Bergman Island
Art and real life coalesce in Mia Hansen-Løve’s meta homage to Ingmar Bergman.
Vicky Krieps
What a curious film this is. Its title could not be more apposite. The location throughout is the island of Fårö off the Swedish coast seen as it is today but everything about the film is centred on the fact that for over forty years this was the home of one of the greatest of all filmmakers, Ingmar Bergman. Indeed, it even featured in some of his films and they include Through a Glass Darkly and Persona as well as the two documentary features that he made about the island itself.
Before viewing this film by Mia Hansen-Løve, I was aware of its unusual structure. That is to say that I knew that it started off with a visit to Fårö by a respected filmmaker, Tony (Tim Roth), and his wife Chris (Vicky Krieps) who also writes and directs but who is less well-established than her husband (both of them are on a residency there favoured by artists who find this a stimulating place to work). In addition, I was aware that a second story would emerge on the screen as we come to see the film that Chris is envisaging. This would again feature two visitors to Fårö, Amy (Mia Wasikowska) and Joseph (Anders Danielsen Lie) but they would arrive as guests invited to a wedding there. These two are former lovers who have parted and made other lives for themselves yet still retain a strong attraction that could lead to them resuming their old relationship.
Despite my foreknowledge, I was surprised to discover that Bergman Island is halfway through before the film within the film is seen on screen. It happens when Chris discusses her project with Tony and admits to being stumped as to how to end her screenplay. This means that for a little short of an hour Hansen-Løve’s film comes close to being a documentary about Fårö’s role today. The place is now highly commercialised with the Bergman Cultural Centre and its Museum at the heart of it while there’s a coach labelled ‘Bergman Safari’ that provides a conducted tour to parts of the island where Bergman filmed. It is, of course, different from other commercial set-ups in that most of its visitors are likely to be admirers of the director, many of them steeped in his work. For many of us – and I count myself as a Bergman enthusiast – this film enables us to pay a visit by proxy. But unless you are well versed in Bergman and his oeuvre, this piece, well edited though it is by Marion Monnier and impressively photographed by Denis Lenoir, may be of limited interest, especially in its first half.
Because both Tony and Chris are filmmakers, there is nothing forced in having them talk at length about their attitude to Bergman, both his art and his complicated love life and shortcomings as a father (Chris being far more uneasy than Tony regarding the personal aspect). Reviewers of Bergman Island tend to stress its observations on such matters as the dubious lifestyle of certain artists and the extent to which even today male filmmakers have things easier than their female counterparts. Furthermore, the very look of the film contrasts with the sombre black and white images that dominated so many of Bergman's films including those about Fårö and the point is made that Bergman's concerns especially about religion and the need to question it are of much more limited interest today. But, while these matters do indeed come up, it is more to encourage viewers to formulate their own responses than to discuss them in much detail. Given the direction taken by the film in its latter stages an even more pertinent question that arises is the extent to which filmmakers draw on their own lives to create fictions born of personal experiences. For some an extra layer here lies in the fact that, like Chris, Mia Hansen-Løve was for many years the partner of a better established director, Olivier Assayas, but once again that only adds to the film’s interest if you happen to know about it.
The film imagined by Chris does largely take over the second half of Bergman Island and here there is a story to follow whereas earlier nothing very specific has occurred and we are mainly left to assess the relationship between Tony and Chris, to note their different attitudes and the extent to which they go their own ways and to decide if their shared lives have become a compromise rather than something that it is desirable to maintain. Chris’s film sets up characters whose development invites a comparison between their own situation and that which Chris has with Tony.
However, all of this is slow to develop and a long wait for anyone who is ignorant about Ingmar Bergman. For them the main compensation will be found in the quality of the acting. All four leads do well but the roles for the actresses are the most prominent. Vicky Krieps, wonderful in 2017’s Phantom Thread, is very effective - it’s an aptly subdued performance which brings out the sense of Chris being a real person going about her life. In contrast, Mia Wasikowska, always a major talent, positively shines as Amy who, as a character imagined by Chris, can exude charisma in a star role. The film within the film even features the Abba recording of ‘The Winner Takes It All’ and has a tone quite different from anything that Bergman ever made. Nevertheless, beneath the surface Amy's tale in addition to inviting comparisons with the story of Chris and Tony arguably looks at relationships with an eye that is not uninfluenced by Bergman’s Scenes from a Marriage.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Vicky Krieps, Tim Roth, Mia Wasikowska, Anders Danielsen Lie, Hampus Nordenson, Clara Strauch, Joel Spira, Teodor Abreu, Kerstin Brunnberg, Stig Björkman, Siri Hjorten Wagner, Anki Larsson.
Dir Mia Hansen-Løve, Pro Erik Hemmendorff, Charles Gillibert, Rodrigo Teixeira and Lisa Widén, Screenplay Mia Hansen-Løve, Ph Denis Lenoir, Pro Des Mikael Varhelyi, Ed Marion Monnier, Costumes Judith de Luze and Julia Tegström.
Dauphin Films/Piano/Platform Produktion/RT Features/Scope Pictures/Swedish Film Institute-Mubi.
112 mins. France/Denmark/Belgium/Sweden/Mexico/Brazil/UK. 2020. UK Rel: 3 June 2022. Cert. 15.
