. Ingmar Bergman by Birgitta Steene, Twayne Publishers, The Virgin Spring (Jungfrukallan) by Ulla Isaksson , Trans- 158 pages, New York 1968. lated by Lars Malmstrom and David Kushmer, Ballantine Books, 114 pages, New York 1960. A FEW SELECTED ISSUES OF PERIODICALS WHERE INGMAR BERGMAN IS THE COVER ABOUT INGMAR BERGMAN STORY By Swedish Authors (in Swedish and translations): [We have excluded most of the well known film magazines: Cahier du Cinema , Sight and Sound, Bianco e Nero. etc.] Ingmar Bergman by Fritiof Billquist, Natur och Kultur, 279 pages , Stockholm 1960. Celuloide , No . 21 , 1959, Rio Major, Portugal , Revista Por- Ingmar Bergman by Marianne Hook, Wahlstrom and Wid- tuguesa de Cinema. Numero especial : Ingmar Bergman. strand, 193 pages, Stockholm 1962. Djavulens Ansikte, Ingmar Bergmans filmer , by Jorn Donner, Etudes Cinematographiques, No. 46-47 , 1966, Paris, Ingmar Bonniers, Aldus A 49, 201 pages, first edition , Stockholm Bergman-La trilogie. 1962. Cinema 39. Vereinigung Schweizer Filmclubs, 1963, Ge- Djavulens Ansikte, Ingmar Bergmans filmer , by Jorn Donner, neve Sondernummer : Bergmans Trilogie , 24 pages . Bonniers, Aldus , 233 pages, second and enlarged edition , Stockholm 1965. Filmklub-Cineclub 20, November / January 1959-60, Zurich, Ingmar Bergman : Was heisst \" Filme drehen \" ?, 12 pages . The Personal Vision of Ingmar Bergman by Jorn Donner, Translated by Holger Lundbergh of the above, Indiana Time . March 14 , 1960 , New York , Movie Director Ingmar University Press , 276 pages , Bloomington U.S .A. 1964 . Bergman , 5 pages. L 136. Dagbok Med Ingmar Bergman , by Vilgot Sjoman , (fro m the film ing of NATTVARDSGASTERNA) , Norstedt, 241 Saturday Review, August 27 , 1960, New Yo rk , Bergman pages, Stockholm 1963. as a Writer and Carl Anders Dymling : Rebel With a Cause, Diary from a Bergman Film by Vilgot Sjoman , two sections 3 pages. of the above translated by Keith Bradfield , 8 pages, this is a part of: Sweden Writes , Prisma, Stockholm 1965. Der Spiegel, No . 44 , October 26 , 1960, Hamburg , Schwe- dens Film-Regisseur Bergman , 15 pages. By foreign Authors: Film Comment. Spring 1965, Volume 3, Number 2 The Ingmar Bergman by Peter Cowie , a Motion Monograph , Isolated Hero of Ingmar Bergman, by Birgitta Steene, 10 41 pages , London 1961 . pages . Antonioni-Bergman-Resnais by Peter Cowie , Interna- tional Film Guide , 72 pages, London 1963 . Film Comment. Fall / Winter 1967, Volume 4 , Number 2-3 My Need To Express Myself in A Film , Bergman interviewed Cinema Eye-Cinema Ear. Some film-makers of the sixties, by Edwin Newman, 5 pages. by John Russel Taylor , Methuen, London 1964 (Berg- man-31 pages) . A SMALL SELECTION OF BERGMAN FESTIVAL PROGRAMMES The Dreams and The Dreamers by Hollis Alpert , Macmillan , (16 pages on Bergman), New York 1962. Smultronstallet Cinema, 2 September-8 December, 1963 Stockholm , Ingmar Bergman. A complete showing of his Das Schweigen und Sein Publikum (about Tystnaden) , by films including NATTVARDSGASTERNA , Svensk Filmindustri , Gert H. Theunissen , DuMont Schauberg , 187 pages, Koln Kungsgatan 26, Stockholm , 66 pages. 1964. Cuadernos de Cine Club Mercedes, No. 1, Mayo de 1963, Da s Schweigen. Ingmar Bergman , Diskussion uber einen Uraguay Ingmar Bergman Festiva l (stencil) . Film , Atlas Filmh efte, 36 pages, Duisburg, Germany 1964. Wie Sie Filmen by Ulrich Gregor, Sigbert Mohn Verlag , Consejo Nacional de Cultura, Embajada de Suecia, No- 7 pages on Bergman, GLitersloh 1966. vember 1966, Le Habana, Cuba, Ingmar Bergman Festival , 8 pages. Ingmar Bergman by Jacques Siclier, Les grand createurs du cinema No. 12-13, 28 pages , Bruxelles 1958. Carlos Fernandez Cuenca , Madrid, 1961 , Ingmar Bergman , Filmoteca Nacional de Espana , VI Semana, Internacional Ingmar Bergman by Jacques Siclier, Editions Universitaires de cine Rel igioso y de valores humanos de Valladolid , 77 No . 8, Classiques du cinema, 190 pages, Paris 1960. pages . Ingmar Bergman by Fran<;:ios D. Guyon and Jean Beranger, A SELECTION OF SEPARATELY PRINTED PRO- Premier Plan No . 34 , 134 pages, Lyon 1964 . GRAMME NOTES ON FILMS BY INGMAR BERG- MAN Ingm ar Bergman by Franc;:ois D. Guyon , Premier Plan No . 3 , 41 pages, Lyon 1959. Da: Det Danske Filmmuseum . Store Sonstervoldstraede, Kb pen- hamn K., Danmark Ingmar Bergman et Ses Films by Jean Beranger, La Terrain No: Norsk Film institutt . Kingosgate 22 . Oslo . Norge Vague , 110 pages, Pari s 1959. Atla s: Atlas Filmhefte . August Osterrieth . 6 Frankfurt! Main 1. Mainzer Themes d 'lnspiration d'lngmar Bergman by Jos Burveni c h, Landstrasse 148. Germany Collection encyclopedique du cinema No. 30 , 59 pages, Bruxelles 1960. DET REGNAR pil VilR KARLEK : Da . EN LEKTION I KARLEK : Atlas. Ingmar Bergman by Jacques Siclier, Libros de cine RIALP , FANGELSE : Da . No . 242 pages, Madrid 1962. GYCLARNAS AFTON : Da . No. HAMNSTAD: Da . Ingmar Bergman , un Dramaturgo Cinematografico. by H. KRIS : Da . Alsine Thevenet and Emir Rodriguez Monegal. KVINNODROM : Da. No . Ingmar Bergman by Ljubomir Oliva, Orbis, 201 pages, KVINNORS VANTAN : Atlas. Prague 1966. SKEP P TILL INDIA LAND : Da . No . SMULTRONSTALLET: No . La Solitudine di Ingmar Bergman by Guido Oldrini , Ugo SOMMARLEK : Da . Guanda Editore, 150 pages, Parma 1965. SOMMARNATTENS LEENDE : No . TILL GLADJE : Da . TYSTNADEN : Atlas. TORST: Da . FILM COMMENT 21

Swedish I was very pleased when my friend Gian Luigi Rondi Films asked me whether Sweden was prepared to partici- at pate in a film display in Sorrento . It was a great honour for Sweden to receive such an invitation ·Sorrento after two so large and important film countries as France and England . by An honour, but also a problem . Large film countries Peter pick the plums along their releases for Sorrento; Cowie they represent perhaps only the top ten percent , some of which have been financed with American capital , whereas a small country like Sweden is compelled to show more than half of its annual production , which is both artistically and financially entirely Swedish. But this problem also has its positive aspects . In this way the Italian audience will get a very repre- sentative picture of Swedish film today . Five years have elapsed since a major film reform was carried out in Sweden The reform aimed at stimulating the production of Swedish quality films through the assistance of large quality grants . In practice this reform brought about a rejuvenation of Swedish films. A new generation came to the fore. The average age of the ten directors whose features will be viewed at Sorrento is under 40 years of age : they have all contributed to changing filmmaking from an industry to a personal form of expression . A development, which during the post-war period , was initiated by the Italian film . Films are not produced in a vacuum . They are de- pendent upon the social and cultural setting in the society, upon its atmosphere. Italy is one of the world 's most important film pro- ducing countries, Italian films would have been un- able to reach such greatness without the fastidious Italian audiences, without the extremely sensitive Italian film critics, without a vital Italian discussion . of films. This meeting with this truly brilliant Italian film atmo- sphere is a challenge for us. The audience and the criticism we meet in Sorrento is the foundation on which the Italian film has its roots-just as the Swed- ish film has grown out of its society. The people in the Swedish cinema, the performers and the producers, look forward to Sorrento with great excitement. They send through me their warm- est greetings to their Italian colleagues. They hope you will find some of our films noteworthy. They believe that these films can at least convey a picture of a country that differs from Italy in so many ways but that still holds it so dearly. Harry Schein Director of the Swedish Film Institute 22 SUMMER 1970

