Monday, July 30, 2007
Ingmar Bergman R.I.P
Feel free to post other Bergman scenes you like -- and can find on You Tube!
(Of course, there also this!)
UPDATE: I feel compelled to note that I am not well versed in Bergman's films. Maybe only seen two or three and not the big ones that he's most known for. Did something happen to Bergman's reputation among younger cinephiles in the 70s, 80s and 90s that I've never felt particularly compelled to correct this oversight? Maybe now ...
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9 comments:
I've only seen one film, actually -- The Seventh Seal -- and parts of a few others. He was rarely if ever mentioned in any of the film classes I took, and I had to search Seal out on my own. Beyond Woody Allen and segments of Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, he doesn't seem to have had any palpable influence beyond the periods in which his films were released. But what other Swedish filmmakers have achieved much reknown? Perhaps the culture is just too isolated to have much of an impact.
Now that you mention it, in all my years of graduate school, both MA and PhD, I only remember one Bergman film being screened in class: Wild Strawberries, a natural for Mamber's narrative studies class on time. But otherwise Bergman was completely missing from the screening lists of any of the core classes or any of my other elective classes. Wasn't Bergman supposed to be part of the film canon or something or did he just slowly fade from view for some reason or other? If so why?
Nationality might be a factor but hadn't his reputation far outstripped the status of his country's cinema? I had the impression that he had entered that rarified realm in which certain auteurs were elevated above such historical entities as nation states to be embraced as international masters, trans-national if not trans historical. Am I wrong? Were Bergman's obsessions too easily parodied/caricatured and thus diminished as a result over time?
It's more than just my graduate career -- he was never brought up in my undergrad days, as well. I knew him more as the director that Woody Allen wanted to be than as a cinematic genius in his own right. All of his films are supposed to be amazing cinematic masterpieces, but how many of us actually talk about them -- talk about him? It might be a case of us not recognizing his influence, but I also think he might be someone who's talent and reputation might be greater than his influence. My fella Pasolini, Antonioni, Ozu, Resnais and others might occupy this realm as well: great filmmakers who never left much of a mark on cinema beyond their own films.
There's an idea for auteurist study: the uninfluential auteur. Directors who clearly have a singular style and unifying voice that most cinephiles seem disinclined to hear but are glad that these directors said something at some point.
This is like a confessional. I have also only seen one Bergman film (Wild Strawberries...also in Steve Mamber's narrative class along with Paul and Rob) and really liked it but the rest of his films - particularly Persona and The Seventh Seal - have been on my must-see list for years. I have been living in perpetual shame for my lack of Bergman-literacy so it's nice to know that I am not alone.
That said (what a weight off my shoulders), these films have been on my must-see list because I believe that they have been extremely influential on world film history. Just because we can only name a couple of obvious examples of homage to Bergman doesn't mean that his style hasn't been woven into the fabric of post-war film language.
How do we really account for a director's influence on other filmmakers anyway? Do we have to be able to point to it for it to be there? For instance, knowing that Bergman was part of the canon of 1960s and 1970s revival/art house film culture, I think that you could certainly make an argument that his contemplative character-driven style was extremely influential on numerous New Hollywood directors. Can I point to an example (other than Annie Hall, of course) of a director directly "quoting" Bergman...no. But that doesn't mean he's not there.
Well, I have been telling Mookie for a while now (especially when he spouts off about Italian cinema) that I am a Swedish film fan. He usually replies with an "Oh, that's nice" equivalent.
While you film studies young'uns may not have been exposed much to Bergman, we cinephiles of the 80's couldn't get enough Bergman. In the late 80's and early 90's we elders were soaking up the Swedish cinema. There wasn't an acting class around that couldn't showcase a Bergman scene in their scene performance classes, particularly from Persona.
In addition to Bergman, there were his proteges to watch: Billy August, Sven Nykvist (directed Oxen in addition to his many cinematographer credits), Lasse Halstrom, etc.
Keep in mind that Bergman was also a writer and that is what he seems to have been doing in his "August" years, excuse the pun. One of my all-time favorites is a Bergman written, Billy August directed film about Bergman's parents titled Best Intentions.
And Mookie, your statement that, "Beyond Woody Allen and segments of Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey, he doesn't seem to have had any palpable influence ..." well stay tuned for my very first blog post on that subject. Because you are oh, so wrong! :-0
Didn't see Michele's post before I posted, but yes, you are very correct. And I also might add that Bergman was still big in the art house/revival culture of the 80's to which I belong.
I would be interested to see who Lori and others believe is influenced by Bergman. My knowledge of his works is limited -- as is my knowledge of Swedish films in general -- so perhaps I've overlooked the influences.
That said, I think all of this begs the question of why don't we remember/recognize him more if he's so influential? We see the allusions in Woody Allen films, but much else? Maybe Whit Stillman, albeit apparently filtered through David Letterman? (Chris Eigemann has always struck me as what Letterman would be like had he grown up in the Hamptons instead of Broad Ripple.) We all seem to agree he was great, and I'm sure Steve Mamber and all of our professors who were also part of the 80s art house period would agree he was... so why didn't they ever teach us about him?
The Bergman problem - as discussed here - perhaps relates to the curious ambiguity of his position in film history, at once a deeply idiosyncratic director (exemplary of the "personal" filmmaker) and a symptomatic one (existing at a confluence of trends that created postwar art cinema).
To put it another way: in an alternate universe in which Bergman had never been born, there would probably have been another director "like" Bergman, whose films would have addressed similar issues.
(Actually, there is another counterfactual that I much prefer, namely that Bergman and Antonioni were, all along, actually the same person, simply different facets of an Ur-"1960s-arthouse-director". Which is, I suppose, somewhere close to the theme of Persona.)
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