Bergman on the set with cameraman Sven Nyqvist (left)
THROUGH A GLASS
DARKLY (Såsom i en spegel) A
Sweden (89 mi)
1961 d: Ingmar Bergman
It’s so horrible to see your own confusion
and understand it.
―Karin (Harriet
Andersson)
A film that explores
the frail hopelessness of the human condition, particularly as society veers
away from the help and sustenance of God, as standing on one’s own in the face
of a bleak reality can be a cold and isolating existence, cut off from the
world around them, as if left on an island, with no shelter from the
storm. This frightening reality grows
darker and even more intense when viewed through the lens of mental illness,
specifically schizophrenia, as one is drawn into real and unreal worlds, unable
to distinguish between them, leaving others helpless in their utter futility to
rescue those afflicted from their inner demons.
Curiously, the film is dedicated to Bergman’s wife, Käbi Larete, a
concert pianist who was friends with Bartok and Stravinsky, though it provides
one of the most extraordinary performances in any Bergman film, allowing
Harriet Andersson (away from working class roles) to literally distinguish
herself in ways few had ever seen before, baring her soul for cinema in an
unflinching depiction of a mental breakdown, much of it described as it’s
happening, offering a window to her soul, allowing viewers to see into the
unknowable. At the time, few films
touched upon this subject, and fewer still did so with any degree of
reflection, like THE THREE FACES OF EVE (1957), where actress Joanne Woodward
won an Academy Award for playing a character with a multiple personality
disorder, as others accentuated the crude treatment methods, including
electro-shock treatments and even lobotomies, as in SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER
(1959), an adaptation of a Tennessee Williams play, whose older sister Rose was
diagnosed with schizophrenia at a young age, eventually subjected to a
lobotomy. In a Bergman film, it’s less
reality based and more theatrically constructed, where a dysfunctional family
environment contributes to the episodic reaction that slowly unravels before
our eyes. The first in the director’s
Faith Trilogy that explores the implications of the absence of God, acknowledging
human limitations in our ability to see clearly, delving into an existential
void of despair, passionate in a preoccupation with deeply personal problems,
this is less religious than overtly confessional, where precious secrets are
continually revealed, with a family on holiday at a secluded island home,
beautifully capturing the long Scandinavian summer days, with radiantly lit
close-ups of faces (a predecessor to Persona), adding up to an extremely intimate chamber
drama elegantly shot by Sven Nykvist, who he would work with for the rest of
his career, the first Bergman film shot on Fårö Island, home to approximately
500 permanent residents, offering a rugged and distinctive landscape in a
remote location that would become the setting of future films like Persona (1966), Shame
(Skammen) (1968), The
Passion of Anna (1969), and SCENES
FROM A MARRIAGE (1973), as well as his permanent home for the next forty years
(while keeping an apartment in Stockholm until 2003), building an expansive
estate on the island (that remains open to artists and scholars after his
death, Application – The
Bergman Estate on Fårö), offering a sense of peace, inspiration, and
freedom.
Winning an Oscar for
Best Foreign Film in 1962, the film opens to the music of a Bach Sarabande from
his Cello Suite No. 2, Pablo
Casals - 4. Sarabande from Cello Suite No.2 in D minor, BWV ... (YouTube
4:04), which plays intermittently throughout, as four characters are seen
coming out of the sea, like a ritualized baptism, or a sense of renewal that
offers a glimpse of hope, in stark contrast to the Dance of Death that it
resembles at the end of The
Seventh Seal (Det sjunde inseglet) (1957).
