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Ingmar Bergman
Director / Screenwriter / Producer
1918 - 2007
Born July 14, Uppsala, Uppland, Sweden
Key Production Countries: Sweden , Germany
Key Genres: Drama, Psychological Drama, Family Drama, Marriage Drama, Reunion Films, Ensemble Film, Period Film
Key Collaborators: Sven Nykvist (Cinematographer), Erland Josephson (Leading Character Player), P.A. Lundgren (Production Designer), Max von Sydow (Leading Player), Gunnar Bjornstrand (Leading Character Player), Allan Ekelund (Producer), Bibi Andersson (Leading Character Player), Liv Ullmann (Leading Player), Ingrid Thulin (Leading Player), Erik Nordgren (Composer)

Highly Recommended: Wild Strawberries (1957)*, Cries and Whispers (1972)*
Recommended: Sawdust and Tinsel (1953)*, Smiles of a Summer Night (1955)*, The Seventh Seal (1957)*, The Virgin Spring (1959)*, Through a Glass Darkly (1962), Winter Light (1962)*, Persona (1966)*, Shame (1968), The Passion of Anna (1969)*, Scenes from a Marriage (1973)*, Fanny and Alexander (1982)*, Saraband (2003)^
Worth a Look: The Devil's Wanton (1949), To Joy (1950), Illicit Interlude (1951), Summer with Monika (1952), Brink of Life (1958), The Magician (1958), The Silence (1963)*, Hour of the Wolf (1967)*, The Magic Flute (1974), Autumn Sonata (1978), From the Life of the Marionettes (1980), After the Rehearsal (1984)
Approach with Caution: The Touch (1971), In the Presence of a Clown [TV] (1997)
* Listed in TSPDT's 1,000 Greatest Films section; ^ Listed in TSPDT's 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films section.

 
 
 
Links: [ Amazon ] [ IMDB ] [ TCMDB ] [ All-Movie Guide ] [ Senses of Cinema: Great Directors ] [ Film Reference ] [ Ingmar Bergman Face to Face ] [ Ingmar Bergman Biography ] [ Bergmanorama ] [ Derek Malcolm's Century of Films: Wild Strawberries ] [ Bright Lights Film Journal Article ] [ Guardian Article (2005) ] [ Strictly Film School ] [ Ingmar Bergman Foundation ] [ Baseline Biography ] [ Wikipedia ] [ Guardian Unlimited Article (2007) ]  [ New York Times Article (2007) ] [ Washington Post Article (2007) ] [ The Criterion Collection ] [ Sweden.se Biography ] [ Playboy Interview (1964) ] [ Guardian Articles (2007)  ] [ 1971 Interview ] [ New York Times Article (2007) ] [ Roger Ebert.com (2007) ] [ Ingmar Bergman Fansite ] [ Washington Times Article (2008) ]
Books: [ The Magic Lantern: An Autobiography ] [ The Ingmar Bergman Archives ] [ Ingmar Bergman, Cinematic Philosopher: Reflections on His Creativity ] [ Ingmar Bergman: The Life and Films of the Last Great European Director ] [ Ingmar Bergman: His Life and Films ] [ The Passion of Ingmar Bergman ] [ The Rite of Redemption: An Interpretation of the Films of Ingmar Bergman ] [ The Films of Ingmar Bergman (Cambridge Film Classics) ] [ Ingmar Bergman: A Reference Guide ] [ Ingmar Bergman: Magician and Prophet  ] [ Images: My Life In Film ] [ Ingmar Bergman: A Critical Biography ] [ Ingmar Bergman: Interviews (Conversations with Filmmakers Series) ]
 
Wild Strawberries (1957)Cries and Whispers (1972)Sawdust and Tinsel (1953)Saraband (2003)
 
     
  "Bergman has never set out to be less than demanding; and as an artist his greatest achievement is in digesting such unrelenting seriousness until he sees no need to bludgeon us with it...Bergman has seen no reason to abandon his faith in a select audience, prepared and trained for a diligent intellectual and emotional involvement with cinema." - David Thomson (The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, 2002)  
     
