Wayne K
Through A Glass Darkly is the 3rd Ingmar Bergman film I’ve watched, after Persona & Hour Of The Wolf. The former I really enjoyed, but the latter left me cold. TAGD falls somewhere in the middle. It’s portrayal of schizophrenia, still largely misunderstood by the everyday person back in the 60s, is admirably underplayed. There are very few big dramatic scenes, only a single screaming tirade and limited fancy camerawork used to depict a fragile mind. We mostly discover Karin’s condition through her descriptions of it, and the opinions and views of her close family. It’s easy to see why some still think of schizophrenia as a split personality disorder, as the character does often swing between 2 opposing frames of mind or inclinations. One minute she wants to go swimming, the next she’s simply content to wander round and do nothing. The film’s extremely pared back approach can strain your patience at times. Long moments of silence, extended pauses in conversation, characters having laborious discussions about the same few topics. Don’t make the mistake I did of watching before going to bed because I could feel myself drifting off on the sofa a while before the credits had even begun. It’s a complex and challenging piece of work, one where you have to listen to everything that’s said and pay attention to all the subtle nuances. By the end you feel as drained as the characters do, but there’s little doubt that you’ve just watched a psychologically profound piece of work. If the pace were improved and some of the conversations were tightened, I would have liked it more. As is, I enjoyed what it did, I just didn’t connect with it as much as I’d hoped to.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
08/10/24
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A R
This movie is so strange but it feels realistic and believable the whole time. It's a classic Bergman investigation of our relationships with religion, but the human relationships between the characters are what shine through for me. The dialogue is beautiful and somewhat melodramatic, but the performances make it feel real all the same. I particularly love the scene with the husband and father on the boat - they are saying incredibly serious and intense things, with very dramatic language, but their performances keep it grounded and human. All of the actors give incredible performances, really listening in every scene and embodying a very character-driven physicality that gives them so much personality. I just love it.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
02/17/24
Full Review
Luca D
The ending was very satisfying. Everything about this movie is great. Bergmans films seem very existential so maybe not something I would recommend to someone going through hard times, though the ending offers more a optimistic outlook than other counterparts. Kind of reminds me of The Lighthouse, maybe this was an inspiration for that movie? Just me?
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
12/21/23
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Matthew B
It was Ingmar Bergman's 1960s movies that did most to cement the image that many people now have of him – that he is a maker of gloomy, po-faced, and not easily accessible arthouse movies, notable for their slow pace, their long silences punctuated by scenes that are heavy on talking and limited on action, and for their almost unbearable intensity of emotion.
Through a Glass Darkly seems an apt title in this respect. It is as if Bergman, like Alice, has passed through a looking glass, and entered a less happy world where despair is the norm. The opening image of the film shows brooding clouds reflected on the surface of the sea, and the waves of the sea can be seen in the background in the film's final scene. It may be an accident that one of the characters is called Minus, but it seems apt for English-speaking viewers in a film that strikes a distinctly negative tone.
The movie is made in black-and-white, giving it the look of a film negative. (Bergman had considered making it in colour, but wisely chose not to.) These monochrome visuals give the film a noir-ish look. The action takes place in a holiday house with peeling walls. They are shadowy with a chiaroscuro effect that recalls the strands of a web (for reasons that become clear later).
Bergman makes meticulous use of composition and lighting. Every shot is carefully framed. The characters are physically separated from one another. They often look in different directions, rather than face one another. They are lit separately, with darkness between them. The vertical angles indicate apartness; the horizontal framing indicates physical desire, which is either unfulfilled or is satisfied in places where it should not be. This use of visual confinement seems to reflect the words of Minus (Lars Passgård): "I wonder if everyone is caged in. You in your cage, I in mine. Each in his own little cube. Everybody."
Everything adds to the sense of loneliness and gloom. The action takes place on the remote island of Fårö, a symbol of the character's removal from one another. There are only four actors in the whole movie – they have been removed from the rest of the world. The camera shots are static with little movement. Most scenes are played without music, deepening the emptiness and silence. Occasionally a solitary cello plays Bach.
All the characters may be seen to be viewing the glass darkly, and Bergman takes time offer all their perspectives. The focal point of the story is Karin (Harriet Andersson), a young woman with schizophrenia who is about to enter another downward spiral. Bergman does not romanticise, sentimentalise or stylise Karin's mental illness. This is not a Tennessee Williams play. He offers a starkly realistic and dismaying portrayal of her suffering.
Through a Glass Darkly was the first movie in Bergman's silence trilogy. It was followed by Winter Light and The Silence. The films are often seen as being about God's silence, but they could also be about man's silence, since the problems on display are created and compounded our failure to relate to one another, or to express love.
Love is the solution proposed in the final unconvincing epilogue to Through a Glass Darkly. After Karin and Martin have gone, Minus appeals to his father for comfort. David suggests that God does exist, but that this God is found in the love that we show for one another.
Bergman was dissatisfied with this conclusion to the movie, but it does fit in with the context of the Corinthians quotation that gives the film its title, Chapter 13 of Corinthians 1. If this argument does not convince you, as indeed it did not convince Bergman, then perhaps more hope can be found in Minus' closing words: "Father talked to me!"
I wrote a longer appreciation of Through a Glass Darkly on my blog page if you would like to read more: https://themoviescreenscene.wordpress.com/2021/04/09/through-a-glass-darkly-1961/
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
09/22/23
Full Review
Dave S
Through a Glass Darkly feels like Ingmar Bergman's most personal film. Touching on themes commonly explored by Bergman (sexuality, the existence or absence of God, mental health, the sacrifices made to create art, family dynamics, etc.), the film is centered around Karin (Harriet Andersson), a young woman suffering from a debilitating mental illness. While spending time at a remote summer home with her husband, father, and younger brother, she slowly but inevitably begins to lose touch with her sanity. Worth watching for Andersson's gut-wrenching performance, Bergman's assured direction, and Sven Nykvist's beautiful cinematography, Through a Glass Darkly remains one of Bergman's finest works.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
10/16/23
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spencer p
Typically poetic direction from Ingmar Bergman creates a haunting study of mental illness and how loved ones react to it.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/30/23
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