Monika et le désir

Sommaren med Monika, often translated as Monika, the Story of a Bad Girl, but directly it is Summer with Monika, I prefer the latter. Summer with Monika is Ingmar Bergman's early masterful classic. It's European modernism and as many of Bergman's films of that era, this film too dealt with social issues. Even that Ingmar Bergman himself was from a bourgeois family, Summer with Monika builds around the working class. It's a story about two youngsters who fall in love and start living a life of their own.

Monika is a minor girl who doesn't get along with her parents. Her only escape from the harsh family life is romantic cinema and her boyfriend, Harry. In result of the distressing life Monika and Harry escape the city to archipelago for the summer. When the summer's over and they come back, the love between them starts to fade.

I have yet not seen as strong film about young parenthood as this. It shows the truth in a very realistic light, Bergman doesn't add any glamor to its characters' lives, which he never does. This is the social theme of Summer with Monika, young parenthood and the subject is still very current, which makes the film timeless. No director of today has succeed in making as good description of the life like that.

Summer with Monika is so beautifully made that it delights you. The plot also has some points that delight the audience, but I was mostly touched by the beauty of the narrative and cinematography. Both of these are clearly European modernism in Summer with Monika. The camera goes behind the reality, it shows the true emotions of the characters. A very impressive scene of the film is when Monika watches directly to the camera. This shocking destruction of the fourth wall and the illusion of cinema, was probably the first one ever made. My information of this is not accurate or reliable, but at least Summer with Monika was one of the first ones, that did this.

A very powerful film of love, youth, parenthood, frustration and life.

Ingmar Bergman's Monika (Summer with Monika) (1953) is the story of two Stockholm teenagers, stock boy Harry (Lars Ekborg) and voluptuous, impulsive Monika (Harriet Andersson), who meet and fall in love and run away for a summer on a motorboat on the Stockholm archipelago escaping from work and all responsibility. Monika becomes pregnant and they return to the city and marry – but things turn bad. This first powerful feature by the Swedish master is simple and sweet but nonetheless rich in emotional wrenching events. The film, which depicts teenage unwed sex, was shockingly sensual for its time. In 2006 the intensity of Harriet Andersson's uninhibited performance is still impressive and this story is just as heartbreaking as it was over half a century ago.

Presented as part of the Janus Films sidebar of the 2006 New York Film Festival at Lincoln Center in another gorgeous pristine-looking new print with a rich black and white tonal range that may look better than the original did.

A sad tale of two lovers who meet in a high emotional state and break up because the lady, Monika becomes bored with the relationship. About the highs and lows of love. Very beautiful in depicting the relationship between Harry and Monika. Its easy to sympathize with Harry because no matter how hard he tries to make Monika happy he always seems to fail. It was during the filming of this movie that Ingmar Bergman left his wife for the actress, Harriet Andersson(an act which he would regret and influence him for the rest of his career). This act would greatly influence Wild Strawberries(1957), Persona(1966), The Touch(1971), Cries & Whispers(1972), and would inspire the Liv Ullman film, Faithless. The director delivers a film of powerful emotions and raw feelings. Harriet Andersson is magnificent as the title character. Sommaren Med Monika/Monika(1953) is the first of many great motion pictures for the legendary filmmaker and visual poet, Ingmar Bergman.

He wasn't always the old glum maestro. Although the young lovers in "Summer with Monika" might have fitted quite easily into a British Kitchen Sink film, this early Bergman is less grim than we later came to expect and although minor, this film has much to admire; it actually reminded me a bit of "A Kind of Loving".

A young Harriet Andersson is Monika and Lars Ekborg is Harry, the boy who loves her enough to want to spend a lot longer than just the summer with her. You might say that for Bergman this is a very simple picture filled with very simple people but Bergman treats them with a fair degree of sympathy. Monika may be just a little tart or simply a young woman trapped in an early marriage while Harry is always seen as trying to do the decent thing and the ending, if not exactly upbeat, is less of a Bergman downer than usual. No masterpiece, then, but an essential part of the canon nevertheless.

Ingmar Bergman's 1953 "Summer with Monika" was chopped down from 92 mins to barely over an hour and shown in America as the provocatively titled "Monika, the Story of a Bad Girl", promoted with saucy posters and even nude postcards. But cool your engines because there's nothing very sexually explicit; if Monika is indeed a "bad girl" that's because she makes some very bad, selfish & inconsiderate choices. Not exactly the "bad girl" of your dreams but more like the crazy girlfriend who ruined your life.

"Monika" (Harriet Andersson) is an 18 year old girl who dreams of escaping her impoverished life but with little foresight beyond that. Enter "Harry" (Lars Ekborg) who is also dissatisfied with his lowly station, but he has a somewhat clearer head about him. In an impulsive moment, the two run off to an island believing they can live forever in a summer of blissful denial. And thus the theme is set: how long can lovers survive "living in the moment"?

Gorgeously shot and expertly acted, this film is definitely a treat to watch. However, you may find yourself disliking, or even hating, the character Monika for the way she tramples all over everyone's life to suit herself. Although she is admirable in her fearless rebellion against conventions, she is shown to be almost childishly self-absorbed. Thus she isn't quite the classy, intriguing female protagonist of "Summer Interlude" (Bergman's film 2 years prior) but she's almost like a deliberate caricature of that character--a tantrum-throwing wild child which Bergman literally illustrates in one memorable scene as she's scurrying through the woods, dirty faced and disheveled, tearing at a piece of meat she had just stolen. Watching "Summer with Monika" back to back with "Summer Interlude" is quite an experience, and I highly recommend it to those of you who are interested in this side of Bergman.

During filming, Bergman and his leading actress Harriet Andersson were having a short but passionate affair, and critics have said that this resulted in the film being a "love letter" to Andersson. Definitely the camera is very attentive to her, and there are some fabulous shots that capture not only her impish beauty but also her cruel, darker side that's not as glamorous but every bit as engaging. But as for it being a love letter to her? I don't think so; if anything it feels more like an exposé, a poetic yet brutal ode to that "bad girl" our momma always warned us about.