Post by Capo on Jan 2, 2007 22:29:51 GMT
Viskningar och rop
Cries and Whispers
Ingmar Bergman 1972 Sweden
A dying woman is tended to by her maid and two sisters.
Spellbinding stuff from start to finish, a film which began as a recurring, stubbornly insistent image in the director's imagination, and found its way over the course of a few years into a narrative about the persistence of Time and the inevitability of Death. It is grounded in Bergman's most controlled manner, an air of artistic - that is, personal - excellence and technical - that is, aesthetic - achievement. It takes on themes from all his other films, for instance, but stands alone in visual style, told entirely in imagery of blacks, whites and reds, with actors shot against the block-red walls of the interior setting, an immaculate mansion. The title is entirely fitting, as the narrative unfolds in long bouts of silence, with characters tormented by ticking clocks and whispers which lead in and out of their flashbacks (the transitions to which are notified by a fade to red), and exploding every now and then into violent screaming and inexplicable tears; a mesmerising work, really, terrifying and bleak, though shot with such fine detail and attention paid to characters' claustrophobic fear of death (or life?) that the closing moments, a flashback to green fields and white dresses, is uplifting and relieving.
Cries and Whispers
Ingmar Bergman 1972 Sweden
A dying woman is tended to by her maid and two sisters.
Spellbinding stuff from start to finish, a film which began as a recurring, stubbornly insistent image in the director's imagination, and found its way over the course of a few years into a narrative about the persistence of Time and the inevitability of Death. It is grounded in Bergman's most controlled manner, an air of artistic - that is, personal - excellence and technical - that is, aesthetic - achievement. It takes on themes from all his other films, for instance, but stands alone in visual style, told entirely in imagery of blacks, whites and reds, with actors shot against the block-red walls of the interior setting, an immaculate mansion. The title is entirely fitting, as the narrative unfolds in long bouts of silence, with characters tormented by ticking clocks and whispers which lead in and out of their flashbacks (the transitions to which are notified by a fade to red), and exploding every now and then into violent screaming and inexplicable tears; a mesmerising work, really, terrifying and bleak, though shot with such fine detail and attention paid to characters' claustrophobic fear of death (or life?) that the closing moments, a flashback to green fields and white dresses, is uplifting and relieving.