"Fanny And Alexander" -- are all Ingmar Bergman films this boring?

Cafe Society
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I like to think of myself as a true film connoisseur, or at least one in training…and to this end, I’ll often rent some films by “classic” directors, along with all the Harry Potters and LOTRs. This week I rented my first Ingmar Bergman film, and chose Fanny and Alexander, since it has the highest rating on Netflix, and of course I chose the 5½-hour TV miniseries, since that was the original version. Now I’m wondering whether or not that was a mistake.

The first three hours were BORING. I mean drop-dead, gouge-your-eyeballs-out extreme tedium on par with the wedding scene from The Deer Hunter (and that only lasted one hour!) I wouldn’t have even bothered putting in disc 2 until that bishop guy’s marriage proposal to Emilie…with unique conditions…when I thought, “Hey, this might actually get interesting.” And it did, to a point. In the second half, I loved the gothic-horror imagery and the whole “evil stepfather” plot. But even so, there were many intense scenes that were ruined by just going on FAR too long, or cutting to some pointless, completely unrelated scene like the Jewish guy reading from the Talmud for ten minutes, or an argument between two people that had absolutely nothing to do with the story.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have anything against the occasional bit of artistic self-indulgence, especially when it’s done with flair. But this celluloid monstrosity was bloated beyond compare, and I can’t imagine the 3-hour “edited down” version to be any better…there was about 80 minutes of really good story, padded with four bleeding hours of nonsense. So I’m wondering…should I continue exploring this guy’s work? I’ve got The Seventh Seal and Through a Glass Darkly in my Netflix queue, but if they’re anywhere close to this exercise in cinematic masturbation, I’d rather pass.

I know there’s some Bergman fans out there…what should I do?

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My suggestion is to stick with all his early films. The Seventh Seal I think is great as is all his early work. His later films got too obtuse for me, so gave up watching them.

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I think the short answer to your question is: Yes.

His early films are pretentious, in addition to being borrrrrrrring. I mean, c’mon, Death playing chess? Really.

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If you don’t like film as art, don’t watch film as art.
Watch the movies.
Go back to Hollywood.

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I thought Fanny and Alexander was boring. Boring, boring, boring. And I didn’t even see the extra-boring version you saw.

But I liked The Seventh Seal. It was not boring. So go watch that; if you don’t like it, either, then swear off Bergman.

(Haven’t seen any others.)

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Yeah, but it was so, you know… real.

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My favorite of his films is the little seen Wild Strawberries. Seventh Seal is alright (though I’ve fallen asleep through it twice…late showing plus slow moving picture is a recipe for nodding off) and I find Virgin Spring to be obnoxiously manipulative. As with the wife and kid in The Shining I was actually rooting for something bad to happen to the eponymous virgin.

And to the implied question, yes, all Bergman films are slow and pretentious, in the sense of placing a greater emphasis on symbolism and allegory than plot and natural characters. You can learn to like that sort of thing to some extent, but if it really annoys you then you should probably avoid his work (though his later pictures are less New Wave-ish). Personally, I don’t find him nearly as annoying as Lars Von Uffing Trier (shudder) or Jean-Luc Godard, whose Contempt made me want to run a red hot darning needle through my ears in relief from bordom. (Imagine your next door neighbor couple having an argument…in your living room…that goes on for two hours…and is about absolutely nothing, and then she runs off with the obnoxious marketing guy two doors down and dies in a car wreck three blocks away.)

Be aware that developing a taste for some of these films does require multiple viewings; they’re both displaced in time and culture, plus many of the classical directors were presenting a rather complex message, not just disposable entertainment. The best of them, though, were capable of doing both; Hitchcock with Rear Window, which works equally well as a mystery with romantic elements and a multi-threaded allegory about the conflicts in human relationships.

If you are looking for classical-for-the-sake-of-being-classical directors:
[ul][li]Vittorio De Sica, whose The Bicycle Thief and Umberto D. are two of the best films of the Italian Neorealism movement and indeed, two of the most poignant, emotional but unmanipulative films ever made.[/li][li]Federico Fellini’s stuff up through 8 1/2 (but not after).[/li][li]Selected bits of Bernardo Bertolucci (Il Conformista in particular).[/li][li]Virtually anything by Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa, from which much of Western film traditions and what are now cliches were derived. [/li][li]Fritz Lang[/li][li]Orsen Welles really did some masterful stuff, but you have to wade through studio cuts and budget constraints to get at it.[/li][li]John Huston, Sam Peckinpah, and Billy Wilder all did great work within genre pictures that defied their own conventions. [/li][/ul]

That’s just a short list, but enough to get you started. Oh, and I already mentioned him, but it bears repeating again: Akira Kurosawa. Seriously. Start with Rashomon or Throne of Blood and work your way up through The Seven Samurai, The Hidden Fortress, Yojimbo and Sanjuro, and cumulating in Kagemusha and Ran, with gems like Stray Dog and Ikiru thrown in along the way. With a bit of research, you can pair up the Kurosawa film with one or more Occidental films which borrowed heavily from it (like Star Wars with The Hidden Fortress or A Fistful of Dollars with Yojimbo.)

