Kirkus Reviews QR Code
THE PERSONAL VISION OF INGMAR BERGMAN by John

THE PERSONAL VISION OF INGMAR BERGMAN

By

Pub Date: March 30th, 1964
Publisher: Indiana Univ. Press

cinemaster Ingmar Bergman have a personal vision? His countryman Jorn seems to think so--at least, some of the time. It may evolve from his dreams or his ourgeois background and the Swedish community. There is talk too of his theology or of his diabolism, or of his diabolic theology -- take your pick. Besides, Bergman is a revolutionary ""advancing across unknown ground, being aware of the danger, taking risks, and knowing fear"". Elsewhere, however, we are assured that his message contains absolutely nothing new: it is all part and parcel of modern literature, of the times, and at appropriate intervals Donner has Strindberg, Proust and Sartre, among others, and leave. Despite these ambivalences, as a chronological coverage of Bergman's thirty films, as an analytic checklist of these films' interlocking motifs, and especially as a technical exposition of Bergman's camerastylo in its relationship to the past (Sjostrom, Stiller, Sternberg) and the present, the so-called Cinema d'auteurs, the book is without doubt of value.