“Ingrid Bergman: In Her Own Words”
A
Not rated. At Kendall Square Cinema.
A forward-thinking feminist heroine who did not put her children ahead of her work, except when one fell gravely ill, Sweden’s Ingrid Bergman had one of the most important film careers in the history of cinema. Her career and life are the subjects of Swedish film critic and filmmaker Stig Bjorkman’s centenary (well, off by a year) documentary “Ingrid Bergman: In Her Own Words,” a film often “narrated” by a fictional Bergman (aptly voiced by rising Swedish star Alicia Vikander).
After the deaths of her parents, young and vivacious Ingrid took to the theater and Swedish film, where she became the latest star in such works as “The Surf” (1935) and “Dollar” (1938).
Summoned to Hollywood by none other than David O. Selznick, producer of “Gone With the Wind,” Bergman leaves her daughter Pia and husband, physician Petter Lindstrom, behind to keep her date with destiny in the form of such American films as the classic “Casablanca.” She reunites with child and husband, but that first parting sets the stage for what was to come in Bergman’s notably multilingual, globe-trekking lifetime. A marvelous assemblage of still photographs, archival film, scenes from Bergman’s films — “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” “Joan of Arc,” “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “Notorious,” “Spellbound,” “Stromboli,” “Autumn Sonata” and more — words culled from her letters and diaries and interviews with children and family friends, the portrait we see is of a strong, loving woman ambitious and eager to live in the “make-believe world of film” and see where her talent might take her. Arguing in a hallway with film icon Ingmar Bergman is one of these places.
Minimalist composer Michael Nyman (“The Piano”) gives the film another soulful voice. Bergman fans may be surprised by her height (she was 5 feet 9 inches), delighted by her Selznick screen test, about which I will simply say that she passes with flying colors, and reminded that she had an affair with famous World War II-era photographer Robert Capa.
In the 1950s, Bergman was condemned on the hardly spotless floor of the U.S. Congress when she took up with Italian director Roberto Rossellini, giving birth to his children and leaving her husband and daughter to live in Italy. Her 1957 best actress Academy Award, collected by her “Notorious” co-star Cary Grant, was a sign from the industry that all was forgiven, and she was welcome to come back. Sigourney Weaver, who worked with Bergman on the New York stage, and Liv Ullmann, who played Bergman’s daughter in Ingmar Bergman’s “Autumn Sonata,” also appear to talk about their colleague. Here’s looking at her, kids.
(“Ingrid Bergman: In Her Own Words” contains ?mature subject matter.)
