Bergman Island

Could have been a great film, but it cannot decide which way to go. It feels like standing beore a signpost with a dozen possible directions, but the author director could not really make up her mind which one to pursue.

Since the story revolves around Ingmar Bergman, who used to life and film on this island, we get a lot of references, movie clips, talks, sights, and quips about him, his films and his life. Praise and critique about Bergman is woven into the story of a couple of filmmakers, Chris and Tony, coming to Fårö, to write scripts and learn more on Bergman. Their different work styles, subjects and attitude have quite some Bergmanesque quality, though none of the straits are followed to the end. The Bergman worshipping and bashing does not offer any new insights and sounds like remnants from an abandoned documentary project. The film tends to remain on the lighter side until we get to hear and see Chris' script evolve as she tells it to her partner.

Here begins the strongest plot line, blending fiction with the reality. I only wish the director had focussed more on this development. It would have been an ultimately more compelling film.

A nifty meta-infused drama about the blurred boundary between the creative process and the life of the creator.

Vicky Krieps is the not very happy heroine at the center of the film, a filmmaker married to another filmmaker (Tim Roth) who has an Ingmar Bergman obsession. They are staying at a Swedish retreat devoted to honoring the film giant's legacy, because what could be more fun than going on a Bergman safari, which is an actual thing, and where they hilariously play Bergman movies on the tour bus. Put "Cries and Whispers" on for your kids on your next road trip and see how far that gets you.

In the grand tradition of artistic couples, Roth is self absorbed and kind of an ass. He's half-heartedly supportive of his wife's latest and stalled project, a movie within a movie that we get to see played out for us as Krieps explains it to Roth. Mia Wasikowska plays the heroine of Krieps's film, a version of herself dealing with the feelings generated by a lingering love affair. Though Wasikowska is also an actual person on Krieps's film crew, and as you can imagine, the film remains pretty vague about how much of what we see actually happens vs. How much is part of the fiction Krieps creates for her movie. Though it doesn't really matter, since either way we get a crystal clear idea of what's going on in Krieps's head. If you are the kind of person who likes to be very clear about what is happening in a movie at any given point in its running time, you will hate this film.

I for one really enjoyed the way this movie played around with time and fluidly moved back and forth between fiction and reality. And Krieps and Wasikowska both give great performances.

Grade: A.

There's an island where a maestro spent his days, Chris and Tony take some time and go and stay, it's not the most magnetic marriage, a slightly disaffected carriage, but they're there to draft stories, for their screenplays. As the days pass they absorb the auteur's land, while Tony forges on with all he's planned, but Chris struggles with her craft, until she outlines her first draft, that recalibrates into, a future land.

A thoughtful piece of cinema, as stories entwine and timelines are confused, on an island where many of the greatest were formulated and filmed. Brilliant if you're a Bergman fan, perhaps a bit too obscure if you're not.

I really enjoyed and loved this film, but I can also understand why others won't. I won't go over the synopsis because I assume most readers are already familiar with it/can easily do so. The pacing is very slow and the plot gets more convoluted as we go along, and there are many many references to Bergman, and so again, I can understand why this would be alienating and maybe even annoying to some, but these are some of the reasons why I liked this film so much. The tone and the way that every scene is directed and shot are also very different from other "serious" so-called arthouse films. The universal and perhaps timeless subject matter--love, relationships, artistic creation, loneliness (or solitude, depending), to name some--are indeed serious but are also treated in a casual, airy, even jovial manner (and not in the derogatory sense of these words), which was really refreshing and made me even reconsider my own preferences, cinematic or otherwise, and the way that I view Bergman in particular and artistic inspiration more generally. There's also a sort of dreamlike atmosphere that surrounds the film and the film within a film especially.

The first hour or so is a very careful and brilliantly written setup for the second hour in which doubles and doubling will appear - characters become narrators and also understudies for other characters, and virtually every sentence that they say can be interpreted metafictionally, as they are aware of being actors in a film (or in the film within a film, as well). It's indeed a film that interprets itself and its own mechanisms, especially its writing process, which is not new (Godard, for example), of course, but this is exactly where the director has shown originality and creativity. Hansen-Løve takes Bergman and his films (and his alter ego in the form of the beautiful, serene island of Fårö itself and also possibly her partner, another threatening male director that looms in the background or the foreground), and instead of merely referencing him for the sake of reference alone and sounding "smart", as a "formidable reference" as one character says, she plays with his myth, with his films. After all, the word "allusion" comes from the word "to play," and this is where the film really shines quite brilliantly. Ghosts become zombies in a horror film within the film, words become real, and the "power of fiction," as one character writes in their journal, dazzles. There's also an interesting discussion of human relationships, love, motherhood, what it means to love more than one person at the same time, especially when it comes from a woman. Women here as in Bergman's films are indeed the driving force both of the plot and of the actual film, dealing with the old issue of writer's block in a new perspective, truly. I think this is what originality really is now: you take an artwork or its creator which precedes you (and in film or any other medium, of course, you never operate solely on your own or in a vacuum, but are under an influence of tradition and an entire history that "haunts" you), and try to re-mold it, shape it into something new by using the same tools but in a different, singular way, using your own tone. Notice that the title of the film is "Bergman Island" and not "Bergman's Island". Bergman doesn't own the island nor can he monopolize it, as much as the industry born from his life there is very much alive. Every director, character, visitor, and film spectator shares the island and its impression via this film. I will say, though, that the ending did feel a bit rushed and maybe even underdeveloped, but it's still done masterfully, showing complete control of the medium of film.

Bergman Island is a beautiful story about the creativity and strong inner life of artists.

My review is likey biased towards favorable one because most clever and abundant references were so familiar to me, not only Ingmar Bergman's films and his biography (recommend Laterna magica to everybody), but also the soundtrack including the hymns of Lutheran church, the recurring theme of Vem kan segla förutan vind and naturally one of the key songs Abba's Winner takes it all. All these elements strongly resonated within me together with the beautiful but a bit harsh island of Fårö connected with a ferry to the outer world.

This was an extremely beautiful film about the creative process and strong inner life of artists. Its focus was what is lurking under the surface which may be only expressed in the art. Here, the theme is the severe longing of fulfillment, in love but also in the film making. The longing of complete connection, warmth and acceptance.

I loved the choice of using a triple-layer structure, the meta-layers were convincing and emotional. Mia Wasikowska's performance was perfect as always. I also admired Tim Roth's subtle performance which created the needed background for the inner struggle of the main protagonist and the artist in the film, played by Vicky Krieps.

The paradox is that the lack of absolute love and connection often drives the artistic process and you need to embrace it while writing and directing. Yet, you need to come back to the imperfect but real world after the process. This may be exhausting. This films describes this perfectly.

I would recommend this film to all cinemaphiles, in particular to those with an earlier interest in Ingmar Bergman's work and life. The movies's tempo is rather slow and the layered structure may be a bit demanding for a wider film audience. This film also gives a valuable view on the women in the film industry as creative artists themselves and not only as muses and lovers of famous directors.