Mjeteconer Just perfect...

KnotStronger This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

Roy Hart If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

queerever Wow. Funny about who are now old school film makers and their latter works. Nice coincidence (for me) that the ideas to write about Saraband come str8 after talking about Lynch's personal psychology recurring in his films.Apparently, Bergman's youth was horrendous... Let's go and "study" that to reconfirm, wait a moment... Ha. I am SO very forking switched in and on. During the film, as I was thinking about my own knowledge of the Swedes, I couldn't help criticizing how they are maybe the world's most childish lot, in terms of being so obsessed with marrying, over and over and over again - always blaming the partner (worst, childish conundrum), and thinking they'll milk yet another to try to get better than what they deserve in the next... marriage. FORGET ABOUT LOOKING IN THE MIRROR YOU A-HOLES, MAYBE THE PROBLEM WITH YOUR MULTIPLE MARRIAGES IS YOU! So, I just found out that, not only in this film but also Bergman himself; ridiculous, incorrigible re-marry-ER's. Too many times over for a decent, responsible person, (let's say, adult). Of course it has a lot to do with this film! But what it has EVERYTHING to do with, is the intense love & hate within a family, which seemingly plagued Bergman until death.And wow. I think the best art drives even great, creative artists like myself, to clichés. It is an emotional tour DE force, thoroughly compelling and entertaining. I reflect on 2 scenes which rival any scene of personal confrontations one could ever imagine, whether in reel life or real. If you are heavily, emotionally & intellectually inclined, this is powerful stuff.The Indians, at least one or some branch of Hinduism believes that the best way to deal with addiction is to increase your indulgence in it, until you may be purged. If it kills you, even better, (authorial reflection). So if you've read anything else I reviewed and saw my hackneyed, anti USAlien rants - here's one more.Whereas Yank crud would have the WOW kiss between father a daughter become some important disaster, our Swedish friend, Bergman implants one as a subtle, mere accent above a note to highlight the tension, and pretty much natural, psycho sexual, familial tension at that. Bergman is Freud incarnate in cinema; I wonder if his illustrious fans (incl. one of the world's most famous pedophiles, Woody Allen) acknowledge that, OR, like so many beepers around here, feel that good film reviewing consists of waxing lyrically about banal crud, (while nothing so bad in itself), yet - NEVER GETTING TO THE HEART & CORE of the matter - IE. film makers and their films, the real motivations behind it all, and what's really going on. G darn it!If everything carries meaning, how amplified is it in (better) cinema!?Because I have provided insights and intelligence for you, maybe you can return the favor by hypothesizing: WHY oh why is granddaddy most obsessed with his dead daughter in law, while (I believe) there is absolutely no mention of his own, nth wife, IE. the mother of his poor son and much beloved cellist grand daughter!? Is THAT something relevant to Bergman's screwed up life too?? (I'm sick and tired of whatever research about total losers, even those that make great films).Do NOT answer with your nerdy, technical, literal calculations - this is the fleshing out of psychology and intelligence, not rocket science.NB. IMDb ripped me off by not allowing spelling differences, let alone swear words! Is this the Imperialist Movie DB or what - FORCING me to spell with z's instead of s's!!? And what may be the prohibited words!? You post puritan losers!

bobsgrock The best way to thoroughly understand the films and theories of a certain director is to view as much of their work as possible. With Ingmar Bergman, the greatest Swedish director and one of the cinema's most enigmatic figures, it is no easy task. There are so many layers and levels to his films, implying the same goes for himself. After seeing his final work as a film director, I can honestly say these past few weeks during which I viewed at least 15 of his films have been the saddest, most depressing and thoughtful weeks of my life. Never has any other filmmaker been so challenging and stimulating as the quiet, serene Swede.In this quiet and serene work, Bergman explores even further the underlying emotions and feelings from the same characters as his great 1973 masterpiece, Scenes from a Marriage. He uses the passing of time and old age as catalysts to understand what the couple of Johan and Marianne have done since their marriage and what they continue to do now and why. A few other characters are introduced; Johan's son from another relationship, Henrik, and his daughter, Karin. These four people have much to say, particularly Johan and Marianne. Some scenes are so brutal in their depiction of raw feeling it can be hard to contemplate how someone could act so. Yet, Bergman never looks away, lingering his close-ups in order to extract as much as possible from the faces of these people.Watching this, I had greater and deeper understanding and affection for the entire arc of Bergman's career. In many ways, my life mirrors his, thus I feel similar to life as he does. Prior to seeing films like The Seventh Seal and Cries and Whispers, I never knew another person could so exemplify what I felt about life, death and God as he did. Now I know and feel much more empowered to carry on with my own life with the knowledge he has given me. Now, he is gone and it is sad. Yet, he wouldn't dwell on that, but rather carry on with what can be done. I thank you, Ingmar, for your empowering films and will never forget how you have changed my life.

