Till glädje

Ingmar Bergman's seventh film, To Joy, is actually a fairly bitter film, more often than not, in looking at the destructiveness of a marriage between two people who somehow got stuck with each other to fall in love. And yet there are some moments that are quite joyful, or at least in the terms that Bergman will allow from time to time, and they help ring this as less a total work of despair than an examination of 'average' people who can't stand not having more. Stig (Stig Olin) and Marta (Maj-Britt Nilsson) meet as they're both musicians in an orchestra conducted by Sönderby (Victor Sjostrom).

She's the only woman in the orchestra, but it's not exactly that they have love at first sight in the slightest. Their connection grows following a party where Stig gets drunk and makes a depressing grandstanding fool of himself in front of friends, and somehow his downbeat manner is charming to Marta. Soon they grow closer, even fall in love perhaps, though their future marriage is complicated by Marta becoming pregnant. This scene, when she reveals it three months on to Stig, is the first real crack in the relationship. It only cracks more, with the occasional patch-up, and the question stands more or less- as Stig is looking back on the relationship following his wife and one of his child's deaths- is what could have come from all of this?

Bergman deals with his characters, at this stage in his career, in trying to just find the simple and really not very simple truths of what Stig and Marta are together and separate. For the first half it almost looks like Stig is a bit too two-dimensional, particularly for a Bergman film (and Olin doesn't play him extremely well, even if he does deliver the beats fairly well, perhaps in line with his own character's inadequacies). He can't seem to enjoy anything that he does because he always wants more, to be a supreme soloist, than to have what he already has gotten. Marta, on the other hand, after having several potential men before going with Stig, tries her best to cope with having two kids that she probably wasn't totally thrilled to have in the first place.

There's a great little scene where Sanderby recounts walking in on Stig and Marta after having some kind of odd tender moment (as well as later on after having a quarrel), without them noticing Sanderby walk in, and the expression still underneath their faces when he formally walks in. In typical Bergman fashion we see the disintegration of a relationship (quite a brutal argument in bed really, more of emotional violence than physical), even if the sort of 'patching-up' period towards the end is a little weaker than what's come before.

So on the one hand there is this aspect, the drama of two people having a constant push-and-pull tie that binds them through Stig's delusions of grandeur and self-pity and fear manifesting in other forms (notably into the arms of another woman) and Marta's own semi-helplessness, which is very good, if imperfect, as classic Bergman storytelling. On the other hand it's also one of the best examples of classical music being used as incidental music: there's not exact musical score like if we hear music accompanying the characters giving the emotional cues during an argument scene or when Sanderby offers advice or gets irritated at Stig, but rather the music of Sanderby's orchestra (and Sjostrom, I might add, is pitch-perfect in the role of the weathered and brilliant second-banana conductor) fills in the spaces at times of the emotional context.

Probably the most successful, and joyful, scene is when Stig finds out Marta has the baby, by running out quick during a rehearsal, the music going along as he's on the phone, then continuing as he sits back down, and as Sanderby asks quietly of one musician who asks another to another to Stig what happened, as the music plays on. This, plus the second greatest cinematic interpretation of Beethoven's 9th symphony 4th movement in a climax (the first being Clockwork Orange), make To Joy worth seeing all by itself, if only for Beethoven fans.

As one of the several films included on the recently released Eclipse DVD series, To Joy will appeal to fans of Bergman's knack at telling of characters in shattered, honest romance, and to those looking for some classical music bliss and have seen The Magic Flute or Autumn Sonata too many times.

Ingmar Bergman's "To Joy" (Till glädje) is one of his earlier films. It opens and ends with a community orchestra and choir playing Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

The story features the courtship and marriage of Stig Eriksson and Marta Olsson, who met while playing violin in the orchestra. Victor Sjöström, who stars in "Wild Strawberries" is the conductor of the orchestra. At the beginning of the film we learn that Marta has been killed in an accident at their summer cottage. It's followed by a long flashback about their tempestuous relationship.

Stig believes himself a skilled player and dreams of a solo career, but his hopes are dashed in one disastrous performance. Stig and Marta have a troubled relationship, but the last several years have seen reconciliation and joy.

