Saraband (2003)
Directed by Ingmar Bergman

Film Review

Saraband marks the closing chapter in one of the most impressive film making careers, that of the great Swedish cineaste, Ingmar Bergman.  After the extravagant spectacle that was Fanny and Alexander (1982), this is a return to the intimate chamber play format which Bergman perfected in the course of his career. It was an approach that was influenced by the works of Strindberg, Ibsen and Chekhov and which allowed Bergman to address psychological and metaphysical themes with great intensity and insight with a small cast of players in a very restricted physical and temporal space.

The film reintroduces two characters, Marianne and Johan, from an earlier Bergman film, Scenes from a Marriage, made three decades earlier.  Interestingly, the film is much less concerned with the relationship of these two characters than it is with the conflict between Johan, his son Henrik and granddaughter Karin.  It's a more ambiguous, less concentrated film than Scenes from a Marriage, and in many ways it's a more pessimistic film, exploring how relationships can become poisoned when issues are left unresolved for years.

Saraband is essentially a film about love that has gone wrong.  The death of Johan's daughter-in-law Anna (represented by a photograph of Bergman's former wife Ingrid Karlebo, to whom the film is dedicated) has resulted in an unbridgeable schism between Johan and his son.  Henrik's dependency on his granddaughter Karin has become so acute that the latter is unable to free herself from his hold over her, and the relationship borders on incest.  Having failed in his career, Henrik is equally dependent on his father for financial support, which merely aggravates Johan's loathing for his weakling son.  The three characters are bound to one another, not by love but by a stifling and ultimately destructive mutual dependency.

Into this Chekhovian mire of festering nastiness waltzes the blameless Marianne, Johan's first wife, and probably the only person he truly loved.  Although their first meeting after thirty or so years is about as warm as a chilly Swedish winter, it soon becomes apparent how much Mariane still means to the reclusive Johan.  It is equally apparent that their time together will be short.  Mariane's arrival serves as a catalyst, setting in motion a chain of events which will have huge repercussions.  Johan, Henrik and Karin all become aware of the evil that has poisoned their lives and will react accordingly.

Whilst the film's realism is at times compromised by Bergman's almost obsessive drive for perfection, Saraband is a thoroughly absorbing and poignant work, meticulously plotted, beautifully shot and with near-faultless performances from the entire cast.  Those who have previously watched Scenes from a Marriage will get a genuine thrill when they see Liv Ullmann reunited on screen with Erland Josephson in one of the most moving scenes of any Bergman film.

Bergman was in his mid eighties when he made this film, and yet his writing and direction are as sharp, rigorous and inspired as ever.  Saraband is not quite his best film, but it is certainly one of his best, a more than satisfactory final salvo in a career that spanned more than five decades and which comprises not just a few but many of cinema's enduring masterpieces.   No film director has ever explored the profound mysteries of the human condition with as much compassion, insight and integrity as that unsurpassed master of the moving image, Ingmar Bergman.

Film Synopsis

Some thirty years after their divorce, Marianne decides to pay a visit to her former husband, Johan, who lives alone in his country house.  The reunion is soured by the on-going feud between Johan and his son Henrik.  After the death of his wife Anna, Henrik lives with his daughter Karin, who shows great promise as a cellist.  Johan has nothing but contempt for Henrik, who depends on him for money and on his daughter for affection.  He relishes the day when he can set Karin free...