This film is one of the most deceptively deep motion pictures I've ever seen. By the end of the film, I knew the main character more deeply than I know acquaintances in real life.
Professor Isak Borg (Victor Sjöström) is a widower who over time has isolated himself from people and become quite cold, because he finds the world too critical. He is being given an honorary degree from his old university and must travel there to accept it.
After having a strange dream about death, he decides to drive to the event instead of taking the train. His dedicated housekeeper Agda (Jullan Kindahl, SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT) doesn't like the change in plans, but Isak's daughter-in-law Marianne (Ingrid Thulin, CRIES AND WHISPERS) decides to ride along with him even though she does not like him because he is cold and distant like her husband/his son Evald (Gunnar Björnstrand).
Throughout the road trip, Isak visits his past in various stops and flashbacks. Along the way, they pick up three older teens who are traveling to Italy. Sara (Bibi Andersson, PERSONA) reminds Isak of his one true love, who was also named Sara. Andersson actually plays Isak's Sara in the flashbacks. The young Sara is traveling with two young men — one is a mellow parson-in-training named Anders (Folke Sundquist) and the other is a passionate, strictly science based thinker named Viktor (Björn Bjelfvenstam, SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT).
Later they get in an accident with the warring Alman couple (Gunnel Broström, I AM CURIOUS & Gunnar Sjöberg) and after that they meet a friendly auto mechanic named Henrik Åkerman (Max von Sydow, THE EXORCIST), who Isak once knew.
The trip is a perfect tool for Isak to reflect on his life's loves and mistakes. The film has an interesting bittersweet feel to it where Isak sees his mistakes and the closeness of his death, but the trip also rekindles a youthfulness in him. We learn so much about him in less than two hours.
Director Ingmar Bergman (THE SEVENTH SEAL) weaves in so many of the big issues of life that one could say that is truly the vast theme of the film outside of the themes of aging and lost love. Bergman's use of camera is evocative, especially in the dream sequences, which attain a creepiness without resorting to the typical film conventions to create creepiness. An out of place object can be beautiful as well as unsettling at the same time.
The acting is solid. This is sometimes hard to judge in a subtitled film because one misses some subtleties while reading. The ending is another area of amazing subtlety. The film doesn't end on a big revelation by Isak, but the natural end to the journey he was on. One needs to listen and watch closely to how Isak reacts and talks with Agda. The future seems to be a lot less cold for Isak.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