Apparently invigorated from a morning swim in the Baltic Sea, we are
quickly introduced to David (Gunnar Björnstrand), a mediocre novelist living
with his two children, Karin (Harriet Andersson, taking the director’s mother’s
name) and younger brother Minus (Lars Passgård), also including Martin (Max von
Sydow), Karin’s husband who is a physician, each one fascinated by Karin’s
psychic meltdown (like an accident where one can’t look away), drawn to her,
wanting to help, yet each must face their own personal torment when realizing
all outpourings of love can’t stop her mental decline. The barren island reflects the emotional
sterility of David, a self-absorbed writer who sacrifices a commitment to his
children by hiding behind his work, acting as if his career is more important,
but really it’s just easier for him to avoid communication with his children,
which has major implications. As David and
Martin set out the morning fishing nets from a small boat, Martin confesses his
increasing desperation with Karin, whose prognosis from a recent confinement in
a sanatorium for schizophrenia was not good, fearing he was losing her, that
she may be incurable. Karin, however, is
alert and vibrant, teasing her younger brother about his raging hormones and
growing sense of alienation, especially from his aloof father, feeling they
never have a conversation, as he’s always away on some work related assignment,
having just returned from Switzerland, yet he’s heading off again for
Yugoslavia. What was supposed to be a
celebratory dinner honoring his return quickly deteriorates in disappointment. However, the kids liven things up performing
a Shakespearean-style costume drama, a story-within-a-story that Minus wrote
about sacrificing one’s ambitions for immortality. While it’s cleverly amusing, literally
blindfolding their father before the performance, with eye-opening suggestions
that he may have fallen short of his ambitions, yet it playfully displays an
artistic side of the family, with David feigning approval though he rightfully
believes it consciously targets his own self-delusion as a writer. At bedtime, Karin avoids Martin’s tender
advances, which appears to be a matter of routine, as Martin’s patient devotion
to her is unquestioned, yet she feels closer to her father than her husband, as
if her father is in some way connected to the divine. Karin awakes early, drawn to the attic where
she hears voices behind the wallpaper, remaining ambiguous whether or not she
is actually ill, yet clearly she is affected, claiming her illness makes her
hearing more acute, picking up on sounds that others can’t hear. Visiting her father in his study, after a hug
he puts her to sleep on the couch, but steals away afterwards with Minus to go
fishing, leaving Karin alone, exploring the contents of his desk, where she
finds a journal that appears to push her over the edge, as he has written: “Her illness is hopeless, but with occasional
periods of lucidity. I have long
surmised it, but the certainty nevertheless is insufferable. To my horror I discover my curiosity. The compulsion to register the progress,
concisely to note her gradual dissolution.
To utilize her.”
Bergman’s trilogy
presents a male-dominated world in which women are silent, or forced into
submission, viewed as sexual objects, yet routinely ignored otherwise. Part of the problem for Karin, and for women
in general, is that they are treated as if they have an affliction and are not
listened to, as if there’s an excuse not to take them seriously. Yet this is a breakthrough film, in some
regard, as what Karin has to say is infinitely more compelling and heartfelt than
anything either adult man offers in this film, yet she’s not even viewed as the
lead character, which would be her father David, as the story actually revolves
around him and his human shortcomings.
In this sense, he is a mirror image of Antonius Block in The
Seventh Seal (Det sjunde inseglet), as the Crusader’s search for God is as
futile as David’s search for artistic perfection. Both are doomed to fail, yet David’s sins are
even more egregious as he uses his daughter’s schizophrenia as material for his
next book, not only neglecting her in the process, allowing her to be subjected
to electro-shock, but contributing to her mental deterioration, as the
discovery of his diary destroys what’s left of her mental equilibrium, leaving
her utterly devoid of hope. This mirrors
Bergman’s own life, feeling the exact same guilt, as he “almost cannibalizes”
according to film historian Peter Cowie, those closest to him, literally
stripping them bare as fodder for his own films. While David and Martin squabble together on
the fishing boat over David’s misappropriation of her suffering, with Martin
calling him a coward, they are clueless what’s taking place back on shore, as
Karin initially flirts with her brother, catching him with pornography
magazines, but then senses a storm is coming, retreating into the safety of a
wrecked ship, literally huddling with her brother in fear during a heavy rain
storm, with suggestions of incest, as Karin has a tendency to get overly
affectionate with her brother, whose innocence is close to an unstained
godliness, using him as an outlet for her love.
Her heightened fears and hallucinations become the central focus,
however, showing rapid mood swings and clear psychological distress, yearning
to see the face of God, which becomes a twisted erotic nightmare, emotionally
steamrolling her family, leaving them grasping at straws, utterly helpless to
stop her descent, intensified by the sound of the helicopter to take her back
to the hospital, literally exhausted from the ordeal of straddling two worlds,
where the film is unequalled throughout Bergman’s output in terms of dramatic
intensity, as it dares to venture into difficult territory that remains largely
unexplored by cinema. Years later we
witness a towering performance by Gena Rowlands in John Cassavetes’ masterful A
Woman Under the Influence (1974), where the family response to silence and
sedate what they view as a hysterical woman and then have her sent away is
simply devastating. Many Bergman
followers found the film shocking, as they didn’t initially understand it,
especially how starkly minimalist and severe the subject matter is, yet it’s
one of the more beautifully edited and perfectly concise films of his career,
packing a punch in just under 90-minutes.
While there are brief references to religion underlying the entire film,
it’s never the focus until the finale when it takes center stage, prominently
featured in an overly pat discussion between father and son trying to make
sense of it all, with God (and father) becoming synonymous with the power of
love. While this verbal breakthrough is
mildly revealing, by giving them the last words, it takes the focus away from
Karin and the magnificence of Andersson, as she is the one person we truly care
about, drawn to her honesty and the fragility of her weaknesses and
vulnerabilities. This is a special
treat.
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