Bergman Island, 2004
Persona ( 1966 )
My words mean nothing to you. People like you can’t be reached. I wonder whether your madness isn’t the worst kind. You act healthy, act it so well that everyone believes you… everyone except me, because I know how rotten you are.
Ingmar Bergman made a movie called The Seventh Seal in 1957. This movie was about people who feel lonely and sad, because they cannot fit in
Not doing, just being. Aware and watchful every second. And at the same time the abyss between what you are for others and what you are for yourself. The feeling of dizziness and the continual burning need to be unmasked. At last to be seen through, reduced, perhaps extinguished. Every tone of voice a lie, an act of treason. Every gesture false. Every smile a grimace. The role of wife, the role of friend, the roles of mother and mistress, which is worst? Which has tortured you most? Playing the actress with the interesting face? Keeping all the pieces together with an iron hand and getting them to fit? Where did it break? Where did you fail? You were left with your demand for truth and your disgust. Kill yourself? No—too nasty, not to be done. But you could be immobile. You can keep quiet. Then at least you’re not lying.
Persona, Ingmar Bergman (1966)
Liv Ullmann and Ingmar Bergman are the subjects of former architect Dheeraj Akolkar’s documentary Liv & Ingmar, produced by the Norwegian company NordicStories and to be distributed by Sweden’s Svensk Filmindustri. After meeting in 1965, Ullmann and Bergman made ten (narrative) films together; they were also off-screen companions for five years.