Stranger

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We all know Death is a Stratego man.

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I haven’t seen a ton of Bergman films but I’d like to recommend* The Virgin Spring,* one of the more disturbing movies I’ve seen. I think the Swedish name is Jungfrukällan. I actually saw this as a kid of maybe 12 or so, and even though it is unbelievably disturbing, I remember it as quite fascinating. I’ve seen it again recently and it still gives me the chills. Mind you, I ain’t that huge an arthouse movie fan. I’ve been forced myself to sit through a couple of Fellini movies, and they just strike me as weird.

If you like TVS, you might like a movie called *Snowland * which was shown at Sundance. I think the director was very much influenced by Ingmar.

On the other hand, I probably just relate to movies with truly evil sickos in them.

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I’ll second Wild Strawberries. I liked Strawberries a lot, though it did leave me with very little desire to see another Bergman film. His pacing and subjects aren’t the most exciting in the film world (though they are well thought-out and deliberate). The Seventh Seal is hard to take seriously unless you are in the right mood/mind set. Parts of it have become the cliche of the foreign art film.

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Crap, Stranger, I should’ve figured that I’d be beaten to the punch, and shot down no less. Gotta be a little quicker, I’m new at this. On the other hand, when I was 12, I sure as hell didn’t think all that shit was going to go down.

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Hey now, I have no problem with movies being arty for the sake of art – heck, I watched the whole Koyaanisqatsi trilogy a few weeks ago, so thereya go. :stuck_out_tongue:

However, I do insist that movies be entertaining, or at least interesting. And F&A certainly had a few interesting moments – the whole “Demons” chapter was brilliant, for the most part (it reminded me a lot of Benicio del Toro’s The Devil’s Backbone, one of the best horror films in recent memory.) And even in the most excruciating moments of boredom, I did note that the composition & imagery were first-rate; not the best I’ve ever seen, perhaps, but certainly done well. Still…if I’m ever in the mood to just look at pretty pictures, I’ll go to a freakin’ museum.

And I’m looking forward to Kurosawa, whenever I can squeeze him in…on the other hand, I’m a little afraid I might be back later with a thread entitled: “The Seven Samurai: Are All Kurosawa Films This Boring?” Heh…
Also…I have it on good authority that the devil only plays Trivial Pursuit now. (Anyone else remember that skit?)

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That’s Guillermo del Toro. Benicio is the scuzzy-looking (most of the time) actor.

What? Not a chance. Kurosawa films are deliberately paced, to be sure, but never boring (although Ran is a bit on the long side). He was great at mixing in humor with action as well. Actually, I thought that Shichinin no samurai was a lot faster moving than the John Sturges remake, The Magnificent Seven.

One thing that bothers Western viewers the first time, though, is how little foley work and almost no musical accompanyment is used (although he does use mournful music quite a bit in Ran.) Virtually all sound is diagetic, and many scenes play almost silently. I find it strangely affecting (expecially after having my eardrums assulted in modern Hollywood flicks) but it is a different experience.

Stranger

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Yes, Kurosawa for the “film connoisser.” Though they work exceedingly well as pure entertainment, too. Not boring at all.

Though to some, Seven Samurai can seem a bit long/slow in spots. Maybe start with a different one? Skip/postpone the Bergman.

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Smiles of a Summer Night isn’t very boring or slowly-paced. From what I recall, at least. It’s almost light!

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Bergman himself was a son of a priest (bishop?) and didn’t have a happy childhood. He’s been doing movies in lieu of therapy since the 1940’s. Go figure.

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I’m a huge Bergman fan and I love Fanny and Alexander, Wild Strawberries and Through a Glass Darkly. If you didn’t like Fanny and Alexander, though, I can’t think of any other Bergman film to recommend because I’ve always thought of F&A as the culmination of Bergman’s career as a director. If you didn’t care for that, I doubt you’ll dig any of his earlier movies.

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I can think of at least one thing wrong with the title, too. {Note for US posters: your definition of “fanny” varies considerably from ours}

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I once took an Ingmar Bergman film class in the middle of a Minnesota winter before the invention of Prozac.

I like Seventh Seal and Persona (although I’ve seen it too many times). Wild Strawberries isn’t bad. But in general his movies are cerebral. Beautifully filmed, slow, depressing. Not really “approachable.” More “appreciated” than “enjoyed.”