Ingrid Bergman (left) with director Ingmar Bergman
Bergman directing his daughter Linn Ullmann on the set
Sven Nykvist discussing the scene with Liv Ullmann
AUTUMN SONATA (Höstsonaten) B
Sweden France Germany
(99 mi) 1978 d: Ingmar Bergman
Taking thirteen years to make (promising her a script when
they first met), this is the first time Bergman worked with the “other”
Bergman, namely Ingrid, the iconic Swedish star of CASABLANCA (1942), appearing
in her final role (diagnosed with breast cancer at the start of filming), it
pits the self-centered nature of an artist who leaves her family and children
in her formative years to go off and pursue a career (much like the career
trajectory of both Bergmans), leaving gaping holes of abandonment and emotional
neglect, with adult relationships turned sour and dysfunctional, with a
daughter believing the sins of the mother have been passed on to her, leaving
her emotionally crippled, feeling incapable of love. Emerging from one of the darkest spells in
Ingmar Bergman’s life, in 1976 he had gone into voluntary exile in Munich after
charges of tax evasion, accused of hiding income from certain films, suffering
a mental breakdown, where he was institutionalized for several weeks, so the
film was actually shot in Norway, but spoken in Swedish, a native language
Ingrid Bergman hadn’t spoken in over a decade of making films, where curiously
she speaks Italian to her own children and English professionally. While the tax charges eventually proved
false, Bergman later returned to his native Sweden to make what many consider
his best film, FANNY AND ALEXANDER (1982), but his years in exile reflect a
stinging anger and bitterness provoked by this experience. Released the same year as Mommie Dearest, a scathing memoir and exposé
written by Christina Crawford, adopted daughter of actress Joan Crawford,
describing the hell of living with the sadistic alcoholic exploits of her
mother who had no business raising children, much of this film covers similar
territory. Ingrid Bergman left her
children from her first marriage for the notorious affair with director Roberto
Rossellini, viewed as a major scandal at the time, while Ingmar Bergman had
eight children, some of whom didn’t even meet each other until his 60th
birthday celebration just a few months after shooting on this film finished, so
this could be described as a “chickens come home to roost” film. Beautifully shot by Sven Nyqvist, using
candles, lamps, and artificial light to produce an autumnal effect, using
oppressive close-ups, there is a distinct coldness in every frame, revealing a
psychological chamber drama exposing the damage caused by emotional
suppression, where this is a bruisingly honest and searingly confessional
memory play that is difficult to stomach with the degree of intense hatred on
display pouring out of a mother and daughter saga, both blind by the
consequences of their behavior, given an illusory tone, both denying their own
responsibilities, believing in a perfect world that doesn’t exist. Similarly, Bergman has shown an antagonistic
distrust of professional men in his films, whether it is a doctor or lawyer,
military officer or college professor, skewering them with satiric barbs,
constantly undermining their authority, yet he gives them a pass when it comes
to the artist, showing a deference to creative personalities, often viewed as
charlatans or fakes, as if their soul is on public display, subject to public
humiliation, perhaps thinking this is punishment enough, as if trying to
absolve himself of his so-called sins.
And while initially it appears he is holding nothing back, allowing a
full-fledged assault to take place before our eyes, yet the ferocity evolves
into a kind of blind resignation, with both characters unable to grasp the
truth of the matter and are none the wiser, rationalizing to themselves,
finding a more restrained alternative fallback position that is easier to live
with, though both seem perpetually doomed, in stark contrast to the words
written into the daughter’s diary at the outset, “One must learn how to
live. I work at it every day.”
