Les Émigrants

One of the few foreign language films to be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards (it didn't win, of course), The Emigrants tells the story of the hardships a family faces in a rural county of Sweden, causing them to look to America as a refuge. What's interesting about The Emigrants is that the film is Swedish- you wouldn't necessarily expect the Swedes to make a film about how awful Sweden is and how great the United States is. But, using a realistic and not melodramatic approach, the film lets us know what the family is struggling with and allows us to understand them.

The characters, played by Ingmar Bergman regulars Max von Sydow, Liv Ullmann and Allan Edwall, face poor harvests, starvation, poverty, religious persecution and even false rumours of bestiality. They look to the US as a place where a farmer can become rich, with even American slavery looking better than their previous situation. Getting to North America, however, will take a rough voyage in which our heroes will face disease, lice and death, and come into psychological conflict with each other. This makes for a strong drama.

Surely one of the best foreign films of the 1970s and a great addition to the strong cinematic year 1971, The Emigrants is an understated but still compelling film, and I look forward to The Criterion Collection's restoration.

'The Emigrants' ('Utvandarna' in Swedish) directed by Jan Troell was released in 1971 and is based on a series of novels written by Vilhelm Moberg and published between 1949 and 1959. The story takes place one hundred years earlier, sometime in the middle of 19th century. And yet, seen today, this film telling the story of a group of Swedes who emigrated from Europe to the United States because of economic hardships and religious persecutions has a strong resonance in the actuality of the second decade of the 21st century. The migrants putting their lives in danger to cross the high waters following the dreams of freedom and better lives for them and their children may speak different languages and their skins may have a different color today, but seeing this film today reminds that most of us or our ancestors have been once migrants. The images of the columns of men and women in march on land or clustered in fragile boats sailing on dangerous seas look so familiar.

As a historical document 'The Emigrants' is a great film. It shows us a moment of crisis in the history of Sweden and Europe, one of those periods that produced the great human migrations to America in the 19th century. From the point of view of American history it is a film about the Zero Moment of the American dream. There is, of course, a lot of naivety in the image that future immigrants have about the New World. Even the most educated of them owe their knowledge of reading propaganda books, written in order to encourage emigration, which contained many inaccuracies, intentional or not. But precisely this naivety is one of the pillars of the American dream. The road is littered with obstacles and not everyone who starts it reaches the promised shore. The power and quality of the film also lies in the description of the psychology and motivation of those who leave their country and the places where they were born and lived forever to embark on an adventure that seems exceptional today. And again, we cannot help but compare what we see in the film with the psychology and motivations of many of today's migrants.

The extremely thorough reconstruction of life in 19th-century Swedish villages contributes to the authenticity and credibility of what we see on screen. The film has an exceptional distribution with Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann in the lead roles. With its over three hours 'The Emigrants' has a format and duration that can be a test for today's viewers. Those who will respond to the challenge will enjoy a quality film show about an episode of history that resonates in the present.

Part 1 of a two-part epic (the second part is 1972's The New Land), I half thought about watching The Emigrants and its second part as one long movie, but The Emigrants by itself is plenty for now. I'd probably burn out and therefore not be able to appreciate The New Land properly if I tried to marathon them, but do plan to find the time to finish this two-part epic within the next day or two.

The Emigrants alone feels like two, or maybe even three, movies in one. Its runtime exceeds three hours, and it tells the story of a group of farmers in Sweden during the 1800s deciding to start a new life in America. This first half of the overall saga involves establishing how bad life was for a farmer in Sweden, then showing the arduous journey by boat from Sweden to America, and then finally, it spends some time with the characters as they travel further inland after setting foot in America.

It's gruelling by design, and viscerally captures how difficult such a journey would have been back during the middle of the 19th century. The section spent at sea is particularly harrowing, but I guess it has to be, and it doesn't shy away from anything when it comes to claustrophobia, seasickness, lice, terrible food, disease, and death. It makes The Emigrants a tough but compelling watch, and part of me wonders what The New Land will do to keep the stakes high, because it's hard to imagine things getting worse than that trip across the ocean (I may end up eating my words 24-48 hours from now, but we'll have to wait and see).