Annually in September, in Sorrento on the Bay of break away from convention and tradition . But Jan Naples, are held special one-week tributes to the Troell , Kjell Grede, Jan Halldoff and Jonas Cornell cinemas of various nations. In 1968, Sweden was have all appeared on the feature film scene since so honored, and in 1969, Czech oslo vakia . Director 1966, and they constitute a highly talented group of this Incontri Internazionali del Cinema is Gian- of directors. Bo Widerberg and Vilgot Sjbman , the Luigi Rondi, whose book Italian Cinema Today (pub- rebels of five years ago, have matured into artists lished by Hill and Wang) , was reviewed in FILM of deep integrity and commitment. The portentous COMMENT, Volume 4 number 2-3. and erotic image of Swedish cinema abroad seems slowly to be fad ing into the past. And a new genera- Honorary President of the Sorrento tribute to S we d~ t ion is emerging from the Institute's Film School. ish film wa s director Ingmar Bergman . HIs Council The possibilities for adventurous film making grows o f 22 film-dire c tor members in c luded Fellini, An- still further in 1969 by the establishment of a Guar- ton io ni, De Sica, Ro ssellini, Visconti, Rene Clair and antee Fund , empowering the Institute to grant loans Sir Carol Reed. of up to 25 % of a domestic film 's budget. The writer of th is report on Swedish film s at Sorren- For years , Swed ish critics have taken Bergman to to, Peter Cowie , wa s an Ex hibitioner in History at task for evading international problems and political Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he edited the commitment. But SHAME deals unflinchingly with the film section on magazines and undergraduate news- moral and emotional impact of war upon a young papers. In 1963, he founded the annual,-Interna- married couple . It is a much more rugged and much tional Film Guide , of which he is editor. It published less indulgent film than HOUR OF THE WOLF ( although in 1969 its six th issue , of 336 pages, with 150 illus- Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann again have the trations. de sc ribing film ac tivities in 28 nations. leading roles) . SHAME represents Bergman 's \" horror Cowie 's books include Antonion i, Bergman , Resnais stricken \" reaction to what is happening in the world ( 1963) , The Cinema of Orson Welles (1965) , Swedish today. Jan and Eva are both musicians, living in Cinema ( 1966) , and Seventy Years of Cinema a small cottage on the island of F!irb (the film was ( 1969)-all of which have been published in the U.S. shot there, and Bergman lives on F!irb, but no time by A. S. Barnes and Company. Cowie travels to and place are specified in the dialogue) . In the first many c ountries each year and contributes to maga- shot we see them together in bed . The alarm clock zines, newspapers and television on film subjects. rings . It goes on ringing until the spring is completely Now 30. he edits the International Film Guide series unwound . Only then , as if called back from the dead of paperbacks, which now contains more than 20 like the boy in PERSONA or th e quartet surfacing titfes . from the sea in THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY, do they awake from sleep. Soon there are disturbing por- A wide selection of Swedish films made during the tents . A church bell is heard tolling at a strange past two years was on display at Sorrento , an event hour; and the telephone in the cottage rings with that wisely focuses its entire attention on the work short, sharp stabs of sound , refusing to stop even of a single country and is beset by none of the hectic after Eva has taken up the receiver. intrigues of a competitive festival. From these small but sinister beginnings, SHAME In one way , the Sorrento Week was the clima x to one accelerates into its breathless narrative . Bergman of the healthiest seasons in the Swedish industry. has seldom told a story so directly. Usually he Ingmar Bergman is at last regaining his stock among pauses en route , using the idea of the journey as even the most hostile critics. ELVIRA MADIGAN took an excuse for long asides , as in THE SEVENTH SEAL the U.S. and Britain by storm. Jan Troell's OLE DOLE and WILD STRAWBERRIES. But there are few reflective DOFF won the Golden Bear at Berlin only nine months interludes in this new film . The island is soon strafed after the same d irector ' s HERE IS YOUR LIFE had by jets and the cottage is bombarded . The 'Iand- carried off the top award at the Chicago Festival. scape is filled with burning trees and dead bodies . In the five years since the Swed ish Film Institute A ghastly sequence occurs when Jan is ordered to was established , feature film production has dou- execute his wife 's lover (played by Gunnar Bjbrn- bled , export revenue has increased by more than strand) and fires so clumsily that several shots are 300 %, and yearly box-office receipts have moved required to finish the job . There is no escape for up from 27 million dollars to 38 million dollars. Jan and Eva, no hope as they drift out to sea in an open boat and their supplies diminish . Only Freedom of expression has been comparatively easy Bergman the dreamer survives the disaster to sum- in Swedish cinema. Thus one cannot really speak mon up, through Eva 's final words , a moving evoca- of a '\" school \" or a '\" wave '\" -like those in France , tion of roses turned into flames, while a child tries Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, where a feeling of pitifully to say something above the harsh sound unity among film makers is inspired by a need to of war. FILM COMMENT 23

'- liv Ullmann and .. .-9'j;... . . Max von Sydow in ~- ~ . \" Bergman 's SHAME. HERE 'S YOUR LIFE . From Left, Allan Edwall, Eddie Axberg and two others work as loggers. Directed by Jan Troell.

Bergman has said that this new film tries to com- scenes, like those with Agneta Ekmanner, or the ment, however indirectly, on the Vietnam situation . parody-within-a-parody of gangster films involving Like Jan and Eva, he regards the liberating forces Harriet Andersson and Gosta Ekman , are essentially and the guerrilla movement with equal abhorrence. marginal to the theme . But as a debut, I LOVE , YOU \" In the drama that washes over us ,\" he has re- LOVE is ex cellent , marrying sex and verbal wit as marked , \" My cry is just as audible as the chirp of effectively as HUGS AND KISSES did last year . a bird during a battle . I feel it , I know it. \" Kjell Grede, husband of Bibi Andersson , has also The \" shame\" of the title is clearly felt by the director made his first picture this year. His HUGO AND JOSE- himself, for he knows that he should take sides , PHINE has been widely praised as one of the most and that by not taking sides he is to a certain degree intelligent films about childhood ever made. Jose- an accomplice to the terror and persecution of Viet- phine is a stout-hearted , independent little girl , nam , Czechoslovakia and Nigeria .. seven years old . She becomes fast friends with Hugo , whose father is apparently a conscientious Mai Zetterling 's THE GIRLS also had a world premiere objector serving a term in prison . Their adventures , at Sorrento . Zetterling 's ardent struggle on behalf their conversations, their discoveries-these form of female emancipation is well known from her pre- the fabric of the film . This is a children 's vision of vious feature films; and her sincere anti-war feelings things- we , the adults, can interpret those facts that were crystallised in THE WAR GAME , a short made Hugo and Josephine can only absorb with curiosity. some time before Peter Watkins 's film of the same We can appreciate the kindly tact and concern with name. Now these two themes come together in THE which the old \" gardener\" treats his two young GIRLS . It is a declamatory and frontal attack on male ch·arges . It is difficult , too , not to respond to the hegemony in all the spheres of life that matter. Three unself-conscious actirig of Marie Ohman and Fred- actresses are touring Sweden with a theater com- erik Becklen , and to the atmosphere of the Swed- pany, performing Aristophanes 's Lysistrata , as funny ish countryside in summer, evoked so warmly by and trenchant an anti-war playas any . Not for the Lasse Bjorne's color photography. first time, Zetterling uses a complex structure of fantasy and reality to illustrate this se x war. But Jan Halldoff's third film , OLA AND JULIA, is in color although there are some effective satirical se- and deals, like LIFE IS JUST GREAT, with young people . quences, most of the fantasy scenes strike a false Ola is the head of a pop group (in reality Ola and note because they are too pompous. the Janglers are the Swedish Beatles or Rolling Stones) . Julia is a stage actress , touringthe country Lars-Magnus Lindgren 's THE BLACK PALM TREES , set as the wife in Beckett 's Endgame. The script skillfully in Rio de Janeiro 's harbor city of Niteroi , rambles explores the clash between fantasy and real experi- for 2 Y2 hours while Max von Sydow and three ship- ence . Julia finds herself behaving in her love affair mates sit on their uppers considering how they can with Ola just as she acts in the play, and one is even obtain a $3 ,000 reward owing to von Sydow. In a reminded of Bergman 's THE NAKED NIGHT and ILLICIT way , it resembles the old-style Howard Hawks or INTERLUDE if) certain dressing-room scenes , when John Huston movie, with a group of men stranded the idea of the entertainer's being imprisoned be- far from their home environment. But the rhythm hind his mask or persona is clearly important. Su- of the film is fatally lethargic-with shots of palm perficially though , OLA AND JULIA is tender and ro- trees at sunset or against the seascape, inserted mantic, always attrative to watch , and naggingly at predictable intervals between the long bouts of reminiscent of A MAN AND A WOMAN, with its regretful drinking and conversation . Like most of the new music and its pattern of arrival and departure as Swedish productions, THE BLACK PALM TREES is in the lovers snatch at brief intervals of pleasure to- color. Even Bergman 's next film , THE PASSION , will gether. be in color , too . Some exciting projects were announced at Sorren- Yngve Gamlin 's THE BATHERS is an unfortunately to , led by Jan Troell 's massive screen version of disjointed study in the corruption of youth , as a Vilhelm Moberg's The Emigrants and Unto a Good teenage girl grows slowly aware of the climate of Land. These films will be shot partly in North Ameri- sexuality around her in a remote village in Northern ca , either in New York State or in Canada , depend- Sweden . Her mother is dead and her father is on ing on the right locations' being found . The epic the brink of collapse. Bua spends her time watching quality of the story seems perfectly suited to Troell , the inmates of a home for alcholics , and she is , of whose HERE IS YOUR LIFE had the style of saga , too . course , raped in the end . Gamlin tries to \" rhyme \" A small group of Swedes are driven by poverty and the decay of the village with the demoralization of starvation in the 19th century to cross the Atlantic Bua , but one 's overall impression is inescapably of and establish a new life in Minnesota . By the time a long , repetitive and often salacious picture. the story ends, their children have forgotten how to speak Swedish . Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann Stig Bjorkman is chief editor of Chaplin , the film will play the principal roles of Karl Oskar and his magazine , and he has made some interesting short wife, Kristina. films . His first feature , I LOVE, YOU LOVE , is a bright and sometimes hilarious chronicle. Sten and Helena AI Sjoberg , a retrospective of whose films was are expecting a baby at the wrong end of their affair They both feel rather amateurish about the business mounted at Sorrento , plans to bring Strindberg 's of parenthood . Sten 's frustration before the happy event prompts him to sleep with another girl ; He- The Father to the screen . He will fi rst stage the play lena 's emotional weariness after the birth leads to the end of the relationship . There are no acrimon i- at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm , and ous quarrels; the bitter taunts remain unspoken . The only weakness of the film is that some of its best then move into the studios with his cast, using an altogether different approach for the film version . It 's encouraging to find that an older director like Sjoberg , who made his first film forty years ago , is still able to work under the streamlined production system in Sweden . 11111111 FILM COMMENT 25



