Product: Saraband (2005)
Rating: 3.0
As cold as ever; maybe that's the problem
At first, "Saraband" seems to be a sequel to "Scenes From a Marriage." The main characters are named Johan and Marianne, played by Erland Josephson and Liv Ullmann. They were once married for a long time, and had two children together. Then they got divorced, but are still drawn to each other, years later.However, there's a lot of new back-story. Johan now has another son from another marriage. That son has an alienated teenage daughter who has great musical talents, and needless to say, father, son and grand-daughter do not get along. At first, this feels like unnecessary weight hung onto the story of "Scenes From A Marriage," which had enough back-story of its own. But ultimately, I agree with the reviewer who suggested that "Saraband" is actually not about the same people at all. The protagonists are a totally different divorced couple, but they happen to also be named Johan and Marianne. It's similar to how Bergman reused names like Vogler and Vergerus in hisearlierfilms.What happens next is pretty much what always happens in Bergman films. The characters engage in horrific emotional abuse. In my review of "Persona," I said that all Bergman films are about people elaborately inflicting emotional suffering on each other. That rule certainly holds here. Johan despises his son, and crudely insults him in conversation. Liv Ullmann, as Marianne, smiles cutely, her dimples twinkling merrily, but her contempt for Johan is even deeper and more subtle. She knows his weaknesses more than anyone else; she humiliated him by moving on to have an extensive sex life after he divorced her, even while he was already beginning to wither away. Many times in this film, it feels like the only reason why she came to see Johan now is to feel her own power and superiority over him one more time. In a powerful scene involving Johan's night terrors, she finally takes pity on him, but even that is really another expression of her victory, since she doesn't intend to take him back.The other major conflict is between Karin and her father. The father is basically a softer, more vulnerable version of the well-meaning but stifling parent figure that Bergman explored in "Autumn Sonata" (and just like in that film, music is the nominal reason for the conflict). His extreme emotional neediness is made clear in the nightmarish kissing scene (if there's one scene in "Saraband" that stays in one's mind, it's that one), in which the daughter ambiguously seems to relish in the power she has over him.So if you're wondering whether Bergman might have lost his touch in the 20 years that passed between "Fanny and Alexander" and "Saraband," you can put your mind at ease. He's in his prime here, as cold and brutal as ever. "Saraband" is just as intense as "Scenes From A Marriage."But at the same time, the film's very strength is its weakness. It's another flawless, vicious emotional assault from the master...but that makes it feel exactly like one of his seventies films. It could have easily been made in 1975 with the exact same story and script. The only hint that it was actually made in 2003 can be seen in Karin's contemporary-looking tank top (which she wears with no bra underneath -- oh Ingmar, you've still got it). The tank top is seriously the only sign of the times to be found in the whole film; it stands out so much that it feels out of place. The film takes place in a remote rural region, so there are no traces of modern technology to get in the way of Bergman's trip back in time.The reason why Bergman's perfect seventies recreation is a weakness is because he had actually begun to venture outside this emotional range in "Fanny And Alexander." The latter film was pretty much the only time when Bergman ever took a real interest in something other than senseless cruelty, and depicted other types of human interaction in a believable way. Possibly this was because the film dealt with childhood, which Bergman has felt nostalgic for ever since "Wild Strawberries." In any case, it was a sign that maybe, he was taking steps to move beyond the worldview that he depicted in the seventies.But there are no such signs in "Saraband." In that sense, the film is a step backward, because it really is identical in tone to "Scenes From A Marriage," "Cries And Whispers," "Persona," and "Autumn Sonata." I don't insist that an artist always has to do something different with each new work, but Bergman already showed all these conflicts earlier, and really, how many unrelentingly cruel films do you need to watch before you start to wish there was something more?