Saraband
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Movie Reviews of Saraband
Movie Review: Great final(?) film...
Summary: 4 Stars
"Saraband" is an intense movie. It should be watched sitting very still, so that everything makes itself known to you. To me, the film is essentially about parents and children--mostly about fathers and sons, but also about mothers and daughters, as the viewer will see briefly at the end of the film. It seems to say: there are two ways of having a relationship with your children: you can abandon them, spurn their love, and watch your soul wither in the process; or you might smother them with your own issues and grief and love--that too can lead to disaster and maybe violence. However, by implication there is a third way, though you won't find it in this film. That way would be somewhere between these two, a way that doesn't involve the nauseating narcissism that Johan and Marianne showed from time to time in "Scenes from a Marriage" when, for instance, an abortion is procured for no better reason than the pregnancy seems inconvenient at the time (this is in the longer version of that film). These people clearly need to learn to live beyond themselves, and that's why the figure of Anna, hovering over the film like the Holy Ghost, is so important. Clearly she knew the right way.
The one flaw I see in this film is the way the men and women are set up, a way that seems to me stereotypical: the men are sullen, withdrawn, melancholic and prone to violence. The women are strong, prone to nurturing and caring. While these tendencies are clearly part of reality, they make the film, for me at least, less than it could be. Still, "Saraband" proves that some of Bergman's best work has been that of his "retirement". I hope I'm this productive and wise in my eighties.
Movie Review: Wonderful, but the math is truly distracting
Summary: 4 Stars
I watched "Scenes" and then watched Saraband the next day, hoping to get more of Johann and Marianne. It was great to see them so changed and yet still the same--Marianne still too-good-to-be-true and Johann still a jerk. Very early in the film, however, we are faced with a large discrepancy between Scenes and this film. In Scenes, Marianne is 35 and Johann 42. In Saraband, there is now a 23 year difference in their ages. Even within Saraband, the timing just doesn't work, as other reviewers have pointed out here. At first I was just confused, but then I was angry at the director for not respecting the fans of his older work. It reminded me of when characters age inexplicably on soap operas, like when Victoria aged ten years overnight on the Young and the Restless. I guess we can put up with that from Bergman but it would have been a lot less distracting if he had just made Marianne 70 and Johann 77 or something like that. It need not have changed the story.Movie Review: Bergman - That's all you need to say.
Summary: 4 Stars
Fantastic to see Ullmann and Josephson! Wonderful movie and story. Hope it really isn't Ingmar's last.!!Movie Review: As cold as ever; maybe that's the problem
Summary: 3 Stars
At first, "Saraband" seems to be a sequel to "Scenes From a Marriage." The main characters are named Johan and Marianne, played by Erland Josephson and Liv Ullmann. They were once married for a long time, and had two children together. Then they got divorced, but are still drawn to each other, years later.
However, there's a lot of new back-story. Johan now has another son from another marriage. That son has an alienated teenage daughter who has great musical talents, and needless to say, father, son and grand-daughter do not get along. At first, this feels like unnecessary weight hung onto the story of "Scenes From A Marriage," which had enough back-story of its own. But ultimately, I agree with the reviewer who suggested that "Saraband" is actually not about the same people at all. The protagonists are a totally different divorced couple, but they happen to also be named Johan and Marianne. It's similar to how Bergman reused names like Vogler and Vergerus in his earlier films.
What happens next is pretty much what always happens in Bergman films. The characters engage in horrific emotional abuse. In my review of "Persona," I said that all Bergman films are about people elaborately inflicting emotional suffering on each other. That rule certainly holds here. Johan despises his son, and crudely insults him in conversation. Liv Ullmann, as Marianne, smiles cutely, her dimples twinkling merrily, but her contempt for Johan is even deeper and more subtle. She knows his weaknesses more than anyone else; she humiliated him by moving on to have an extensive sex life after he divorced her, even while he was already beginning to wither away. Many times in this film, it feels like the only reason why she came to see Johan now is to feel her own power and superiority over him one more time. In a powerful scene involving Johan's night terrors, she finally takes pity on him, but even that is really another expression of her victory, since she doesn't intend to take him back.
The other major conflict is between Karin and her father. The father is basically a softer, more vulnerable version of the well-meaning but stifling parent figure that Bergman explored in "Autumn Sonata" (and just like in that film, music is the nominal reason for the conflict). His extreme emotional neediness is made clear in the nightmarish kissing scene (if there's one scene in "Saraband" that stays in one's mind, it's that one), in which the daughter ambiguously seems to relish in the power she has over him.
So if you're wondering whether Bergman might have lost his touch in the 20 years that passed between "Fanny and Alexander" and "Saraband," you can put your mind at ease. He's in his prime here, as cold and brutal as ever. "Saraband" is just as intense as "Scenes From A Marriage."
