Film Review
Henrik Ibsen's epic poem
Terje Vigen
is masterfully transposed to the big screen in this stunning visual
odyssey of the silent era, a landmark in Swedish cinema which
established its director, Victor Sjöström, as one of the
foremost masters of his craft. With a budget of 60,000 Swedish
Kronas, it was the most expensive film made in Sweden up until this
point and coincided with a significant shift in policy for the
country's leading film company, Svenska Biografteatern (the forerunner
of Svensk Filmindustri), which opted to make fewer, more expensive
films to bolster its reputation at home and abroad. Known to the
English-speaking world as
A Man
There Was, this was the film that heralded the beginning of Sweden's
golden age of filmmaking, which would continue for the next seven years
with Sjöström playing a crucial part in sustaining this
unprecedented era of cinematic artistry.
Sjöström had already proven himself to be a formidable and
highly innovative filmmaker, through such groundbreaking social dramas
as
Ingeborg Holm (1913). He
was also a highly accomplished actor, although in this capacity he is
now best remembered for his leading role in Ingmar Bergman's
Wild Strawberries (1957), which
he played towards the end of his life. In
Terje Vigen Sjöström
appears in front of the camera in his late thirties, not the weary
oldster we remember so fondly from Bergman's film, but a young man of
fiercesome vitality. In some scenes, Sjöström's
portrayal of the title character is as wild and furious as the seas
that rage about him - indeed, he comes to personify the unremitting,
seething anger of the stormy waters that rant and rave for reasons we
can only guess at.
By the standards of its time,
A Man
There Was was a phenomenally ambitious film on account of its
extensive, incredibly daring sea-bound sequences. For
Sjöström, the use of real locations that evoke the majesty
and might of nature was an essential component of his art. No
visual realisation of Ibsen's poem would have worked without stark
images of the sea at her most unforgiving. The sea is the driving
protagonist in the original poem and it is fitting that it is so in
Sjöström's film. With the camera strapped to boats of
various description, often venturing out in the most hazardous of
conditions, Sjöström's ace cinematographer Julius Jaenzon
manages to give the sea an overwhelming presence in the film, the most
powerful manifestation of nature's supremacy over man and its power to
guide his destiny. Anyone who has seen Jaenzon's remarkable work
on Mauritz Stiller's
Sir Arne's Treasure (1919) will
already appreciate his genius. His work on
A Man There Was is just as
breathtaking, and just as effective in reminding us how puny we are
compared with nature at her most untamed and capricious.
The film also marks a significant development in Sjöström's
technique, with more dramatic camera set-ups, faster editing and less
reliance on inter-titles to carry the story. For the dramatic
sequence in which the title character attempts to evade capture by the
English, crosscutting is used to great effect to build tension and
heighten the emotion of the moment. In a later scene, when the
prematurely aged Vigen is confronted with the man who ruined his life,
a short flashback avoids the need for an explanatory title card.
Throughout the film, Vigen's inner feelings are powerfully visualised
by cut-away shots to the sea, which becomes his soul's mirror, capable
of far greater expression than the human face can ever show.
Before this, there was probably no other film that employed the sea to
such incredible dramatic effect.
A Man There Was represents
cinematic innovation of a very high order and it continues to enthral
with its extraordinary narrative power and stark visual poetry.
© James Travers 2014
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
On the wave-lashed coast of Norway there lives a man who is never
comfortable on land, preferring instead a life of danger and excitement
on the open sea. Terje Vigen is his name, a young seafarer whose
love of the sea is matched only by the love he has for his wife and
infant daughter. These three live an idyllic life, until the
drums of war reach the rugged Norwegian shores. In 1809, the
English navy sets up a blockade which prevents food and essential
supplies from reaching Norway. With his family facing starvation,
Terje sets out to sea in a rowing boat in a desperate bid to fetch food
from Denmark. On his return, Terje is captured by the English and
thrown into prison by a ruthless captain who mocks his entreaties to
let him return to his starving wife and child. Five years later,
Terje is released and heads back to his home, only to find that the two
people who are dearest to him have been laid to rest in a pauper's
graveyard. The shock of this calamity is more than the seafarer
can bear. Shunning the society of others, he comes to hate the
sea that has robbed him of his dear ones. After years of bitter
solitude, he sees a small yacht caught in the fury of the raging
waves. His compassion gets the better of him and he comes to the
yacht's aid, only to discover that its skipper is the very man who had
mocked and imprisoned him all those years ago. At last, the hour
of vengeance has come...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.