Mr. Nordberg is a film critic for a Stockholm news- But Garbo is, of co urse, known as the movies' foremost paper and was a juror, with FILM COMMENT Editor femme fatale. And as such she has always been able, Gordon Hitchens, at the 1968 international film with uniqu e consistency, to portray two of the world festival at Berlin. His article on Garbo is one chapter literature's most famous ladies of destiny: Margue- of his book, published in Swedish by Wahlstrom rite Gauthier and Anna Karenina. and Widstrand, Stockholm. The article was trans- lated and broadcast OL'e rseas in English by Sveriges The courtesa n who carelessly plays wi th the fire of love Radio in 1959. and who herse lf is burned by suffering, and who un- dergoes a moral conversion-this woman we meet In AS YOU DESIRE ME, based on a play by Luigi not only in CAM ILLE but also in THE MYSTERIOUS Pirandello, Garbo plays a yo ung Italian countess who loses her memory after a nocturnal castle fire; after LADY, ANNA CHRISTIE, THE SINGLE STANDARD, diverse wanderings she lands in Budapest as a night- club singer. To her husband-who after desperate ROMANCE, INSPIRATION , A WOMAN OF AFFAIRS, attempts finally succeeds in finding her-she is always Maria, the pure and faithful, akin to apple blossoms SUSAN LENOX and MATA HARI. The neglected wife and spring skies. To the cynical Zoltan, who has who almost freezes to death in her refrigerated taken up with her in Budapest, she is, on the other marriage, but who in her lover's arms experien ces hand, Zara, the scornful and faithless woman who an erotic resurrection-mystery, we first become engages lovers at a glance and dismisses them with acquainted with in THE SAGA OF GOSTA BERLING a gesture of her hand. Each man is equally convinced and later in WILD ORCHIDS, THE KISS, THE PAINTED that his conceptio n of her is the true one. VEIL and CONQUEST. Also, Garbo indirectly plays a similar part in GRAND HOTEL, QUEEN CHRISTINA But Maria-Zara floats through all the compli cations and NINOTCHKA , in which she is caught in a forced with a secretive smile. What is she really like? marriage to, respectively, the art of ballet, the Swedish state and the Russian Communist Party, At 'first it may seem that Garbo has performed, in her only to be freed by, in order, the elegant jewel thief, films, as many quite different types of women. The the Spanish ambassador and the Parisian man of the poor foundling who, in SUSAN LENOX-HER RISE AND world. FALL, grows up somewhere on the American prairie and is almost raped one stormy night by her intox- But don't Marguerite Gauthier and Anna Karenina icated step-father, does not, for example, seem to (in Garbo's pictures) have so many qualities in com- have much in common with the sophisticated woman mon that they blend together into the identical of the world in A WOMAN OF AFFAIRS, who speeds over woman? They both live in the illegitimate marriage the roads of Europe in her low sports car and who of forbidden passion; \"You belong,\" says Anna exchanges male companions with absent-minded Karenina 's husband to his unfaithful wife, \" to that amiability, as if she were trying on gloves. Queen ambiguous type of women who are neither married Christina-who studies Descartes beside her nightly nor unmarried.\" They are both struck by the spot- tallow lamp, makes her morning toilet in the winter light of society's damnation and are forced, typically snow and generally lives like a Spartan virgin in her enough, to be pilloried in exactly the same scene: stone-cold Wasa castle-would seem in turn hardly with their lovers in a box at the theater, helpless akin to the exotic spy, Mata Hari, who dances almost victims of eager, well-adjusted opera glasses. But nude before the god, Shiva, in the cabaret hall. And however much these two Garbo heroines are thrust so on. into the stocks of shame and are spat upon , they never, remarkably enough, lose their inner innocence and spiritual nobility. FILM COMMENT 27





