Before today I had admittedly never seen an Ingmar Bergman film, so I decided to finally get a few of his more popular titles ready to watch and decided to start by watching what many regard his greatest film:
Persona. I'll be posting my first thoughts about the director and his work in this thread and will possibly do some full reviews other in my review thread soon.
Persona (1966, Bergman)
I was not really sure what I was going to get with this (to me) new director and new film, and I don't think that the first 10 minutes of work, the opening scene of any other film has had such a memorable impact as this one. We see a bizarre array of ultra violent and strange images such as a penis, a lamb being slaughtered, a tarantula and a nail going through a hand, all these flashing at our eyes as well as the face of a young boy with haunting music playing over in the background.
What follows is equally as memorable and haunting, a truly enthralling film experience which is received with mixed emotions as we witness the minimalistic (and artistic) tale of two women as one, a nurse, is appointed with the task of tending to a now mute actress.
At the film's end I felt similar to how I did having watched
Mulholland Drive. I've watched a few interviews with David Lynch following viewing a couple of his films and he talks about how a linear story of a film is not important, films are films. I've also read a bit about Bergman, preparing myself for his films, wikipedia says 'His major subjects were death, illness, faith, betrayal, and insanity.' and it's clear that
Persona is not so much a narrative tale but instead a clearly experimental film that is used as a platform to convoy something other than a simple straightforward tale, images, themes, ideas and greater meanings that Bergman wants to display.
Like I have already said, watching
Persona was a fantastic experience. It's memorable, haunting, unforgettable, enthralling and at times very disturbing, it's impossible to put a single word on the mixture of emotions and thoughts you'll have once you've seen it.
Rating:
Next Viewings:
Wild Strawberries,
Cries and Whispers