Film Review
The transience of all good things - love, happiness and life itself - is a prevailing
theme in the work of Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. Aside from the human dimension
- how we learn to cope with loss and accept our own mortality - there are metaphysical
concerns - what kind of God allows beauty to be created and then snuffed out so tragically
and so apparently without purpose?
Summer
Interlude is the first film in which Bergman shows a profound interest in these
issues. Indeed, it is a kind of manifesto, setting the course for his future filmmaking
career, introducing us to the philosophical and psychological themes which would underpin
much of his cinema.
Summer Interlude is particularly significant
in that it is the film in which Bergman's genius as a cineaste first became evident.
His ten or so previous films showed a promising talent but also a worrying lack of confidence
and vision.
Summer Interlude is markedly
different to what preceded it - a far more mature, considered film, with more convincing
characters, a greater lyrical sense and the most extraordinary photography.
Bergman
was fortunate to have as his cinematographer Gunnar Fischer, who had a rare skill for
capturing the beauty in nature and rendering it even more alluring in black-and-white
photography. Natural light seems to burn with an unreal intensity, whilst shadows
are so stark, so solid, that they have the character of a demonic force - light and shade,
like life and death, two opposing sides in a cosmic game of chess. Fischer
worked with Bergman on some of his greatest films, most notably
The Seventh Seal and
Wild Strawberries.
Bergman had originally
intended to make
Summer Interlude many years
earlier, but had to shelve the idea when his first film,
Crisis, was judged a failure
and he lacked the resources to make the film. The story derived from a short story
that Bergman had written when he was an adolescent, based on his own early romantic experiences.
There are striking similarities with Bergman's earlier film,
To Joy (1950), which also recounts a tale
of a tragic romance through the device of an extended flashback. Actress Maj-Britt Nilsson
plays the female lead in both films, reinforcing the sense of duality (another key Bergman
theme).
Summer Interlude is, however, a
considerably more sophisticated film, better structured, filmed more imaginatively, and
directed with much more flair and confidence.
This is certainly one of Ingmar
Bergman's most poetic films, unhampered by the psychological depth and harsh emotional
realism that would appear in his later work. The middle section (recounting the
heartrending idyll involving Marie and Henrik) achieves a level of elegiac expression,
lightness of touch and simple poignancy that Bergman rarely surpassed, leading one to
think that this was one of his most personal films. As the director himself remarked,
he made
The Seventh Seal with his head, but he
made
Summer Interlude with his heart.
© James Travers 2007
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Next Ingmar Bergman film:
Waiting Women (1952)
Film Synopsis
Marie is a leading ballerina with a ballet company in Stockholm. One day, she receives
a mysterious parcel - an old diary written by Henrik, her first love. After a frosty
exchange with her present boyfriend, she gets on a boat and heads for the archipelago
where she spent her happiest summer, more than ten years before. She calls to mind
her first meeting with Henrik, how they became friends and then lovers, and how fate cruelly
intervened to separate them forever...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.