For t he Garbo heroin e is a pa ra dox ical creature: her in H cul t ic act, a c losed occurrence of circlin g a nd overt fri vo li ty cam oufl ages her a bso lu te devoti on. ret urn , a st ri ct ly regul ated ri t ua l. This, ty pi cally, is also t he case wit h t h e skiin g teac he r, K a rin , in t he C uk or co medy, TWO -FA CED WOMAN. This ri t ua l is ide ntica l wit h t he dra ma of repe nt a nce In order to lure he r run away hu sba nd bac k to t heir over forbidden passion. At the sa me moment tha t bed of ma rriage, this basica lly h onora bl e wife dis- t he Ga rbo heroin e is' stru ck with remorse, she is sub- guises herse lf as a va mp . Indeed, the ti t le, T WO - ject to sufferin g. Th e sinn er mu st receive punish- F ACE D WOMAN, may se rve as a n en t ra nce-sign t o t he men t , a nd t his punishment is as preorda in ed as it is wh ole Ga rbo ga llery of heroines. She is a lways a un avo ida ble: a ve nge ful D estiD Y a lways dogs her wo ma n wi t h two faces, a t once bi tc hy like Za ra a nd ste ps. Love is doo med in a dvan ce a nd a lready a t birt h sain t ly like Ma ria: a virt uous femme fata le. is s ha dowed by a nnihilation. Ma rgueri te Ga uthier suffers he r first fate ful attac k a t t he ba ll where sh e In retrospect, it a ppea rs obvio us t ha t it was t he confesses her love for Arm a nd , a nd Ann a K a renin a doubl e-a llure of t his t wo-faced heroine t ha t ma de has her first fata l meeting with Vronsky a t th e wintry Ga rbo's sc reen love a ffa irs such profi ta ble capi ta l railroad st a ti on where her dra ma will soo n reac h in vestments. By simul ta neously ent icin g, wi t h t he its t ragic denouement. erotic levity of t he de mi-m onde, yet display in g t he in corporeal spiritu a li ty of the ma donn a. Garbo came This ritu a l a lso demands tn a t t he Ga rbo heroine t o a ppea l to a n ideal tha t has persisted for ce nt uries : a lways li ve in t he stri ct sphere of t he Abso lu te. Her a double mora li ty wit h deep roots in puri ta ni ca l lover may disa ppoin t her- t hat is, of course, wha t deni a l of t he fl esh. As a virtu ous femme fa tale-by ha ppens to both Ma rguerite Ga u t hi er a nd Ann a th e way , a near rela ti ve of t he good-ba d girl of the K a renin a-bu t she a lone is in capabl e of compromise : 1940's a nd 1950's-Gar bo has represe nted a reac ti on- she rema ins a guile less stra nger a mong a ll th ose ary wo ma n-m yth t hat fascinated a ma nifo ld readin g hy poc ri tes of love. In t he end , she a lways gets redress. publi c a nd t heate r publi c long before t he first sma ll So bbin g, Arma nd kn eels beside t he dying Ma rgueri te, crowd of believers, that first m ovie a udience, assem- who lies t here, her face t ra nsfi gured ; whil e Vro nsky bled in what H a rry Martinson has ca lled t he \"cha pel in t h e last scene, crushed, loo ks up at t h e por t ra it of of t he life-cowa rds.\" his dead mist ress, who wit h a smile of supern at ura l mildness gazes down upon t he unwort hy one. Created by Alexa ndre Dum as in his nove l a nd play , La Dame aux Camelias, Ma rgue ri te Ga ut hier was In this moment, t he ri t ua l is fulfill ed. The sinn er has preceded in li te rature, as Yrj b Him has shown in a n fin a lly reached t he end of her long wa nderin g t hro ugh essay, h.v th e R oussea u heroin e, evo lved as a co n- purgato ry, a nd she is tra nsformed in to a madonn a, t inu a ti on of his nove l abo u t H elo·ise. La uret ta Pisa na ra ised a bove a ll t he low dema nds of t his world . And in has bee n forced by her nasty pa rents at a very earl y this sam e mome nt we understa nd t he rea l reaso n age to drink dee p fro m t he we ll of vice, bu t she is why t he Ga rbo heroine must a lways sac rifi ce he r clea nsed a t t he last moment in t he we ll of love. She h a ppiness and ofte n a lso he r life. It ha ppens, not to falls so ma dl y in love with a n En glish lord t ha t for expia te a crime, bu t to save us, who lac k fa it h, from his sa ke she not only re noun ces her former life bu t doubtin g t he miracle of love. If one regards t he clea n: also, in t he end , she sac rifices her ha ppin ess. Moved hear ted sinn er in t his li gh t, her dra ma of pe ni te nce by t his hea rt t ha t \"destiny has left to sha me bu t reminds one of a kind of sufferin g by' proxy. nature had crea ted for chastity\" (to use R oussea u 's words, which seem to be borrowed from a Ga rbo This da rk a nd fata listic re ligion of love has ha rdly scree n-pl ay) , t he lord wa nts to ma rry her. Bu t La ur- a nythin g in common wi t h t he er otic sunshine phil os- e tt a refu ses. And in a fa rewe ll letter she ex pl a ins why. ophy t hat otherwise so ofte n h as been presented on S he kn ows t ha t a n En glish lord m ay n ot soil his fa mily the Ameri can screen a nd t h at for t he most pa r t refers coat-o f- a rms by ma rryin g a wo ma n with a da rk past. t o a lifelong ha ppin ess of ma rri age. In stead, it rath er And rather t ha n . . . reminds on e of t he \"da rk \" fi lms of t he 1930's in Fra nce. Leav ing aside a r t istic compa riso ns, t he elegiac H ow nea r t he Ga rbo dra ma ca n be co nn ected to t his ri t ua l of the Garbo dra ma seems close ly related to ori gin a l tex t is show n by I NS PI RA TIO N. In t he film , Prevert's a nd Ca rne's dirges a bou t yo un g lovers wh o we a re prese nted wit h a so ugh t-a fter a rtists' model meet under t he co nste ll a ti on of Destin y a nd in t he in t he Pa ris of the 1920's, hectica lly flirtin g to righ t gathering shad ow of n eat h. a nd le ft. But t he n she meets the yo un g diploma t, fa lls ma dly in love wit h him a nd for his sa ke breaks P erh a ps also in t his conn ecti on one may brin g in wi t h t he sha ll ow bo hemia n life, of which she has been An ouilh . Even if t his pl ay wri ght has sha rpe ned ma ny t he cen te r. In t he dept hs of he r me la ncho ly so ul , how- frost-shinin g a ph orisms a bout the t reac he ry of t he eve r, she kn ows t hat t his short ha ppy time will soon emotio ns, he has basica lly a lways been t he sa me: be over. Th e last sce ne a lso shows how she wa nde rs a wo unded idea list, a disa ppoin ted roma nt icist who away from her loved one t hrough snowfa ll at du sk in disgust turn s a way from a world of hypoc ri t ica l a fte r hav in g writte n her fa rewe ll lette r. H er hear t suffe rin gs a nd whci in stead ecsta ti ca ll y ha ils t he will neve r be long to a nother. Bu t she kn ows what his uniqu e moment of love t hat ca n be co nqu e red fin a lly ca reer dema nds. And rather t ha n ... onl y whe n life is sac rifi ed. It is proba bly t his bi tte r- sweet va riation of a theme of puri ta n chast ity t ha t The refore, Ga rbo's he roines, see min gly ha rdl y re- has ena bl ed An ouilh to win such a wid e hea rin g wit h lated collect ive ly , represent in actua lity on e a nd t he the wo rld puhli c. And it is basica ll y t hi s sa me t heme sa me ty pe of wo ma n. In t he sa me way , t he embroi- t ha t Ga rbo a lways port rayed. dery of in t ri gue in her pi ctures, which seem so chao tic, may a ll he ta ke n bac k t o a n in a lte rab le basic patte rn . But doesn't t hi s smile- whi ch Ma ri a -Za ra has bor- And it is proha ble t hat it is just t his magic in repetition rowed from Mona Li a -mea n t hat we still haven 't th at ex pl a ins to a hi gh degr ee th e dra win g powe r of hee n a bl e to unm as k her for what she rea ll y is\" t hese film s on t he puhli c. The spectator ta kes pa r t Th e Ga rbo he roin e is neve r kindled by t he fire of the se nses; inst ead, she a lways t urn s aside, coo l a nd un to ucha bl e. In spi te of t he s tri ct ri t ua l of passion, 30 SUMMER 1970







her erotic relations often seem marked by playful roman ce, she was also indirectly appealing to the distraction. At the same time that, with manly gen- temper of the times, for a self-justifying, independent tleness, she co nso les her sisters in their romantic woman. which she h erse lf had helped bring out. sorrows, she always embraces her lovers with her head thrown back: A$ if she wanted, in that very Greta Garbo Filmography moment of ecstasy, to push them away from her .. . 1922 And perhaps one remembers Edith Sbdergran's lines: PETER THE TRAMP: Written, produced and I am no woman. directed by Erik A. Petschler. Swedish title, LUF· I am a neuter. FAR-PETTER. I am a child, a page, and a daring decision . .. 1924 The child, the woman and the page-these make up THE STORY OF GOSTA BERLING: Directed by the trinity that shows itself through Garbo's screen Mauritz Stiller. personality and that, if yo u like, is mirrored in her physical appearance, with its subtle combination of 1925 manly and womanly components . It is by virtue of JOYLESS STREET: Directed by G. W. Pabst. Ger- t his that her destiny-haunted tragedienne can some- man title, DIE FREUDLOSE GASSE. Also known as THE times have the features of a modern androgyn that exerts a dangerous magnetism and thereby gives the STREET OF SORROW. pathetic love story a graciously disquieting under- tone. The shadow of Tintomara, of Carl Jonas Love 1926 Almquist's classi c nove l, Drottningens juuelsniycle THE TORRENT: Directed by Monta Bell. [The J ewels of The Queen] , seems sometimes to lurk THE TEMPTRESS: Directed by Fred Niblo. in Garbo's pictures, and in QUEEN CHRISTINA it comes fully before the curtain. 1927 FLESH AND THE DEVIL : Directed by Clarence With the same teasing of fi ckleness as the mysterious Brown. dancer at Gustaf Ill's masked ball, Garbo in QUEEN LOVE: Directed by Edmund Goulding. CHRISTINA changes her erotic attitude. In one mo- ment, youthfully slender in boots and page dress, she 1928 is spying on Ebba Brahe's amorous rendezvous, and THE DIVINE WOMAN : Directed by Victor Sea- soon afterwards, dressed in a dainty la ce dress, she strom. throws herself into the arms of the Spanish ambas- THE MYSTERIOUS LADY: Directed by Fred Niblo. sador. It is as if, deep within her, she is neither jealous of her lady-in-waiting nor in love with her lover. 1929 Rather she makes one think of an irrational child of nature, a creature of instinct who plays for the A WOMAN OF AFFAIRS: Directed by Clarence sake of playing and who, like Tintomara, is free of the common destiny of both sexes \"continually to Brown. . chase after one another . ..\" WILD ORCHIDS: Directed by Sidney Franklin . The secret ability of the Garbo figure to attract, as THE SINGLE STANDARD: Directed by John S. an ideal personality in our over-sexualized dqys, per- Robertson. haps depends in the last analysis on this half-mock- THE KISS: Directed by Jacques Feyder. ing, half-sorrowful inac cessibility. As Marguerite Gauthier looks down from her box with malicious 1930 melancholy at the gaudy audience in the theatre, ANNA CHRISTIE: Directed by Clarenc~ Brown so Garbo has always, with a kind of ironic detach- (American version). Directed by Jacques Feyder ment, viewed the tumult of sufferings whose center (German version). she always is. As Almquist 's heroine lives \"in high ROMANCE : Directed by Clarence Brown . agreement with myse lf,\" so Garbo seems to live in an amoral universe obeying only her own laws. 1931 INSPIRATION: Directed by Clarence Brown. I am Ma ta Hari, my own master . . . SUSAN LENOX: HER FALL AND RISE: Directed by Robert Z. Leonard. This line, as one so desires, may be said with an emancipated accent. And in an y case it is easy to 1932 place Garbo's Tintomara character in relation to a MATA HARI: Directed by George Fitzmaurice. special time. GRAND HOTEL: Directed by Edmund Goulding. AS YOU DESIRE ME: Directed by George Fitz- During the 1920's and 1930's the boyish ideal woman maurice. was brought forward , a woman who in more refined form can be said to have embodied the free behavior 1933 and fresh disposition toward revolt of the suffragette. QUEEN CHRISTINA : Directed by Rouben Mamou- This type of woman-whose pyschological portrait lian. Edith Sbdergran painted in the preceding poem, Vierge moderne-is also noted for certain defini te 1934 outer attributes: low-heeled shoes, page-boy haircut, THE PAINTED VEIL: Directed by Richard Boles- masculine clothing. But we recognize just these at- lawski. tributes from numerous newspaper photographs of Garbo-perhaps it was simply that she, more expres- 1935 sively than most actresses, came to in carnate this ANNA KARENINA : Directed by Clarence Brown . boyish ideal in the eyes of the world. And when Garbo on the screen implied the presence of a siren of CAMILLE: Directed by George Cukor. CONQUEST: Directed by Clarence Brown. 34 SUMMER 1970 1939 NINOTCHKA : Directed by Ernst Lubitsch. 1941 TWO-FACED WOMAN : Directed by George Cukor. 1I 11~1



