Scenes From A Marriage (1973)

Average rating

(72%)

Starring:	Liv Ullmann \| Erland Josephson \| Bibi Andersson
Director:	Ingmar Bergman
Studio:	PALISADES TARTAN
Run time:	164 mins
Genres:	Drama \| World Cinema
Languages:	Swedish
Subtitles:	English
Released:	September 29, 2003

Originally created as a six-part series for television, this film -- widely regarded as one of Ingmar Bergman's most powerful later works -- offers a close-up examination of a relationship as it slowly falls apart, and investigates the toll it takes on both parties. Johan and Marianne (Erland Josephson and Liv Ullmann) are a seemingly successful professional couple who have juggled careers as (respectively) a doctor and an attorney with marriage and children; when we first encounter them, they're being interviewed by a television reporter about what makes their marriage a success, an event contrasted by a later meeting with an openly bitter and combative couple (Bibi Andersson and Jan Malmsjö). But things are not always what they seem on the surface, and Johan announces he has become involved with a younger woman. Johan seems to give little thought to the harm he has done to Marianne, while she is devastated by his abandonment of her. After a stay in Europe, Johan returns to Sweden and visits Marianne; eventually, the divorced couple briefly comes together, but the damage done is too severe to mend. Focusing less on narrative than on a deep-focus portrayal of the thoughts and emotions of two characters, Scenes From a Marriage originally ran nearly 300 minutes in its original television edition; Bergman later edited the film to 168 minutes for theatrical release in Europe and North America.~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Rating of 4 stars out of 5

Originally a six-part, five-hour television series, this was personally edited for feature release by writer/director Ingmar Bergman. Running at close to three hours and mostly shot in tight close-ups to enhance the tensions between the main protagonists, this is not easy viewing: some of the insights seem too blatant for a film-maker of Bergman's intellect to be bothered with. However, when the rambling gives way to fierce infighting and wounding insults, the film exerts a much firmer grip. Liv Ullmann as the betrayed wife, Erland Josephson as the philandering husband and Bibi Andersson as the other woman are all quite superb.

Rating of 3 stars out of 5
Halliwell's Film Guide

Bergman edited the film into feature length from six 50-minute episodes made for television, and the structure of the original remains, with each episode given its own title, moving from Innocence and Panic, with an apparently happy marriage on dis

Highest rated reviews

15 out of 16 people found the following review helpful:

Rated 5 stars
A Look at Marriage Without the Romance

A Customer from London, 8th October, 2004

One wonders why a director who has been married at least five times would even think of doing a film about marriage. Yet if you watch it you will know why. The film takes a very scrutinizing yet objectionable look at love, marriage, sex, and even happiness. It questions what it all means and whether the ideal union between two human beings is even obtainable. It's honest and realistic. It looks more a two flawed individuals than as a couple, which makes it more interesting. It shows the never ending complexities that the institution of marriage creates. How the 'meeting of the minds' is task in itself. It also examines the delicate balance we all have of pursuing selfish needs and still wanting to be loved.

This is a very deep psychological study with endlessly stimulating dialogue. The two stars dive into their roles with a emotional abandon. The atmosphere and approach is quite civilized yet their is moment of completely unexpected violence, which is good. It shows that the director, in an effort to pull out the reality, isn't afraid to dig to even the darkness part of the human psyche.

However some of this does become overly protracted. The approach is too scholarly, which gives it a very wooden feel. The viewer never gets emotionally drawn in and there is never any dramatic impact. It takes a full hour before this thing even starts to gain any type of momentum. It also would have been more complete to see these people when they first met instead of starting when things are already beginning to go bad.

Still this is a worthwhile exercise. Many married viewers may find a lot of truth to this especially if they stick with it. The characters go through a full range of emotions in each and every scene. Bergman shows an amazing intimacy. You really feel like you are alone with these people and no one else is around. The lighting is terrific and cinematographer Nykvist captures Ullmans expressive face like no one else.

One of Director Ingmar Bergman's great talents was his deep understanding of women and his love for them. In Liv Ullmann he found a woman who could express that passion so that it could be felt by others. In the cinema that I most admire there is a collaboration of love and adoration between the director and the star that is expressed in the performance. We see this in the work of Krzysztof Kieslowski and to a lesser extent in the work of Roman Polanski and Roger Vadim. And I guess I might mention Beno?t Jacquot and Andre Techine who first directed, respectively, Judith Godr?che and Juliette Binoche. But with Bergman there is a wider expression of this love and admiration to include the experience of pathos and tragedy. To understand what a woman is in the fullest extent of her being is what Bergman strives for, not just the revelation of a pretty girl. In Bergman we find the kind of all encompassing psychology characteristic of Shakespeare or Ibsen, in which the characters are fully fleshed and expressive of a wide range of human experience. This begins slowly as a stage play and continues as something seen on television and then suddenly springs like a trap and we are immersed in a compelling drama about people who are interesting and alive, people like ourselves who have the longings and the frustrations that we live but seldom express. As Marianne and Johan watch their friends expose the sordid details of their failed marriage, they are understanding and quietly smug that they are different, especially it is Marianne who is proper and conventional, always alert to the necessities of propriety, who feels this way, and is so happy that their marriage, while not perfect, will last. And so it appears.

