From the Life of the Marionettes (1980)
(Aus dem Leben der Marionetten)
Country: GER/SV
Technical: bw/col 104m
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Robert Atzorn, Heinz Bennent, Martin Benrath, Christine Buchegger
Synopsis:
A respected professional murders a prostitute and we are granted glimpses of his life and testimonies from both before and after the event in order better to understand the reasons for such an apparent aberration.
Review:
Talkative, indulgent study in the fear of death, or the fragility of existence, typical of its creator, disguised as a complex, jargon-filled anatomy of a murder. Essentially still more scenes from a marriage, with the murderer's relationship with his fashion promoter wife providing the backdrop for the emotional discharge represented by the killing. There are also a psychiatrist and the wife's gay partner, the latter of whose musings on mortality and the twin aims of existence (dreams of closeness and tenderness forgone in favour of lust and 'filth') offer a renewed, perhaps redundant glimpse of the director's obsessions. The aesthetic (from colour to black and white and back again) is resolutely close order shots of talking heads, with significantly less to occupy the eye than in previous work. All in all, an indulgence in deep pessimism no doubt provoked by Bergman's exile for tax evasion.
(Aus dem Leben der Marionetten)
Country: GER/SV
Technical: bw/col 104m
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Robert Atzorn, Heinz Bennent, Martin Benrath, Christine Buchegger
Synopsis:
A respected professional murders a prostitute and we are granted glimpses of his life and testimonies from both before and after the event in order better to understand the reasons for such an apparent aberration.
Review:
Talkative, indulgent study in the fear of death, or the fragility of existence, typical of its creator, disguised as a complex, jargon-filled anatomy of a murder. Essentially still more scenes from a marriage, with the murderer's relationship with his fashion promoter wife providing the backdrop for the emotional discharge represented by the killing. There are also a psychiatrist and the wife's gay partner, the latter of whose musings on mortality and the twin aims of existence (dreams of closeness and tenderness forgone in favour of lust and 'filth') offer a renewed, perhaps redundant glimpse of the director's obsessions. The aesthetic (from colour to black and white and back again) is resolutely close order shots of talking heads, with significantly less to occupy the eye than in previous work. All in all, an indulgence in deep pessimism no doubt provoked by Bergman's exile for tax evasion.
(Aus dem Leben der Marionetten)
Country: GER/SV
Technical: bw/col 104m
Director: Ingmar Bergman
Cast: Robert Atzorn, Heinz Bennent, Martin Benrath, Christine Buchegger
Synopsis:
A respected professional murders a prostitute and we are granted glimpses of his life and testimonies from both before and after the event in order better to understand the reasons for such an apparent aberration.
Review:
Talkative, indulgent study in the fear of death, or the fragility of existence, typical of its creator, disguised as a complex, jargon-filled anatomy of a murder. Essentially still more scenes from a marriage, with the murderer's relationship with his fashion promoter wife providing the backdrop for the emotional discharge represented by the killing. There are also a psychiatrist and the wife's gay partner, the latter of whose musings on mortality and the twin aims of existence (dreams of closeness and tenderness forgone in favour of lust and 'filth') offer a renewed, perhaps redundant glimpse of the director's obsessions. The aesthetic (from colour to black and white and back again) is resolutely close order shots of talking heads, with significantly less to occupy the eye than in previous work. All in all, an indulgence in deep pessimism no doubt provoked by Bergman's exile for tax evasion.