It is said the film is semi-autobiographical about Bergman's first two marriages. I found the film an engaging reflection of a couple working through their first six or seven years of marriage.

This seems to be a deeply personal work for Bergman, and it's interesting that the backdrop to the story is classical music. We get extended sequences of an orchestra practicing or performing, and the music exudes a feeling of being grand, joyful, perfect, and immortal, whereas by contrast the lives of these characters are small, sad, flawed, and fleeting. It's hard to know how much of the story is Bergman flagellating himself for the failure of his second marriage and his inadequacies as a young artist, but regardless, I love the film for its raw honesty, and for showing the husband to be the childish, insecure, and selfish one in this couple's marriage. They both seem to seek authenticity and meaning early on in their relationship, and start off their marriage promising to be honest and kind to one another, but inevitably things deteriorate, the entropy of which is (in various forms) a recurring theme in Bergman's work.

I loved the shot on the boy at the end, it's powerful, but in the overall scene, I would have preferred an even more somber sequence amidst that soaring music. (It's hard to believe I'm saying I would have preferred something being more somber in a Bergman film, so I hope that's not saying more about me than I'm saying about the film, hehe) Anyway, it was wonderful to see legendary director Victor Sjöström as the cranky orchestra conductor, just as he'd appear later for Bergman in 'Wild Strawberries,' and look for Bergman himself in a cameo in the doctor's office.

A few quotes: Bergman seemingly through Stig (Stig Eriksson): "I'll tell you the secret of real art. It's created when you're unhappy. I prefer being unhappy. God knows it's the state I usually find myself in."

And maybe Bergman through Marta (Maj-Britt Nilsson): "There's so much misery, laziness, and indifference, in body and in mind. In the end you don't believe in anything. You think that's just how it is. That's the whole meaning. (Stig: There doesn't have to be a meaning.) Yes there does. If there isn't, you make you one up. Otherwise you can't go on living."

And lastly this one, Bergman on music in 1960: "I would say that there is no art form that has so much in common with film as music. Both affect our emotions directly, not via the intellect. And film is mainly rhythm; it is inhalation and exhalation in continuous sequence. Ever since childhood, music has been my great source of recreation and stimulation, and I often experience a film or play musically."

Although the plot of this film is rather simple - a man reflecting on the good and bad times that he had with his wife - it is handled well by Bergman, who gives the film an interesting audio and visual side, including creative editing changes, and at least one meaningful aerial shot early on the piece. The protagonist and his wife are concert musicians, and in the first few scenes, and in some later on, non-original music is used superbly to coincide with the action on screen. There are however a few concerts scenes that may have been better had they been trimmed in length, as seeing a whole concert performed is not necessary in the story. Although the film is mostly a series of memories, there is also one is ill-judged point in which a character other than the protagonist starts to narrate events, which is not possible in the way the story is told. Also, there is room to complain about the film being a bit too literal, but there is hardly reason to concentrate on the drawbacks of the film when it is such a delight to watch, and so well done where it is well done. Victor Sjöström, as the maestro, delivers fine support, and the film is an excellent example of great visual storytelling. In the years after this, Bergman would go on to direct more complex films that would require more skill on his behalf, but this early entry still stands up fairly well, even if not up to the standard of some of his latter work. The final sequence is especially well done, both in how it uses music, and in the contrast that it has to the first scene in which the man's son is seen.

Somewhat one-sided and sometimes melodramatic portrait of a doomed marriage, this still has it share of lovely moments, not least of which is the on-screen performance of great classical music by the orchestra that both protagonists are part of.

While their romance starts sweetly, Stig rapidly turns into a hateful character, his failure to reach stardom as a solo musician translated into taking out his frustrations on his sweet wife, and coldly having an affair to counter his feelings of impotence and self-loathing.

While an interesting portrait of an artist's own ambition standing in the way of being better at their craft (it's Stig's need for approval and outward success that doesn't allow him to really thrown himself, body and soul into his music – or his marriage), Marta his wife just comes off as too perfect a martyr.

There are moments where the acting is very strong, and some of the photography is lovely, but the film just feels a bit like the character of Stig – too self-conscious and too sure about who is right and wrong. Still, there are lots of hints of Bergman's genius to come, and it's well worth seeing for those.