Through a Glass Darkly written and directed by Ingmar Bergman was the 1962 Winner of The Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, and the Nominee for the Oscar for The Best Writing, Story and Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen and it is one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made – you find many notes on films from the NYT 1,000 and other lists, plus reviews of magnum opera from The GOAT site and others on my blog and YouTube channel https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html

 

Through a Glass Darkly written and directed by Ingmar Bergman was the 1962 Winner of The Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, and the Nominee for the Oscar for The Best Writing, Story and Screenplay - Written Directly for the Screen and it is one of The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made – you find many notes on films from the NYT 1,000 and other lists, plus reviews of magnum opera from The GOAT site and others on my blog and YouTube channel https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html

 

 

10 out of 10

 

I have already seen Through a Glass Darkly and wrote this note on it https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/10/through-glass-darkly-written-and.html given that this is one of the best motion pictures, and the auteur is also one of the greatest film makers, his work deserves A Closer Look

 

Nonetheless, we must say that Ingmar Bergman was not a wonderful man: he supported the Nazi, while he was a Swede, which means he did not live in Germany, and we could argue that Hitler could have killed him, if upset

 

Through a Glass Darkly is a powerful, inspiring chef d’oeuvre, one of the main themes is God, there is a conversation between David aka spectacular Gunnar Björnstrand (one of the splendid thespians that act in many, if not most of Bergman’s movies) and his son, Minus played by Lars Passgård, where the latter asks about

 

-          God

 

God is meant to be love, ergo Karin - Harriet Andersson is wondrous in the difficult role – will be alright, because they love her…alas, she had been released from a mental hospital, she has issues, visions, maybe she is the one who sees the Truth, this is epiphany, and not madness, only the symptoms are troubling

Max von Sydow is glorious, as usual, in the role of Martin, and he is Karin’s gentle, kind husband, he has been patient, in part because he is a doctor, and understands illness, but mostly because he is such a munificent, resilient, almost saintly man, in love with his wife and willing to wait for her to get better, if possible

 

Except the illness is incurable, he shares this truth with her father, David, the latter is a writer, and keeps a journal, in which he will write about this disease, and when he is out of the room, she gets access and reads about her condition, and worse, that her father ‘has a perverse curiosity to watch her disintegration’

 

-          And…use it in his work

 

This leads to a sort of confrontation between Martin and David, in a manner of speaking since these are Scandinavians, Swedes, they do not get into shouting matches suddenly, though in Scenes from a Marriage https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/01/note-on-scenes-from-marriage.html the spouses are not kind to each other

The whole film is fabulous, the atmosphere, the characters, and there are only four people in the narrative, well, maybe we should add another personage for Karin, as she pendulates between the woman we ‘know’ and this alter ego, and then they put on a play within the film, and she is Isabel of Castilla…Ingmar Bergman was one of the auteurs, thought the term has been disputed, I have seen Wild Strawberries https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2026/01/wild-strawberries-by-ingmar-bergman-is.html again recently, and the plan is to continue with the other magnum opera, Fanny and Alexander may be next…

 

Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – I am on Goodreads as Realini Ionescu, at least for the moment, if I keep on expressing my views on Orange Woland aka TACO, it may be a short-lived presence

Also, maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/09/do-you-have-any-feedback.html – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the benefits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

 There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html

 

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

 

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

Comentarii

Trimiteți un comentariu

Postări populare de pe acest blog

Epistolary edited by Gabriel Liiceanu http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/11/50-minutes-with-plesu-and-liiceanu-10.html - 10 out of 10

  Epistolary edited by Gabriel Liiceanu http://realini.blogspot.com/2021/11/50-minutes-with-plesu-and-liiceanu-10.html 10 out of 10     This wonderful book contains letters exchanged between the brightest minds we have in this realm – there is the exception of Eugen Simion, the late president of the Academy here, a rather horrid attack on luminaries that were so much wiser than this fellow, who came to lead a forum that should be only for the crème de la crème, yet, his presence at the top in fact reveals the ‘values’ that have reached what should be the chamber of the nec plus ultra – and as such, much of what is being debated is quite inaccessible   Ergo, the spoiler alert, warning, disclaimer, and maybe the way out of accusations of spam – one of the notes I have posted on Goodreads, Cleo From 5 to 7 http://realini.blogspot.com/2023/07/cleo-from-5-to-7-aka-cleo-de-5-7-by.html has been deleted, because it was considered spam, while the one who is the #...
Citiți mai multe

The Killer by Luc Jacamon 10 out of 10

  The Killer by Luc Jacamon 10 out of 10     Reading about killers, or watching the stupendous The Killer, with fabulous Michael Fassbinder in the leading role may seem like the wrong idea, in a world that has some nasty wars taking place in Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Myanmar, and the danger is that they might be expanding, as it is, Iran is attacking the USA, through its proxies Hezbollah, Houthis in Yemen (they have launched missiles) and militias in Iraq and Syria   It all depends on how good the author is, what the adaptation looks like, cast, director, you could have a magnum opus that is a crime story, such as Crime and Punishment http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/06/crime-and-punishment-by-fyodor.html by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - an algorithm has recently looked at various relevant compilations and established the 50 Greatest Novels and the story of Raskolnikov is on it, together with other astounding works, Marcel Proust is at number one The Killer starts...
Citiți mai multe

The Adventures of Ferdinand, Count Fathom by Tobias Smollett – included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List http://poemeglume.blogspot.com/2023/04/1000-novels-everyone-must-read.html - 7 out of 10

  The Adventures of Ferdinand, Count Fathom by Tobias Smollett – included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List http://poemeglume.blogspot.com/2023/04/1000-novels-everyone-must-read.html 7 out of 10     The Adventures of Ferdinand, Count Fathom was first published in 1753, which might mean that it is not for the tastes of readers from our times, not even middle aged ones, like yours truly (who is actually sixty in a couple of months, but like to adopt the ‘the sixties are the new forties’ slogan) who has abandoned this   Hence, the spoiler alert, warning, disclaimer to avoid being (again) censored for spam – though I did not get the inclusion in that category, a reading of the definition could help, but this being my note, until it is obliterated by the Goodreads staff, and then it will still be available at the new blog https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/ I say that spam is used for the unrequested messages we receive, meant to make us buy things ...
Citiți mai multe