{"id":17254,"date":"2021-10-14T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-10-14T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/?p=17254"},"modified":"2024-03-02T21:13:59","modified_gmt":"2024-03-03T05:13:59","slug":"review-bergman-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/review-bergman-island\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Bergman Island<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s tempting to read Mia Hansen-L\u00f8ve\u2019s Bergman Island <\/em>purely from an autobiographical perspective, casting the filmmaking couple at the center of the movie as the on-screen counterparts of the director and her former partner Olivier Assayas. But the cinematic reality is slippery here; real life seeps into fiction and vice versa within the world of the film, and it\u2019s all far more interesting than simply serving as the cinephile\u2019s equivalent of TMZ. Hansen-L\u00f8ve goes beyond any gossip, delivering a witty, warm commentary on the creative process and the dynamics of relationships where both partners are artists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like Hansen-L\u00f8ve\u2019s previous films Things to Come<\/em> (2016) and Eden<\/em> (2014), Bergman Island <\/em>examines the seesaw of personal and professional life. Here filmmaker Chris (Vicky Krieps) and her more famous director partner, Tony (Tim Roth), have traveled from America to F\u00e5r\u00f6, an island off the coast of Sweden. F\u00e5r\u00f6 was both the setting and inspiration for Ingmar Bergman for works like Through a Glass Darkly<\/em> (1961) and Persona<\/em> (1966), making it the perfect place for Chris and Tony to each work on their next films \u2014 despite the humorously ominous presence of the bed from Scenes from a Marriage<\/em> (1973) in the home where they\u2019re staying. Tony quickly finds his groove, filling pages in his notebook, while Chris struggles to produce. She finally breaks out of her writer\u2019s block and tries to relay her next movie to a distracted Tony. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her main character, Amy (Mia Wasikowska), is also a filmmaker who has traveled to F\u00e5r\u00f6, but she is on the island for a friend\u2019s wedding, where she reunites with an old lover, Joseph (Anders Danielsen Lie). The lines between Chris\u2019s life and her work begin to bleed into one another, as Chris \u2014 and Bergman Island <\/em>\u2014 tenderly interrogate a variety of ideas: As a mother, could a woman amass the artistic output of Bergman? Can we reconcile the fact that Bergman wasn\u2019t a great father \u2014 or human \u2014with his status as a talented auteur? Can both members of an artistic couple create equally, or is one likely to eclipse the other as she (always she) shoulders more of the domestic responsibilities? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Hansen-L\u00f8ve doesn\u2019t dive too deeply into any of these issues; despite the omnipresence of Bergman on the island and within the film, it isn\u2019t trying to be a Bergman movie. Instead, it is pure Hansen-L\u00f8ve in its sly, light touch. Bergman Island<\/em> playfully asks the big questions and doesn\u2019t shy away from gently poking fun at the pretension of a particular type of film lover, while simultaneously displaying a clear affection for the Swedish filmmaker. But what it does share with Bergman is a palpable intimacy; whether Hansen-L\u00f8ve is depicting the relationship between Chris and Tony or in the movie-within-a-movie between Amy and Joseph, these connections feel real and human.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hansen-L\u00f8ve also brings detail to the more concrete elements of the film. Mikael Varhelyi\u2019s production design is as much a joy for film nerds as it is for Scandinavian design fans, with white wood, exposed beams, and a wishbone chair that exactly matches the one on my mood board. Costume designers Judith de Luze and Julia Tegstr\u00f6m outfit the actors in breezy dresses and the kind of enviable knitwear that is de rigueur for any Nordic-set film. F\u00e5r\u00f6 gets as much love as its most famous former resident, with Denis Lenoir\u2019s cinematography capturing the island\u2019s rustic beauty of sand dunes, winding roads, and windswept grasses. Chris observes of the idyllic location, \u201cAll this calm and perfection \u2014 I find it oppressive.\u201d The line gets one of the bigger laughs of the movie, but the landscape does bring such serenity amidst the quiet inter- and intrapersonal drama. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bergman Island<\/em> could feel slight, especially in comparison to the films of the director of its title, but audiences shouldn\u2019t expect Hansen-L\u00f8ve to ape Bergman. There\u2019s somehow profundity, even without plumbing too deeply. \u201cNo one\u2019s expecting Persona<\/em>,\u201d Tony tells Chris as encouragement during her block, but like much else in the film, it\u2019s as much about the movie as it is a metacommentary. Berman Island<\/em> isn\u2019t meant to be Persona<\/em>, but that doesn\u2019t take away from the many pleasures of Hansen-L\u00f8ve\u2019s creation.\u00a0\"\"\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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“Bergman Island” is out Friday in limited release.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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