Sweden, early 1900s. Lawyer Fredrik married the 19-year old Anne after his late wife, much to the unease of his 20-year old son Henrik. Fredrik is still infatuated with the theater actress Desiree, his ex fling, but she is now the mistress of Count Malcolm, himself married to Charlotte. Anne is jealous at Desiree and senses something is up between her and Fredrik. At a castle during the Midsummer Night, they all get drunk, which causes them to release their true desires. Anne and Henrik kiss, which is seen by Fredrik who thus invites Charlotte for a fling, and thus Malcolm challenges him to a fake duel. In the end, Fredrik is comforted by Desiree and asks her to stay with him.
Famed director Ingmar Bergman made several excursions outside his existentialist-depressive dramas which were refreshingly different, among them into the thriller-revenge genre (“The Virgin Spring”), experimental film (“Persona”) and comedy, as in case with his film “Smiles of a Summer’s Night”, included in Roger Ebert's list of Great Movies. While this last one is his least successful of the three mentioned, it nonetheless serves as an interesting testimony to ‘Bergman-light’ who is much more accessible to the audience. Bergman has no true sense for humor, but a lot of moments in this contemplation on infidelity are just plain fun. The scene where the protagonist Fredrik steps through a door only to fall into a giant puddle on the other side, upon which Desiree bursts into laughter, or the witty dialogue between grandma and Desiree (“Your father threw me out of a window.” - “Was it open?” - “No, closed. I fell straight into a lieutenant colonel. He later became your father.” - “You said your father threw you out.” - “He became your father later!”) are effervescent and charming. The sequence where Fredrik meets Desiree again in her dressing room is also notable because Bergman granted him one of greatest compliments in cinema when he allowed him to say this cherished quote to her: “Your body has the perfection which the perfection is lacking”. Throughout the storyline, it is established that all these characters are in a relationship or married, but secretly yearn or are in love with someone else, which serves as an allegory on society based on suppressed compromise, always shut out from pure joy, which in turn also subtly ignites sensuality as the friction between them slowly grows, and the inhibited passions break loose in the finale. Not all the jokes work, and Bergman again cannot resist not to resort to his “mellow” slumps in some dramatic scenes, which feel out of touch with the rest of the story, yet even in this flawed edition, the movie works much better than expected, almost on pair with Bergman’s more famous films.
Grade:+++
No comments:
Post a Comment