Movie Review: The Silence (1963) - Page 2

From the very first scene, inside an oppressively hot train carriage, the differences between the two sisters are immediately apparent. Anna sits uncomfortably in the heat, sweating profusely, limbs spread wide apart, while by contrast Ester in the same conditions appears aloof to them, sitting deep in thought neatly across the carriage from her sister. As the film progresses the gap between their personalities will become more clearly defined. Anna is impulsive, sexually promiscuous and constantly fussing over her appearance; Ester, clearly disapproving of her sister's behaviour prefers drinking and smoking in solitude, deeply engaged in the more cerebral activity of her job of literary translation. The voluptuousness and apparent rude health of Anna is contrasted in Ester's increasing ill health; while the former fulfils her carnal desires, the latter struggles for life itself.

Of his many Bergman tributes, Woody Allen in Love and Death (1975) concludes that “human beings are divided into mind and body”, surely a direct reference to The Silence, since Ester and Anna are clearly somewhat artificially representative of these two sides of the metaphysical divide. Whether this is literal or metaphorical within the confines of the film is certainly debatable, particularly when considering how far Bergman will subsequently go to meld two personalities together in Persona (1966). There are cryptic visual and verbal clues to suggest alternative readings: sometimes the sisters are framed as distant to each other, yet other times their faces almost coincide. If they are the same person, what is the significance of Ester's apparent lesbian attachment to her sister, often manifesting itself in physical jealousy and masturbation?

The Persona comparison, though, is not helpful, since it positions the women at the core of the film; as in Through a Glass Darkly, which is also frequently misread, it is in fact the son who acts as the fulcrum upon which the film tilts between its competing poles. The several times that Jonas can be seen to wind his watch during the film will remind us of the sound of ticking heard over the opening credits; this and the fact that the film opens and closes with the young boy aboard a moving train are clearly temporal and spatial signifiers of the moral journey he is undertaking here, torn between choosing to live his life according to his mother, and the Dionysian body, and his aunt, the Apollonian rational mind. The strange figure of the troupe of dwarves midway through the film highlight the boy's apparent pre-sexual nature, yet the unmistakably Oedipal relation to his mother suggests approaching pubescent conflict.

Article Author: Bags

Bags is a writer based in Bristol, UK. He likes the idea of being called a 'cultural historian', though 'boring film and music geek' is probably closer to the mark. Ouch.

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