Not a film for everyone, but I thought it moved pretty well considering its length and slow pace. Performances were generally strong, and it had some very good visuals too. I get the sense Terrence Malick would have loved this movie, too, because I see bits of Badlands, Days of Heaven, The New World, and A Hidden Life in here at times.

This film is so deeply immersive, taking its time to give us an incredibly realistic portrayal of what life was like in 1840's rural Sweden, and then an immigrant to America. The first hour or so is slow, but it establishes the world these people were living in, with hardships often threatening ruin, when child mortality rates in Sweden were 20-25%, and when superstition, ignorance, and religion were so dominant. The context is incredibly important to show the motivation to emigrate, and just how extraordinary the undertaking was. It also amplifies one of the film's best scenes, that backward glance they take at the old farm as they trundle down the road in their carriage. It's an enormous moment for not only them, but their children and descendants. To the film's credit, nothing is fast forwarded; we're not given simple cursory scenes in Sweden, cut to being on the ship, and then to arriving in a new land all smiles. We really feel the experience at each stage.

There are lots of little touches in the film, such as the family's reaction to being on a train for the first time, reminding us that railroads were a monumental innovation in the 19th century. The priest who is with them along with his followers because they were persecuted in Sweden doles out some sublime thoughts, such as reminding them that even lice are god's creation and that suffering because of them allows one to understand suffering in others better and to empathize. He also dispenses a lot of nonsense, such as the idea that they'll magically understand English when they land in America per his understanding of the Bible, and in general trying to attribute everything that happens in their little lives to divine favor or displeasure operating on them in ways he's always trying to explain after the fact.

The family is incredibly naïve about planning beyond the idea of 'going to America', and their rosy optimism of all the wonderful things they would find there. It's interesting that on the one hand they find a fellow Swede in Minnesota living in what his mother sees as squalor, but on the other hand, that they're free to stake out claims to beautiful, arable land, which is hard to fathom today. They are in some sense disillusioned, but in another sense, are in a paradise of sorts. There are lots of moments where fantasy and reality meet in the film, but it's in nuanced ways and never overplayed.

It's a fantastic moment when we get a brief glimpse of slaves in chains on a steamboat, and in those poor eyes get a heartstopping reminder that to others, coming to America was a very different, horrifying nightmare of an experience. So much for the idea that the young men had read about in Sweden, that "many of the slaves have better houses, food, and circumstances than peasants in Europe." Unfortunately while we might see a few Native Americans at one of the stops, the idea that the land these people from Sweden are claiming had been inhabited by people who were going through genocide is not articulated by the film, though it is in the sequel, 'The New Land.'

In terms of production value, there is a lot to love about the realism. We're not flooded with grand images of landscapes, and even the beauty we see in the woods or fields has a natural ruggedness to it. It's a very small moment, but at one point director Jan Troell gives us the sun on the water during a very serene moment with slow undulations, which I found simply exquisite, and such a contrast to the harshness of the ocean journey. The performances from Max von Sydow, Liv Ullmann, and the rest of the fine cast are unaffected and natural. The version I saw had unfortunately been dubbed in English though, and I think seeing it in Swedish with English subtitles would have been infinitely preferable, and much more in keeping with the spirit of the film, so if it's an option for you, I would certainly seek it out.

Jan Troell, has truly captured the feeling of what inspires people to emigrate and the subsequent hardships that await in the land of hope. True masters of the craft, Sydow and Ullmann, are superb in their performances. They truly pull you into the time, the frame of mind and thus make you feel like you are sharing their voyage. A great film that is everything a film should be - moving. It is a mystery why this film did not win an Oscar for best foreign picture, best actress and best actor - though with all fairness, with both Caberet and The Godfather in the running, it would have required a miracle. If you should have the luck of stumbling onto this film at a rental shop, thank Fellini's ghost - grasp it and head for the check out.