And then we have the scene in which Johan tells her that he is in love with a younger woman. It is nothing short of magnificent, one of the most memorable in all of cinema, and done with such subtly and power, infused with a deep underpinning of a wild and desperate, yet cunning expression of love from Liv Ullmann that would win over the devil himself. This is a woman at thirty-five, when everything that means anything to her is suddenly threatened, and this is how she responds, with genius.

Or, some might say, with madness. Johan's dull indifference is absurdist, and Marianne's incredible tolerance and 'understanding' of his behavior is stunning. Yet when it happens to us, sometimes we are just a bit ahead of ourselves and we realize what has really happened, and like Marianne we are generous and sad instead of insanely jealous. And Johan's insufferable arrogance and 'worldly' understanding of himself makes us want to scream. And then it turns and he says, 'I'm beaten,' and there is just a trace of a triumphant smile on her face. At forty-five, he is a beaten man. 'You win,' is what he is saying. And now he becomes a bit pathetic. His behavior, when it is she who has the upper hand, is crude and ugly. Of course hers was cunning and desperate when he had the upper hand. And then it turns again and then again, and we have twenty years of a marriage.

One thing I must say, this is a little too intense for TV! (The entire production, six hours worth, was originally made for Swedish TV.)

I was pleased to see the photos of Liv Ullmann as a child and then as a little girl and then as a teen and then as a young woman worked into the script. She is so beautiful and wholesome in a distinct way, like no other actress, and yet I knew her in the ninth grade in the person of a girl with the same red hair and the same white, reddish, freckled skin. The range that Liv Ullmann displays in this film is remarkable, but she is not alone. Co-star Erland Josephson is also outstanding. And they had better be since they command the screen for most of the 170 minutes this version runs. What Bergman does that keeps us glued to the tube is he tells the truth. It's a Bergman truth, but it is a truth so beyond the contrivances and superficialities of most movies that we are fascinated.

In general the work of Mr. Bergman for me registers a negligible vibration. His is a world that seems to consist mostly of darkness and shadows, of distraught emotions and stifled anguish.

Having viewed some twenty of his films over the years, it has usually been a trying experience. His tendency toward joylessness has been vexing and unrewarding. My attendance at his works has admittedly been more dutiful than motivated.

While I acknowledge his undeniable technique and genius of his craft, I really can't say I'm drawn to it. 'Scenes from a Marriage' is certainly one of Mr. Bergman's best works, yet even here it's so painfully and agonizingly wrought that it takes great personal effort for me to become engaged, and with little reward.

I'm certainly not trying to down his work, only admit that his is a world I'd rather choose not to inhabit. At the same time I acknowledge that Mr. Bergman has established himself as one of the world's great film makers, and I take my hat off to him in that regard, while leaving his admirers and devotees to continue to support and appreciate his cinematic and theatrical creations.

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9 out of 9 people found the following review helpful:

Rated 5 stars
A nailed on stone cold classic

boopy from London, 13th May, 2004

Originally shown as a TV series in Bergman’s native Sweden "Scenes From A Marriage" introduces us to a respectable, happy, middle-class couple.

When first shown it rocked the Swedish nation with its candour and realism. As a consequence Bergman was asked to be a consultant to the Swedish version of “Relate” such was his knowledge of the darkest room in relationship hell.

If you’ve ever been through a break up this film will make you feel a little better. Harrowing, gruelling and completely believable it grabs you by the throat and pulls you kicking and screaming into this couple’s life. Complacency, ambivalence, hate, seeping frustration, responsibility, dependency and desperate longing. The minutiae of a relationship imploding - It’s all here and it’s frightening!

Now, having given you a somewhat stereotypically bleak Bergman summary (Little Nicky this isn’t!) I would contend that ultimately the message is hopeful; that despite everything we see fit to do to those we love, love has a habit of enduring.

By the end of this film you will know these characters better than your family and you will feel differently about the world – yes, it's time for you to rent Fanny & Alexander.

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3 out of 3 people found the following review helpful:

Rated 4 stars
Scenes from a Marriage

William Johnson from leamington, 24th September, 2004

One of Bergman?s longest films this is a cut down version of his 5 hour TV mini series. It consists essentially of a series of conversation pieces taking place over a 10 year period and centred around critical points in the marriage of Marianne (Liv Ullman) and Johan (Erlund Josephson). The film opens as the family is having a 10 year anniversary celebratory photo taken. Almost immediately we get the impression that Johan is too conceited for his own good while no one but a complete mouse could possibly have married such an insufferable man. There follows a scene at a dinner party where a couple of their married friends have a terrible fight followed by another in which Marianne, a divorce lawyer, interviews a client who wants out of a loveless marriage. With these two forewarnings you can guess what is about to happen to J & M?s ?ideal? marriage but things don?t turn out quite as expected. There is a nice touch at the end just as the pair seem to have grown more mature and become reconciled both to themselves and each other a lonely foghorn sounds a warning.

Bergman analyzes the different phases of the marriage in excruciating detail in what is a fascinating film despite its length. The only reservation I have about it is that the Bergman made the main characters very remote; it is very hard to feel anything for either husband or wife except after the first scene a desire to slap the pair of them.

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