Wolfi-10 "Saraband" is another one of those Bergman movies which, it seems, could all be fittingly entitled like that other movie of his, "Through a Glass Darkly". Making things perfectly clear, once considered an essential element of a successful literary creation, is by Bergman intentionally and carefully avoided. The story is simple: An old, long-divorced couple (Marianne and Johan) meets again; and Johan's son Henrik from another marriage, recently widowed, and their daughter Karin live nearby. A simple story of essentially four people, but oh so dark and contradictory are the feelings between them. Johan hates his son, for reasons we never learn. Yes, cash-strapped Henrik needs to ask his rich father time and again for an "advance on his inheritance", but this could not quite explain the father's disdain. Henrik the musician drills Karin on the cello and loves her madly, but won't let her move to a decent music school for her further education. Now this may not be quite so puzzling as it first appears when we learn in passing that they both sleep in the same bed, an arrangement none of the other two people on hand seem to perceive as unusual. While this tidbit may further Sweden's alluring reputation, the casual acceptance of this matter is in fact quite unrealistic, as this reviewer was assured by a reliable Swedish source (who even mentioned "jail"!) Karin's mother Anna, on her deathbed, may have had a hunch that something like this was in the wings, but again, we don't learn for sure, since Karin won't read to Marianne (and hence to us) the last page of her mother's farewell letter (which masterful move, incidentally, spared Bergman the writing of it).We can't quite figure out what Karin's notion is about her domestic setup - does she hate the sex but loves daddy otherwise (whom she calls "Henrik", isn't' that cool?), or does she really only hate the daily cello drills (since she just wants to play in an orchestra rather than train to be a soloist, as we hear in her great emotional outburst)? Well, when she finally tells the old man that she's going to split, he attempts suicide. Of course, we can't be sure if it's successful. But hold it - taking all clues, there is a finite probability that it was not. Ah, now, will that persuade Karin to come back? What do you think this is, a documentary? That's the final mystery!No, wait, there is one more: Marianne lets us know that she has a definite opinion about this whole affair. But she won't tell.Some tedious writing avoided again!Surely, Bergman smiled all the way to the bank.

Galina "A saraband is a grave, courtly Baroque dance.." Marianne (Liv Ullmann) and Johan (Erland Josephson), the heroes of "Scenes of a Marriage (1973), meet again after thirty years when Marianne suddenly decides to visit Johan at his old summer house. When he asked why she came, she answered that she thought he had called for her. The story of Marianne and Johan in this film provides a background for another story which involved Johan's son from his first marriage, 61 year old musician Henric and his 19 year old daughter Karin whom Henric has been giving cello lessons and dreams of her becoming a famous performer. There is one more character present in the movie, even though she's been dead for two years - Anna, late Henric's wife and Karin's mother who has been deeply missed and mourned by everyone including Johan.This film is dedicated to Ingrid von Rosen, Bergman's last wife who died in 1995. It is her face we see at the photograph of Anna which Bergman shows over and over again. It seems to me that one of the reasons of making "Saraband" was for Bergman the chance to say to Ingrid, "I love you and I miss you and even death can't take you from me". In his last movie, Bergman sadly proves (once again) that even time can't heal the painful wounds caused by deeply-rooted hatred which is only one step away from love. How disturbing was the scene between 86 -year-old father and 61-year-old son. They looked the same age, old, grey-haired men who still cherish the hatred and contempt for each other that go way back and there is no victory in this power struggle. But there is hope in the movie for young Karin who breaks out of the world that she was forced to believe she belonged to but she did not and she found the strength to leave and to be free and to make her own decisions...As all Bergman's films, "Saraband" does not provide the easy answers to the difficult questions; it does not provide any answers at all but as old Johan in the most moving scene of the film bares his body, Bergman bares his very soul and lets us look inside of it and maybe learn something about ourselves.