But not in this one. After Eva tells her mother she wishes that selfish people like her could be locked away from decent society, we cut to a scene of Helena crawling out of her crib, pleading for her mother to come. The blatantly obvious symbolism of the physically damaged daughter stating overtly what the emotionally damaged one cannot is perhaps the only thing that keeps this film from perfection. Knowing the depth of Eva’s loathing, we then fade to a scene on a train, with Charlotte and Paul, where she, again in English, tries to pretend all is well, as she did early in the film, before Eva attacked her so viciously.
Eva, meanwhile, is out at the grave of her son, while Lena has an apoplectic attack, trying to compose her final letter to her mother — a weak and unfelt apology she likely knows will never be read, even as she realizes her role in her mother’s abrupt departure the next morning, yet the camera ends up focused on Eva reading it, Charlotte reacting to it, and Viktor eventually sealing it up to be mailed. Nothing has effectively changed in the film. Yet, while both parties are to blame, neither is guilty of anything more than only human weakness.
The camera work by Sven Nykvist is not as blatantly showy in this film, although quite painterly in the gorgeous colorful interior of the vicarage is stunning in its reflection of the autumnal feel of the film and the state the characters are in, especially the gallery of close-ups that sear these characters and their emotions into a viewer’s mind. However, the transfer is not good, a shock considering The Criterion Collection is usually excellent in cleaning up prints. In this one many splotches appear, but they are a minor distraction, at worst.
The film’s music comes not from the actual music, which is brief - Händel's Sonata in F (Opus One), played during the credits, and a Chopin Prelude - but from the music of juxtaposed human facial portraits. The commentary by Cowie is excellent. He is a very knowledgeable Bergmaniac, and thankfully this film comes not only with English subtitling, but with an English dubbed soundtrack by the actual actors. There is also a trailer for the film.
The film also does not go on too long, for it’s only 92 minutes long. At two hours it could have been tedious. The film gained Oscar nods for Best Actress (although Bergman lost to Jane Fonda in Coming Home), Best Original Screenplay, and deservedly won other Best Picture awards, such as the Golden Globe, the National Film Critics Circle Award, the National Board of Review, the New York Film Critics award, and the Italian National Syndicate award. It is a writing tour de force, and those critics that dismissed it as a talky Psychology 101 film are just trying to sound quotable, for this film is talky Psychology 101 the way Othello is merely soap opera.
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