  "Although he may be faulted for an occasional cold, humourless pessimism that may seem contrived, both his intellectual gravity and his uncompromising devotion to cinema as a serious art form are undeniable." - Geoff Andrew (The Film Handbook, 1989)  
     
  "Bergman's unique international status as a filmmaker would seem assured on many grounds; his prolific output of largely notable work; the profoundly personal nature of his best films since the 1950s; the innovative nature of his technique combined with its essential simplicity even when employing surrealistic and dream-like treatments; his creative sensitivity in relation to his players; and his extraordinary capacity to evoke distinguished acting from his regular interpreters." - Roger Manvell (International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers, 1991)  
     
  "Human laughter, sorrow, joy, and anxiety are analyzed and compellingly illustrated by Bergman, one of the great directors." - William R. Meyer (The Film Buff's Catalog, 1978)  
     
  "Film as dream, film as music. No art passes our conscience in the way film does, and goes directly to our feelings, deep down into the dark rooms of our souls." - Ingmar Bergman  
     
  "I write scripts to serve as skeletons awaiting the flesh and sinew of images." - Ingmar Bergman  
     
 
Please note that the rating given for this director (see top-right) is based only on the films we have seen (listed above). Films by this director that we haven't seen include It Rains on Our Love (1946), A Ship to India (1947), Music in Darkness (1948), Port of Call (1948), Three Strange Loves (1949), Secrets of Women (1952), A Lesson in Love (1954), Dreams (1955), The Devil's Eye (1960), All These Women (1964), Face to Face (1976), and The Serpent's Egg (1978).
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"What, then, is this place that is the human condition? What does this moral landscape look and feel like, what are its most basic features and laws? Bergman’s “reduction” reveals our lives as moral and spiritual beings to be constituted by six fundamental kinds of experience and their interrelationships. These occur throughout Bergman’s films in many variations and combinations. Sometimes all are present, sometimes only a few. They are the seminal moments of judgment, abandonment, passion, turning, shame, and vision. Together they delineate the kind of journey life is and the kind of road it must travel. They are the “plot points” through which all of Bergman’s stories develop, and they provide the framework for understanding Bergman’s films and his achievement as artist and “filmic metaphysician.” - Jesse Kalin, The Films of Ingmar Bergman

 
 
Top 250 Directors 
100 Essential Directors (Pop Matters)
The 13th Most Influential Director of All Time (2002 MovieMaker Poll)
Survey of Filmmakers: Top 25 Directors (2005 poll by The Film Journal)
Gerald Peary's Magnificent Seven (2006)
One of the twelve greatest living narrative filmmakers - Jonathan Rosenbaum (Placing Movies: The Practice of Film Criticism, 1993)
Robin Buss' Top 10 Directors
501 Movie Directors: A Comprehensive Guide to the Greatest Filmmakers
 
See Also
Woody Allen
Robert Altman
Michelangelo Antonioni
Robert Bresson
Carl Dreyer
Krzysztof Kieslowski
Akira Kurosawa
Jean Renoir
Eric Rohmer
Andrei Tarkovsky
Liv Ullmann (External Link)
Luchino Visconti
 
Ingmar Bergman's Favourites
Andrei Rublev (1966) Andrei Tarkovsky, Bang! (1977) Jan Troell, Dark Eyes (1987) Nikita Mikhalkov, The Emigrants (1971) Jan Troell, Great Expectations (1946) David Lean, Hamsun (1996) Jan Troell, The Last Laugh (1924) F.W. Murnau, Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953) Jacques Tati, The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) Carl Dreyer, The Phantom Carriage (1920) Victor Sjöström, The Phantom of the Moulin Rouge (1925) René Clair, Sunrise (1927) F.W. Murnau, Tabu (1931) F.W. Murnau, Tous les matins du monde (1992) Alain Corneau.
 
 
 
         
         

 

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