Film Review
With its stark minimalist composition and austere yet strangely alluring presentation,
Through a Glass Darkly is a quintessentially
Bergman-esque study in those essential components of human experience - love, faith and
hope. It is the first in a remarkable series of three films (the others being
Winter Light and
The
Silence) in which director Ingmar Bergman explores Man's relationship with
God with great depth, sincerity and compassion.
The film involves just four characters - a young woman, Karin, who is a victim of
recurring bouts of mental illness, and the three men who are linked to her by an undying,
unspoken bond of love - her father, her husband and her brother. Karin's illness
is the mechanism by which the three men grow to realise the awesome power of love and
come to see this as proof for the existence of God.
Whilst the film is not flawless
(the plot feels contrived, the acting performances not entirely convincing),
Through
a Glass Darkly is nonetheless a profoundly moving piece of cinema and was well-received
on its first release (it won the Best Foreign Film Oscar in 1961). It was shot on
the island of Faro in the Baltic Sea, a location whose raw natural beauty (captured marvellously
by cinematographer Sven Nykvist) serves the film perfectly. (Bergman so loved the
island that he later made it his permanent home.) The bleak tranquility of the
setting and the strange, unreal quality of its summer light exposes the unease in the
minds of the protagonists as they look inwards and read the truth painted on their soul's
dark mirror.
The most interesting and believable characters are Minus and his
father, David. The relationship between the two men is evidently strained
as a result of the latter's preoccupation with his work - David has effectively sacrificed
family love in his pursuit of a successful literary career. The author finds it
much easier to write about love than to actually experience love for himself. His
interest in his mentally ill daughter Karin is one of professional detachment - she is
not much more than subject material for another novel.
Minus, by contrast, has
a great yearning for love. Despite his obvious youth and apparent clownish naivety,
he is far more perceptive in human relationships than his father (as the "play within
the play" cleverly reveals). When he cannot win love from his father, he focuses
his attentions on his sister, and the result is inevitable - an incestuous relationship
which only makes matters worse for everyone. Karin and Martin are pretty well minor
players (perhaps merely cyphers) in the drama, the main thrust of which is a father waking
up to the presence of his own son, and in so doing realising what it means to love another
human being.
© James Travers 2007
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Next Ingmar Bergman film:
Winter Light (1962)
Film Synopsis
Four family members arrive on a remote island to spend a few days in each other's company.
They consist of David, a renowned author who is working on the final draft of a novel,
his daughter Karin, his son Minus and Karin's husband, Martin. Karin suffers from
mental illness and has only just been released from a psychiatric establishment.
Although she appears normal, she is already showing signs of decline - she flirts with
Minus, has a habit of disappearing and begins to have strange hallucinations. Martin
is concerned not just by Karin's behaviour but by his father-in-law's emotional detachment...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.