o • Frederic Fleischer Lena Nyman in I AM CURIOUS (YELLOW) , Export or die is the guideline of the Swedish film directed by Vilgot Sjbman . [photo : Grove Press] industry. Everyone concerned realizes that the do- mestic film market alone is much too small to keep Sweden feeds Swedish producers in business and to enable cre- the world's ative talent to flou rish. appetite for The development of Ingmar Bergman 's international Swedish films reputation came not only at the last moment for him but also for the Swedish film industry as a whole . Immediately after Bergman ' s SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT was awarded a special prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1956, his films became popular in many nations. At the same time, television arrived in Sweden and soon kept nearly half the population out of movie-houses. A couple of hours of daily programs on one channel was enough to keep most Swedes in their homes . The international acclaim showered on Bergman 's films gradually stimulated the curiosity of foreign distributors and promoters as to what other \" un- discovered \" talent might be found in Sweden . For some time, however, the Swedish film industry did not realize that there could be an international mar- ket, within the shadow of Bergman , for other Swed- ish films as well . The establishment in 1963 of the Swedish Film Insti- tute-which indirectly brought some younger men into executive positions within the industry-played a vital part in changing the attitudes of Swedish producers . Of course, they were encouraged by the art-cinema movement in various countries . More- over , the Swedish Film Institute, which granted awards to artistic productions, helped convince producers to invest in low-budget art films in order to discover and develop new talent. Swedish sex was known to appeal to foreign audi- ences, but hitherto Swedish producers had merely satisfied themselves by making films with a certain amount of nudity and no artistic pretensions. Now they realized that they could win a more secure distribution footing abroad by ex posing their na- tion 's ad vanced attitudes in an artistic conte xt. Pro- ducers recognized that sex did not have to be the specialty of poor-quality films , but instead , by being part of an artistic film , the film could be more ad- van c ed and se x could be appreciated not only by voyeurs but also by persons who discussed se x seriousl y with in an intellectual frame of reference. 36 SUMMER 1970

This change was reflected , for example , in DO YOU important. In some countries certain distributors , BELIEVE IN ANGELS?, released in 1963 by Sandrews faithful customers , get a first look at a new Swedish and soon breaking box-office records. Directed by film . For Western Europe, our producers usually Lars Magnus Lindgren , the film marked the arrival require a guarantee and a royalty from distributors. of Gbran Lindgren-no relation-among the top ex- In areas where there is little opportunity to keep ecutives at Sandrews , a company second in size informed about the distribution fate of films , the to Sweden's largest and oldest company, Svensk Swedes sell them for flat fees . Sandrews has its own Filmindustri . DO YOU BELIEVE IN ANGELS? had a good representati ve in Paris and in New York , and it portion of nudity, was professionally made but nei- ex pects to have one in South America in the near ther very daring nor artistic . It dealt with idyllic sum- future . Most other Swedish companies send their mer love in the Stockholm archipelago , an old export managers on regular trips to the various favorite locale of Swedish films. Several years later, markets . Paris is especially important for European Gbran Lindgren let Lars Magnus Lindgren shoot sales . DEAR JOHN , which has grossed between five and six times its cost . The film portrayed the independence Co-productions between French and Swedish com- of a young Swedish woman who gets considerable panies, instigated by the Swedish Film Institute, have sexual pleasure out of a love affair but who demands been met with mi xed emotions. The films have been no promises from her lover and accepts mutal re- French , with the Swedish participation more or less sponsibility , e.g. , she uses a diaphragm . In many symbolic , except in financial matters . Although parts of the world , this attitude was found to be Swedish producers take a rather skeptical view of rather shocking , although worthy of serious thought. such co-productions, they admit that they have opened up the French market for their films, a mar- Gbran Lindgren , who is now president in charge ket that was virtually closed to them earlier. of Sandrews's film and theatrical activities, de- scribes his own attitude by saying : \" We have no Sandrews claims that exports account for about half mass foreign audiences but we have small ones in of its income. Other major Swedish producers quote every country, often exclusive ones that want to figures between 30 and 50 percent of their grosses. keep abreast of what is going on in the world . This Normal production costs in Sweden vary between audience appreciates what is 'different' in various $160 ,000 and $280 ,000 . For the present , Swedish countries .\" producers are rather pleased with conditions. Their gross income during 1966-67 increased by 9 per- Lindgren believes that Sandrews 's films sell well cent, although the number of movie-goers de- abroad because they are controversial and because creased by 4.6 percent. The average price of tick- Swedish directors are interested in subjects that at- ets rose by 14 percent, to over one dollar, while tract foreign attention , particularly sex. Ironically, the number of movie-houses dropped by 8 percent. many Swedish directors are themselves puritanical , Stockholm , which had the highest prices on tickets, and they shock themselves as much as their audi- accounted for about one-quarter of movie attend- ences . Lindgren sums up : \" We ' re ahead of other ance in the entire country . countries . .. among other things we're lucky that our directors are so interested in sex .\" The leading Swedish production companies are also major importers , as they own large chains of movie- Within the Swedish film industry everyone denies houses. There are over a hundred theaters in that films are tailored for foreign audiences. Execu- Svensk Filmindustri 's chain , whereas Sandrews has tives and producers say rightly that their directors about fifty . Because the companies own most of the are granted exceptional freedom , and once they theaters outright, they are not faced with the prob- decide to let a director make a film , they allow him lems of just making films to please local the- to develop his subject as he wishes , so long as he ater-owners. At the same time, the sizable incomes keeps within his budget. from the theater-chains enable them to experiment, to some extent. Although the financial pressures are rarely or ever stated , a director knows that his feature depends Looking beyond the immediate future and into a upon boxoffice returns . If he can win a certain fol- crystal ball , the Swedish film industry has a number lowing abroad , his future is on more solid ground . of important problems ahead . Will Swedish films be Comedies , however, are almost entirely out , as they able to hold onto their export markets? Today only are rarely considered to be exportable. 10 to 20 percent of the Swedish features are in color . Harry Schein , president of the Swedish Film Insti- As an illustration of the faith that Sandrews has in tute, recently warned producers to keep abreast of its directors, Gbran Lindgren has told me that Vilgot international trends and to use color much more Sjbman showed him an outline of perhaps ten pages often . when he wanted to make I AM cuBIOUS . Lindgren approved it and then began the long period of prep- Early in 1970, Sweden 's government-regulated tele- arations. A production usually goes through four vision launches its second channel. Swedes will months of planning before the director starts to choose between two TV programs . As a result, more shoot . By the time the film is ready for release , of them will stay at home in front of their sets. Lindgren wants between 10 and 20 prints for mar- keting purposes Perhaps the most serious future problem for Swed- ish films will be how to continue to make con- The actual marketing of films differs from case to troversial films. Swedish films are far enough ahead case . As a rule , however , Swedish producers show of other countries in attracting interest and com- their wares to foreign distributors at private show- mercial distribution , but we are not so far ahead ings at film festi vals , especially at Cannes . The re- that we wish to be stopped at the borders and to views of foreign critics are considered to be very be banned. FILM COMMENT 37

oung i wedish I• nema IN RELATION Certainly , it is superfluous to state that like all mod- TO SWEDISH ern art, the film of today has a tradition behind FILM TRADITION it-that it can break away , or that it can extend the tradition . Over a wide erea, something new and BY interesting has occurred in the 1960s: the docu- RUNE mentary film and the acted film based on fiction have WALDEKRANZ more or less exchanged identities. This has created a fertile synthesis of, on the one hand, films con- cerned with society in the wider sense and with analysis of fact, and of, on the other hand , subjective and poetic films of imagination . These two main streams of cinema history , after traversing all the way from Lumiere and Melies, have now flowed together into a common effort to sharpen our ap- prehension of the actuality within us and without, by interpretation of it, and to create a consciousness of our present word that may , in an indirect way , alter reality itself. Today, the art forms lie open to one another , and there is an interplay among them that amounts to the consistent pursuit of ideas and intentions that were already being proclaimed in the 1920's and even earlier. Is there something more vital in the tradition behind present Swedish film-making than the mechanical survival of antiquated production routines and an outm.oded view of life? Does a living bond still ex- ist-if in the situation today the suggestion is not too paradoxical-between the youthful Swedish cin- ema and classical silent films? I doubt that I can give a clear and unequivocal an- swer-although I know of a very interesting example 38 SUMMER 1970

THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE, 1920. Directed by Victor Sjostrom. [All illustrations for th is article are from the Museum of Modern Art/ Film Stills Archive .) of how the classical Swed ish film has indirectly gone time. The \" nineties\" writers, to whom Selma influenced one of our youngest and most gifted Lagerlof belonged , were responsible for a great directors . To be sure , nowadays it is a dubious period in Swedish literature. With poetic insight, they proceeding , indeed almost shameful , to speak about described life in the Swedish provinces-;first of all , influences at all . I can readily understand the ag- in Varmland and Dalecarlia, which kept their char- gressive scepticism that is directed against the acteristic country traditions-and thus these writers method , practised by older film historians , who look created in literature a kind of parallel to the open-air everywhere for influences and prototypes. Of museum , celebrating the old , rustic Swedish way course , the interesting thing in the work created by of life, which Arthur Hazelius was at the same period an artist is always what is new . Whether or not he constructing in the Skansen park of Stockholm. produces this by making use of what others have done before , as his raw material , is of secondary When Sjostrom and Stiller made their films, marked importance and of interest only to a small circle of by that spirit of the 1890's, the peasant land of theoreticians . What matters for film historians and Sweden was becoming industrial. In its classical film critics is to discover and to elucidate elements silent films, a nation took leave of its old way of in an older trad ition that .can still induce creative life. For that reason , Sweden 's film art acqu ired a impulses and incite new movements in the cinema strongly nostalgic character. of today. The backward glances and tender sadness were, Is there , then , anything in the classical Swedish film parado xically , balanced by a modern and vital aim : tradition from the Sjostrom and Stiller era that can to depict people and their surroundings in a wholly have a stimulating and challenging effect on the unstereotyped manner, with a psychological realism young directors? and a devotion to the truth scarcely equalled in other films of the time. To a very great extent, the films The epoch of Sjostrom and Stiller is not only remote in question were made outside the studios , in the from us in time , but its films generally dealt with Swedish countryside that they intended to portray. subjects that , even then , were shrouded in the em- This demand for veracity in film-making was of great bellishing mist of the past. The literary inspiration importance to , among others, Carl Dreyer-indeed , that gave material and lent color to the majority of to all European film . the classical Swedish films came, of course, from Selma Lagerlof's novels. But even when other au- It is characteristic of the artistic liberation experi- thors supplied the original stories, Swedish directors enced by the young French and Italian directors , had a preference for depicting the ways of a fore- perhaps also the youthful American ones, that they have received , through intimate knowledge of film FILM COMMENT 39

archives , a schooling in film history and aesthetics some of our most gifted modernists have-no doubt that points to something new and significant in the quite unconsciously-taken up and pursued lines development of cinematic art. We have not been so well favoured in Sweden . Perhaps the classical from twa classical Swedish films . Swedish films are not altogether unknown to our young film generation , but, undeniably, they are When I saw Bo Widerberg 's first film in color , ELVIRA incompletely known . MADIGAN , it was Sjostrom 's THE OUTLAW AND HIS WIFE [BERGEJVIND OCH HANS HUSTRU] that came to my The youthful Swedish film directors have, on the mind . Perhaps this was a schizoid association , pos- other hand , an indirect link-through those who sible only for a film historian . And certainly it must have given them inspiration abroad-with the mod- be disturbing for Widerberg to find his work com- ernistic film tradition . Bo Widerberg , the pioneer pared , if only fleetingly , with a classic where the of a new movement towards documentary realism acting represents a high-flown \" dusty and theatri- in the Swedish cinema , became a film-maker on his cal \" style. What, to begin with , aroused the curious own conditions under the direct influence of Truf- association in my mind was the thematic similarity faut, Demy and also , perhaps not least, John Cas- between the amorous drama in ELVIRA MADIGAN and savetes . Jorn Donner, who was for a time an influ- THE OUTLAW AND HIS WIFE . ential critic in Oagers Nyheter, has directed his Let us consider the parallel for a moment. In both films we meet a pair of lovers who have broken with films, aimed at analysis of the contemporary scene, the community and are declared outlaws. The two under the effect of his meeting with the new Polish films depict people who , outside the social conven- and Italian films . tions , try desperately to uphold themselves and their love. They have placed themselves beyond the In the modern Swedish cinema , Ingmar Bergman bonds of society , and thereby they are doomed . In is pretty much alone in possessing a thorough the autumn meadow , Si xten Sparre shoots his be- knowledge of the Swedish film classics . He has , of loved , Elvira Madigan-and , like no previous film- course , in some of his foremost films established maker , Widerberg allows the frozen picture to be- a fruitful contact with Sjostrom 's works . Starting come a poetic vignette that concludes the drama: from his personal basis, he has given a new artistic thus, on the first night of frost, a pair of butterflies dimension to the synthesis of psychological realism are turned to ice . In THE OUTLAW AND HIS WIFE , Barg- and poetical vision found in Sjostrom 's films . There Ejvind and Halla meet death together in the merci- are , primarily in THE SEVENTH SEAL [DET SJUNDE IN- less mountain snowstorm : they , too , die in a style SEGLET] , scenes and images rousing direct visual that befits their drama-one in accord with the harsh associations with THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE [KORKAR- Icelandic pathos of Sjostrom 's film . LEN] and TRIAL BY FIRE [VEM DOMER?] , Before other film-makers , Sjostrom attempted- in INGEBORG HOLM What connects these two films, so remote from each and THE PHANTOM CARRIAGE , indeed also in THE other , is the vision offered by both film-makers of WIND-to render the inward drama by purely visual a force uniting erotic human nature with surround- means; and this Bergman has done in such films ings that are totally dominated by landscape and as WILD STRAWBERRIES [SMULTRONSTALLET] and the turning of the seasons. The Danish beech woods WINTER LIGHT [NATTVARDSGASTERNA] with a subtlety and meadows correspond poetically to the soft, and acuteness of which there had previously been unrealistic, escapist element in the principal char- only an inkling in sound films . The psychological acters-ex actly as the defiance and harshness in close-up is one of his foremost means of expression . Berg-Ejvind and Halla are in harmony with the deso- late Icelandic mountains where they seek refuge. Departing from new points and using means new Discreetly , in Widerberg 's color film , the loveliness to poetic and psychological realism , Bergman has of the Danish summer landscape brings out the added to the classical Swedish film tradition . But fleeting brevity , underlines what is fragile and Bergman no longer represents the youngest gener- doomed , in the romantic couple 's destiny . But even ation of Swedish film directors. Have any of these in a costume film Widerberg is opposed to the theat- manifested interest or sympathy for the same tradi- rical . His camera portrays for us , in tones of the tion? No , rather than do that, they regard it as part Impressionists, a relaxed mood of poetic tragedy. of their program to show that they are opposed to all tradition . A predilection for outdoor filming was characteristic of the Swedish silent film . This was true not only The anti-tradionalism of the new Swedish cinema of Sjostrom and Stiller but equally of their contem- has been sharpened by the need of youthful film poraries, Brunius and Hedqvist. Not just isolated directors to keep clear , in pure self-defense , of the sequences were shot in authentic surroundings ; strong suggestive power that emanates from Berg- instead , the camera was moved out into the land- man 's filmic visions. Consciously or unconsciously, scape and stayed there during the greater part of these men remain aloof from the class cal line in the shooting . Brunius remained for months in Nor- Swedish film-making . The case of Vilgot Sjoman , way , where he made SYNNOVE SOLBAKKEN , which the director who has been closest to Bergman as acquired a genuinely Norwegian character; and his former assistant and very much his pupil , is Hedqvist moved to an old foundry in order to make characteristic . As recently as in MY SISTER , MY LOVE THE SWAN CHILD [DUNUNGEN] . The directors of silent [SYSKONBADD] , there were echoes from Bergman 's films had a technical apparatus tnat was compara- films and the Swedish classics . But in his latest work , tively easy to handle, and consequently they had I AM CURIOUS [JAG AR NYFIKEN], Sjoman has abruptly mobility in their work (if not in their films) . There burned all his bridges behind him has gone in un- is a parallel today in the use of hand-held cameras conditionally for exploring the terra incognita of and tape-recorders by modern film crews. But more Swedish everyday reality. important than the outward affinity of working con- ditions is the kinship of artistic intentions . I cannot refrain from shocking my readers by as- serting here that, during the past several years , 40 SUMMER 1970

Tara Teje and Lars Hanson in EROTIKON , 1920. Directed by Mauritz Stiller. THE OUTLAW AND HIS WIFE , 1917. Directed by and starring Victor Sjostrom .