But at the same time, the film's very strength is its weakness. It's another flawless, vicious emotional assault from the master...but that makes it feel exactly like one of his seventies films. It could have easily been made in 1975 with the exact same story and script. The only hint that it was actually made in 2003 can be seen in Karin's contemporary-looking tank top (which she wears with no bra underneath -- oh Ingmar, you've still got it). The tank top is seriously the only sign of the times to be found in the whole film; it stands out so much that it feels out of place. The film takes place in a remote rural region, so there are no traces of modern technology to get in the way of Bergman's trip back in time.
The reason why Bergman's perfect seventies recreation is a weakness is because he had actually begun to venture outside this emotional range in "Fanny And Alexander." The latter film was pretty much the only time when Bergman ever took a real interest in something other than senseless cruelty, and depicted other types of human interaction in a believable way. Possibly this was because the film dealt with childhood, which Bergman has felt nostalgic for ever since "Wild Strawberries." In any case, it was a sign that maybe, he was taking steps to move beyond the worldview that he depicted in the seventies.
But there are no such signs in "Saraband." In that sense, the film is a step backward, because it really is identical in tone to "Scenes From A Marriage," "Cries And Whispers," "Persona," and "Autumn Sonata." I don't insist that an artist always has to do something different with each new work, but Bergman already showed all these conflicts earlier, and really, how many unrelentingly cruel films do you need to watch before you start to wish there was something more?
Movie Review: A Heartfelt Expression of Bergman's Grief, but Less Successful as a Narrative Film.
Summary: 3 Stars
"Saraband" is a deeply personal film by veteran director Ingmar Bergman, inspired by the loss of his wife Ingrid. Marianne (Liv Ullmann) is suddenly moved to visit her first ex-husband Johan (Erland Jossefsen), a retired academic whom she has not seen in at least 30 years. She finds Johan at his summer house in the country, where his estranged son Henrik (Börje Ahlstedt) and 19-year-old granddaughter Karin (Julia Dufvenius) are staying in the nearby lake cottage. Henrik is distraught over the death of his beloved wife Anna 2 years before and has transferred his possessive affection to Karin, a talented young cellist, whom he tutors in music and fears will strike out on her own. There is no limit to the venom between Henrik and Johan, a needy man who as a boy sought his father's love and the father whose distaste for the boy eventually turned to hatred. Marianne becomes a sympathetic ear for Karin and is immersed in this family drama.
"Saraband" is a series of conversations between these 4 people, isolated from the outside world by miles of countryside and by the strong emotions that bind them at the same time they corrode their relationships. Many of the conversations are essentially monologues, sometimes even spoken to the camera. The performances are expressed intensely, and I was particularly impressed with Börje Ahlstedt's pathetic, cruel, mercurial characterization. But "Saraband" works better as a tortuous expression of Ingmar Bergman's grief than it does as a story, and the film is better understood on that level. Karin is too neurotic and melodramatic for a 19-year-old, until we remember that she embodies the psyche of the very old, very neurotic director. Johan's bizarre attachment to his deceased daughter-in-law, whom he barely knew, doesn't make sense unless we consider that Johan is Bergman, just as Henrik is Bergman. The quasi-incestuous relationship between Henrik and Karin seems out of place in the story, but it works as metaphor. The memory of Anna pervades the film to an extent that is creepy. But Anna is there because Ingrid is always in Ingmar Bergman's thoughts.
One thing I found interesting in "Saraband" was the conflicting views of the characters: Marianne always thought Johan was "nice", while Henrik finds him nasty and beneath contempt. Most of the world thinks Henrik obnoxious, domineering, and slightly crazy, but his wife thought him full of love. There is a valid point there. And the fact that the characters can no more change how they feel about one another than they could bring back the dead is accepted as fact, which I suppose is kind of refreshing. But what we have is a bunch of people who don't get along. And so what? They don't need to. Bergman manages to give every emotion a great deal of weight. Too much weight. "Saraband" is an interesting bit of metaphor and may shed light on the nature of Berman's personal grief. But these characters just aren't credible in the real world. It doesn't work as a narrative. And I think it needs to, thus my 3-star rating.
Note: Bergman should have been more careful with his numbers. Marianne is 63 and hasn't seen Johan in 30-32 years. They were married for 16 years, then saw each other again after Marianne divorced her 2nd husband. I'm sure that Bergman wanted to indicate that Marianne was a young woman when she married, but he probably didn't mean to say she was in junior high school. It's a careless error that Bergman would probably brush off as inconsequential, but numerically-minded members of the audience will pick up on it right away.
The DVD (Sony Pictures 2006): The single bonus feature is a 44-minute film about "The Making of Saraband". It is primarily behind-the-scenes footage of Ingmar Bergman directing the actors, filming, and dealing with technical issues. It also includes some interview footage with Bergman, the cast, and the film's art director, costume designer, and prop master. Subtitles are available for the feature film in English, French (Canadian), and Portuguese (Brazilian).