The last work made expressly for the cinema, as from here on
out, every Bergman film, even those screened theatrically, was made for
television. Given a theatrical
structure, Bergman opens the film with a husband Viktor (Halvar Björk) in the
foreground staring directly into the camera commenting upon his continued
fascination with his wife Eva (Liv Ullmann), initially seen out of focus in the
background sitting at a table writing a letter that she eventually reads out
loud enthusiastically inviting her mother to come stay with them. Reading several passages from her diary, we
quickly learn of the remote isolation that has become their lives, a country
pastor and his devoted wife living an idyllic life among the Norwegian fjords,
yet their life has been fraught with pain and anguish at the death of their
only son from drowning a day before his fourth birthday, where his room remains
unchanged after several years, and his photographs are a constant presence
throughout their home, which is like a shrine to his living memory. At the arrival of her mother who she hasn’t
seen in seven years, we immediately see mixed expectations, as Eva is nervous,
yet excited, while Charlotte Andergast (Ingrid Bergman) is a classical pianist
renowned throughout the world, described by critics for her “generosity” and
“warm tone,” but she’s coming off an extensive break caring for an aging second
husband who recently died, leaving her lonely and bewildered, yet she appears
in a time warp, sped up, on a different wavelength, completely out of sync with
a slower pace of life in the hinterlands (with Bergman requiring her to tone it
down for the film due to the close intimacy of the camera), speaking as if
she’s still the center of attention in a major European metropolis, with Eva
listening obediently to a constantly chattering mother who couldn’t be more
self-absorbed. She’s shocked to discover
Eva’s seriously disabled sister Helena (Lena Nyman) is also living there under
Eva’s care, bedridden from cerebral palsy, a degenerative disease that leaves
her unable to control her speech and body movement, with Charlotte clearly
unhappy at this revelation, believing she should be in a nursing home, where
she left her, though she’s polite enough to go through the motions of an
awkward greeting. Things grow more
disturbing after dinner, with Charlotte encouraging her daughter to play Chopin
on the piano, Autumn
Sonata (Hostsonaten) 1978 - (Ingrid Bergman, Liv Ullmann & Halvar Björk)
YouTube (7:29), which she does (played by Bergman’s wife Käbi Laretei), though
shy and hesitatingly, demonstrating a complete lack of self-esteem, still under
the thrall of her mother, openly inviting criticism afterwards, as if expected,
which her domineering mother is more than happy to provide, painstakingly
correcting her, explaining that Chopin wasn’t a “mawkish old woman,” offering a
masterclass on how Chopin should be
played, manly, avoiding sentimentality, meant to express “pain, not reverie,” of
course, then doing it herself, with Eva staring intently as much in awe as
disbelief, like waking a monster, with all the old feelings returning at once,
where the film changes with her utterly aghast facial expressions. This sets the stage for an obviously
traumatized daughter attempting to crawl out of the abusive and tyrannical
control her mother holds over her.
With her husband faded to the background, Eva is docile,
dressing plain, a parson’s wife, looking intentionally unattractive so as not
to attract attention, living a life of empty self-sacrifice, emotionally
barren, while her mother makes a grand entrance, dressed all in red, though Eva
is overly concerned about her mother’s welfare, wanting to spoil her, offering
her a room of her own with a private bathroom, looking after her every need,
intending to serve her breakfast in bed the next morning, though following her
mother’s strict dietary protocol. The
facade of polite friendliness is quickly broken, as Charlotte awakes from a bad
dream screaming in fright, surprised it was all an illusion, as she felt
someone was suffocating her. This
foreshadows what follows, as any pretense of politeness is quickly thrown out
the window as Eva reminds her mother what her childhood was like, from her
perspective, recounting specific instances of her mother’s deplorable behavior,
as she simply didn’t want to be bothered by having children around, avoiding
them at all costs, instead escaping obsessively into her work, spending most of
her life on the road, avoiding both her husband and her children who were left
waiting for her to return. With brief
flashback sequences, these scenes are illuminated and charged with Eva’s
decidedly one-sided denunciations of her mother, holding back nothing, going
for the jugular, as scathing and ferociously accusatory as anything captured on
film, the stuff normally associated with live theater, where the verbal
attention to detail is meticulously written and staged, perfectly choreographed
in small, claustrophobic moments of grueling intimacy. Surprisingly, hysterical theatrics are
allowed to prevail, becoming an exaggerated tour
de force of bitter discord and overtly confrontational melodrama, a tearful
unleashing of repressed emotions that come pouring out like a gusher of
untapped recriminations, born out of a reservoir of soured hurt, where it has
gestated over the years into something wildly detestable, each displaying
aggressive feelings, seeking out yet finding the other repulsive, echoed by
Helena’s unsettling utterances, sounding more like symphonic chaos of
internally wounded pain. While the
autobiographical aspect of the source material feels familiar, the incendiary
manner in which it is expressed is unusual, even for Bergman, where it’s an
all-out, savagely cruel assault by a longtime victim of oppression, believing
her grief is her mother’s secret pleasure, targeting that boot on the back of
her neck, desperately seeking an escape route.
While the mother acknowledges her shortcomings, claiming as an artist
she never fulfilled the promise of her youth, where her own disappointment
drove her obsessive desire to succeed, but Eva refuses to step off the gas,
unleashing all her buried resentments.
It’s cringeworthy territory veering into the horror genre, especially
coming from Liv Ullmann, who projects so much inner warmth, but she refuses to
be deterred, tuning out everything her mother says, only to pile it on even
more, growing over-the-top and exaggerated beyond belief, where the meek rises
from the ashes and offers a tumultuous knockout blow, one with catastrophic
results. Perhaps the heart of the film
is a devastating remark spoken by Eva aimed squarely at her mother, “There can
be no forgiveness.” Imagine that being
the final word. With her mother whisked
into their lives and just as quickly whisked away, making a furious escape
after an eventful night, both have serious regrets afterwards, but it’s an open
question asking what each has learned, as both remain somewhat delusional
afterwards, where self-protective amnesia and lies have a way of altering
painful memories and turning them into blind spots of cold indifference, where
you can simply put them out of your mind as if they never existed.
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