Sweden was not the only film country where , during tion . This gave their acting a freedom and ease that the era of the silent film , directors liked to work in they could hardly attain on the stage. Finally, there settings outside the studios . But the Swedish direc- is the thematic Similarity between Stiller'S film and tors were pretty much alone-at least in Europe at Cornell 's: both satirize the conventions of the up- that time-in using the outdoors and authentic en- per-class. vironment to accentuate the poetic and psy- chological elements in their artistic creation . In this After the successful appearance of HERE IS YOUR LIFE regard , they came later to influence French and [HAR HAR DU DITT LlV] , Jan Troell sometimes heard Russian films of the 1920's. Bya long and circuitous that an older public associated his new work which route , this influence has come back to touch Bo the classical Swedish films. In Troell's film it was Widerberg . not coincidental if the thoughts of spectators turned easily to Sjostrom 's great landscape films , in which In h is first film , HUGS AND KISSES [PUSS OCH KRAM] , characters were always profoundly marked by ele- Jonas Cornell has displayed an estimable talent, ments of nature, by the immensity of the forests and stimulating to the public , for film comedy-and in by the heavy, epic rhythm of the seasons. The only our country such a talent is a rather unique phe- silent classic Troell has seen is THE PHANTOM nomenon . It so happens that Jorn Donner dedicated CARRIAGE . But his producer and collaborator on the his TO LOVE [ATT ALSKA] , a serious , social-satirical scenario , Bengt Forslund , has related that he con- comedy , to Mauritz Stiller. As Donner is , so Stiller sciously sought to restore contact with the tradition of Sjostrom . was a Finn by origin ; and perhaps Donner wished to indicate that he could look with critical distance HERE IS YOUR LIFE follows the path of a poor boy , at the Swedish environment , which, as Stiller did , on his way to becoming a writer, at the turn of the Donner experiences and depicts this environment century in the isolated , arctically barren province with the uncommited freedom of his position as a of Norrland . The film shows how his personality is foreigner. But there would have been no need for moulded equally by the woodsman 's lonely winter protest if Cornell had dedicated his film to the cre- life and by his wandering adventures in summer , ator of EROTIKON . For HUGS AND KISSES is-as far as brief as a butterfly . In the film the psychological and I can see-the only Swedish film comedy since poetic elements gain a peculiarly significant visual Bergman 's SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT [SOMMARNAT- expression . The film lives in the spirit of the silent TENS LEENDE] that carries the line from EROTIKON on film more through its broad , lyrical-epic pictorial into the modern cinema. Stiller'S sophisticated com- descriptions than through its dialogue. Not the least edy directed its irony at conventionality in the then- of what Troell does is to reproduce , with a stinging, Puritan Sweden , and also-though with under- poetical realism , the protagonist 's inward experi- standing humour-at the extravagant habits of up- ences , dreams and fantasies . In the :;;ame way that per-class Swedish life . EROTIKON spurred Ernst Lu- the vision of the rickety , transparent barrow in THE bitsch into making elegant and erotic film comedy, PHANTOM CARRIAGE is a projection of David Holm 's full of insin uation and understatement. In 1950, remorse and terror of death in Sjostrom 's film , when I had the pleasure of meeting Lubitsch 's dis- Troell 's portrayal of Norrland (in the color episode ciple , Billy Wilder , in Hollywood , he confirmed to called \" The Song about Consumption \" ) becomes me emphatically that seeing Stiller's EROTIKON had a supernatural vision of the conditions of life in the constituted a turning-point for Lubitsch . poor marshlands . It is a visualization of dread before the elementary cruelty of existence, and on the filmic Cornell , too , has an inclination to be ironically dis- plane it acquires a pure and poetiC quality as it gives tant , to use percipient malice and subtle understate- form and voice to what is otherwise ineffable . ment, as Lubitsch did . This bent, which forms part of Cornell 's artistic and intellectual equipment , is Thus , we may say that in their film Troell and Fors- so unusual in Sweden that we have no Swedish word lund consciously attempt to renew , by means of a for the quality or style involved and so must fall back modern film language, the tradition that comes from on the English word sophisticated. Cornell has not Sjostrom . To a greater extent than in Bergman 's needed to see any of Stiller's, Lubitsch 's or Wilder's films , they place emphasiS on the epic . There is more comedies in order to develop a use of light and poetic entry into the spirit of landscape and of peo- iron ic al innuendos as one of his characteristic ple than there is dramatic intenSity and sharpness means of expression . It would be neither encourag- in the film vision of a time gone by . They create ing nor fair to Cornell to compare his work directly a synthesis of the old and the new, in that they with that of those directors ; he is a beginner set experience artistic responsibility before their literary on feel ing his own way along. source , Eyvind Johnson 's novel , just as Sjostrom did before the writings of Selma Lagerlof . And , as Cornell has taken Widerberg as his model , regarding with Sjostrom , the artistic responsibility has not tied the techniques of film-making and also in adapting their imagination , but, on the contrary , delivered it Widerberg 's way of instructing actors-relaxed and and set it free . allowing various degrees of improvisation. But per- haps there is , here too , an unconscious parallel Direct influence from the classical period on modern with Stiller. Especially in EROTIKON , Stiller used au- Swedish films is not , as this brief summary perhaps thentic interiors. He permitted the pampered wife, indicates, remarkably great. And its appearance-as Irene , to make an aeroplane trip as a matter of in the case of Bergman and Troell-is limited , char- course , as to a visit to her furrier. It is her manner acteristically enough , to films in the costumes of of displaying independence, of manifesting her a bygone period . But in an indirect way the tradition emancipation , her status as an upper-class woman . of the classical Swedish films lives on in the contem- Stiller, the maker of silent films , was not bound by porary Swedish cinema , as a craving that has never written dialogue-as little bound as Widerberg or been lost , a craving for authenticity and truth in the Cornell wish to be . His actors were allowed to say way a film depicts life . what seemed most natural to them in a given situ a- 42 SUMMER 1970

Harriet Andersson and Zbigniew Cybulski in TO LOVE , 1964, directed by Jarn Donner. HERE 'S YOUR LIFE . Eddie Axberg (left) with Ake Fridell. HUGS AND KISSES , directed by Jonas Cornell. Breakfast in bed for the loving couple: Sven-Bertil Taube at right, with Agneta Ekmanner, as her father, toting the tray.

BY KIRK BOND Agneta Ekmanner, as maid and / or erotic plaything , separates husband and wife (Adrian Asti and Lars Ekborg) in this scene from the domestic black-comedy, DUET FOR CANNIBALS , directed by Susan Sontag . 44 SUMMER 1970

Susan Sontag was born in New York City in 1933. At th is point comes the film 's climax : Bauer tries She has gained international recognition as a writer. to keep Tomas out when he arrives. Tomas, sus- essa yist and critic. She is the author of two novels. pecting the worst , pushes his way in and finds The Benefactor (1963) and Death Kit (1967). Against Francesca laid out on the bed , apparently dead . Interpretation ( 1966) , a collection of her critical writ- After some heated talk, Bauer apparently shoots ings, was nominated for the National Book Award himself. Tomas starts out the door, only to have in the Arts and Letters Category. In 1969 her Styles Francesca call after him . Now Tomas and Francesca of Radical Will , a second book of essays, was pub- join in burning Bauer's books and papers . But in lished. An account of her visit to North Vietnam , that moment, Ingrid arrives, looking for Tomas. She Trip to Hanoi , appeared in 1968. Miss Sontag 's finds him and they are reconciled . The two go out stories have appeared in Harper's Bazaar, Harper's , the door and get into the car and drive away. But Partisan Review, and other magazines. Her reviews. as they do, both Bauer and Francesca stand at the essays. and articles have appeared in The New York window-looking out at them . Times, Partisan Review, The New York Review, Ramparts , Film Quarterly , Book Week , Commentary , Within this skeletal framework of DUET FOR CANNIBALS The Nation and other publications. DUET FOR CANNI- innumerable bizarre events occur throughout. The central figure of Bauer is charming , brutal , amusing , BAL S is part of a Sandrews projec t that provides repulsive . He slaps his wife in the face , but she accepts it as a matter of course . Bauer is subject grants to artists in fields other than motion pictures to terrible stomach upsets at the table , but he is to make film s. immediately himself again and helping himself to large portions of food . These two-husband and When I saw Susan Sontag ' s DUET FOR CANNIBALS wife-play rather the roles of the queer people in at the Seventh New York Film Festival in September the strange old house , so dear to film writers-until 1969, I was impressed-more so , I gather, than a Ingrid arrives. From that moment, the bizarrerie good many people. I saw the film again at the Muse- applies to them all. The girl becomes maid to the um of Modern Art, and I came away with the feeling Bauers, and then , after Tomas leaves, she becomes that DUET FOR CANNIBALS is one of the most important films of our time . It should become a famous classic . aan equal in a menage trois , symbolized by the Whether it does or not remains to be seen . shot of the three of them in bed , looking so exactly In the question-period at the Museum screening , like refugees from Chitylova's DAISIES. Tomas re- with Sontag present, there was the inevitable query: mains a little outside the prevailing insanity, but he What Was The Film About? She answered cheerfully: does engage in an absurd charade with Francesca, it was not about anything , Hamlet was not about with his head all bandaged . anything either . If, she said , one had to give an answer, one might say \" cruelty ,\" or, going back to The film has nothing like the bizarre quality of Bara- the title, \" psychological cannibalism .\" Granted. But tier's LA POUPEE or , let us say , LE SOCRATE of Lapou- this \" subject \" of the film is only the starting point. jade or Borowczyk 's GOTO . DUET is couched in nor- One must begin somewhere, thus Sontag begins mal terms, indeed severe terms , and it might be with something that can be labeled \" cruelty.\" likened to some of the Czech films . Let us look first at the bare bones-the plot skeleton : Nonetheless, DUET clearly goes beyond conventional a young man goes to work for an older man , a dramatic limits. It is fantastic to the point where it political refugee who is also a writer and who . becomes foolish to ask for mundane meanings- though not so old , wants to have his large collection political, sociological or psychological. The basic of papers put in order . It is the young man 's task question then arises: is DUET essentially a Gothic to do this . The older man , Dr. Bauer, is an exacting shocker or, as some seem to feel , a black comedy? employer, and the young man , Tomas, finds him- Or is it a very serious film , as Bergman's ALL THESE self spending nights as well as days at Bauer's WOMEN is serious? And I think the answer is simple . suburban house. This tends to cut Tomas off from It is hard to conceive of Susan Sontag going to this the girl with whom he is living , Ingrid . She becomes trouble to make a superficial film . DUET must be a annoyed-and also suspicious, in view of Bauer's profound film in its intention . attractive young wife, Francesca. Perhaps even so. DUET might not be a really good Bauer meets Ingrid , admits that he , too , is dissatis- film , particularly because this is a first film . But no . fied with the situation , and the two agree to work DUET is a very good film , though the style is quiet together to improve matters. This means that Ingrid and cool. This becomes clear on seeing DUET a comes to the house herself. But once she arrives second time . In fact , the handling of the separate the situation turns into a free-for-all , with Ingrid if shots, and the editing by Sontag herself, are to be anything more pleased than Tomas. Tomas finally marvelled at. And the acting is just right. That some- decides to leave, though Ingrid insists on staying . one without practical experience in filmmaking Then , after a time. Tomas has second thoughts, could elicit from the players-in such a difficult aes- and he bargains with Bauer to return if Bauer will thetic ambiance-such superb , confident work is let Ingnd go . Ingrid is sent away, but instead of something else to marvel at. returning to Tomas . she takes another man into the old apartment. Tom as disco vers th is , but still So we come to the real film . I have said that DUET he goes back to Bauer. reminds me of Czech film s. Especially I think of Nemec 's A REPORT ON THE PART Y AND THE GUESTS . There is a general resemblance between Bauer and FILM COMMENT 45

Gosta Ekman, left, and Lars Ekborg, in Susan Sontag 's DUET FOR CANNIBALS . the host of THE PARTY , and at one point Bauer says like Kluge-apart even from Godard . Godard moves to Tomas , regarding some strange behavior , \" It is in this world , and his figures-his presonae-stand- all a game,\" echoing the protestations of the men- ing against their bright red walls and their political acing group that captures the picnickers in THE posters , speak to us in our everyday language , even though they themselves are already searching for PARTY. something beyond . But these new people seem , though obscurely, to have found something of the And as I see something godlike in Nemec 's host, beyond . What, they hardly know . None of us knows . I see something godlike in Bauer and his wife- something indeed Olympian , in the sense that these I want to add one other point. I have not mentioned gods are human , all too human . They play with the mortals they meet (shall we recall Hardy and the Straub. I have suggested elsewhere that Straub may President of the Immortals?) , and then when the mortals have left these gods stand calmly at the be the most important of the new directors. His work window , not even stooping to hand out farewells . does not bear any very close resemblance to DUET. Do we see a change in the relationship of the young people? That stands out as a major possibility in But after mulling it over for some time , I began to interpreting DUET. The gods, so to speak, intervene and leave the couple together again , whereas they think of Straub . Straub might be called the Dreyer were on cool terms at the outset of the film . Per- haps-and Sontag has said that this change does of the new film , the purist with a cool , formal beauty take place . But the evidence is , I feel , rather too slight to make this the central point. And there is , but also a sense of the depth of the human condi- after all , no need to have gods in order to patch up a little earthly difference. Of course, we are tion . DUET moves me as much as NIGHT VERSOHNT thinking symbolically, but again the symbolic entity carrying the idea has at least to be substantial, not does, that deceptively simple film \" about \" a family . anything as slight as we are given here. I don 't know what either film means. But I do know Of course, the young people \" escape.\" But here we are back at the Old Dark House idea, whether that I feel these are both wonderfully rich , strong we take it literally or symbolically . And it is interest- ing to note that , after all , it is really the arrival of films . 11111111 Ingrid that makes the escape possible . As long as Bauer lived (so far as Tomas knew) , Tomas would Duett For Kannibaler presumably have gone back to Bauer. He went back [Duet For Cannibals] even when he knew that Ingrid did not want him . Once Bauer died, Tomas was free-but without In- Sweden, 1969 Susan Sontag grid he had nowhere to go, and he was prepared Director: Garan Lindgren to stay on with Francesca . So it was Ingrid who Producer: rescued him , as he had previously rescued her. It Production Company: Sandrews is not at all a simple matter of two human beings Screenplay: Susan Sontag getting out from under the spell of two other human Photography: Lars Swanberg beings or two gods. We are getting into the difficult Editor: Carl-Olov Skeppstedt region of ancient epics and sensibilities that precede Sound: classic drama. We are verging on the world of Helen Executive Producer: Uif Darin or Brunhild. Leading Players : Peter Hald Francesca: And this is perhaps the point . This is what sets Bauer: Adriana Asti Susan Sontag-like the great Czechs , like Mimica, Tomas: Lars Ekborg Ingrid: Gasta Ekman Agneta Ekmanner Distributed in the U. S. by Grove Press, 80 Universi- ty Place, New York, N. Y. 10003, in Swedish dia- logue, with English sub-titles. 105 minutes, 8/W. Participant: 1969, at Cannes , New York and San Francisco film festivals. 46 SUMMER 1970

Lars Ekborg , left, and Gosta Ekman , in Susan Sontag 's DUET FOR CANNIBALS . Bauer (Lars Ekborg, left) watches as his employee , played by Gosta Ekman, comforts Mrs. Bauer, played by Adrian Asti , in a scene of domestic bliss from Susan Sontag 's DUET FOR CANNIBALS .

er ~1l1l1l1l1l11'1l1lll1lll1l1l1l1l1l1l1l The fam ed Sll'edil:ih director. Victor Sjol:itrom (Sea- I a m s ure that it did not fo r a m ome nt occur-n eith e r strom) . died in 1960 at age Rl . His long a nd di:;tin - to him n ot to m e- t hat we in t hose o ld days we re guished career included THE WIND and TH E SCAR LET doin g so mething t h at wo uld be re membe red a nd LETT ER, hoth u·ith Lillian Gil:ih and made in th e ta lked abo ut m a ny yea rs late r. We h appe ned to e n te r United S tates. In 1957, h e gave a striking p erform - t he job at a lu cky time. Lu c ky fo r our a mbiti o n . an ce as th e old schoLar in In gmar Bergman 's WILD Giv in g us t h e o ppo rtunity to get o u t o f t h e prevailin g STRAWBERRI ES . Th e following reminis cen ce l N/S writ- rub bis h that at t h e tim e was s upposed to be \" wh at ten by Sj dstrdm in 195 1, twenty -three yea rl:i after the the public wants.\" W e we re a lso lu c ky to work fo r d eath of his Long- tim e friend and fellow director, th e a co mpan y, Svenska Bi o [Swedis h Bi ogr ap h] \" , whose Finnish -horn Mauritz S tiller (EROTIK ON , T H E STORY head , Cha rles M agnusson , was a wise ma n a nd wh o OF GOSTA BERLIN G, other films) . Sjostrom reca lls th e by a nd by was so wise t h at he discove red t ha t t he p ersonality, wor/( methods and final death-momen ts best way to h a nd le St ill e r a nd me was not to hand le of S tiller in this remarlw hle document. It ll'a:; orig- us a t a ll but to leave u a lone a nd let us do wh at inally publil:ihed in C lassics of The Swedis h C ine m a, we wanted to do . And what we t ho u gh t was t he righ t written hy Bengt Idestam-Almquist and publish ed thin g to do. Wh e re does a m o ti on-pi ctUl'e directo r ill 1952 hy th e S ll'edish Institute and A / B SL'en:; /? nowa days wo rk unde r s uc h co ndi t io ns? Th e re we re Filmindustri. t imes when t h e hea d office ha rd ly kn ew more of what we were doing t h a n the titl e of t he pi ct ure. . And While readin g what Dr. Idestam-Almquist has writ - a nyt hin g ca lled bud get -m eeti ng o r bud get d id not te n a bout m e in t his boo k I fe lt - we ll , to te ll the trut h ex ist. I hard ly kn ow wha t I fe lt. I t was rat he r mi xed fee l- in gs. I ' fe lt em ba rrassed a nd a t the same time I I have often wo nde red : if St ille r a nd I we re yo un g co uldn 't he lp th inkifl g of the ta le a bo ut Bis ma rc k m e n now- o r re la ti ve ly yo un g me n , at abo u t t he sa me (o r was it Frede ri c k The Great?) who is q u oted to age we we re a bo ut 25 o r 30 yea rs ago-I wo nd e r if have exclaimed : Donn erwetter hab ' ieh dies a/les we wou ld have the sa me e ne rgeti c spirit, eager to gethan '-H ave I don e a ll that?! m a ke so m ethin g diffe re nt, so met hin g new. One t hin g is s ure: we wou ld never be a ll owed to m a ke t he kind Biog rafbladet has as ked me to a dd a few in troduc- of pi ct ures we wa n ted to o r have t he sa me libe rt y to ry words to Dr. Idestam-A lm qu is t 's a rt icles. T o to ma ke t h e m as we we re used to. ta lk a bou t m y wo rk or a bo ut myse lf has a lwa ys bee n re pu Is ive to 'm e, a nd I have m a de it a prin cipl e to Anot he r t hin g I so m e t imes as k myse lf: wou ld we be fo ll ow the good a d vice of t he o ld pro ve rb: a rt.ist, do a bl e to com pete wit h t he s pl e ndid directo rs of to-day? yO UI' wo rk bu t do n o t s pea k. Bu t to say a fe w wo rds I don 't t hink o. Yes, St i lI e r. H e was in a way so ~ b o u t m.v fri e nd a nd com pa ni o n , M au rit z Sti ll e r, is \" mode rn .\" H e ha d a grea t \"s how se nse\" whi ch eve n a diffe re nt th in g. nowa da ys wou Id n ot fail to im press. H e was bold e no ugh ' to take a ll libe rti es rega rdin g his sc rip ts . 48 SUMMER 1970