Cries and Whispers (1972)

          One of the most acclaimed films from a body of work containing multiple masterpieces, Ingmar Bergman’s Cries and Whispers is disturbing, mysterious, and profound. Those who avoid Bergman’s work because they dread emotionally wrenching narratives and existentially themed monologues will find the experience of watching Cries and Whispers challenging, because it’s unrelentingly bleak. The concept of death permeates every frame, and characters wrestle with demons including betrayal, hopelessness, self-loathing, and suicidal impulses. The movie also contains a gruesome scene of self-abuse, and a painful sequence in which a man assaults his lover’s psyche by listing all of her faults, external and internal, until she’s deeply wounded. Like all of Berman’s important films, Cries and Whispers explores how the battlefield of the human condition intersects with the caprice of fate, essentially cataloguing the thousand cuts we inflict on each other every day while also recognizing the likely futility of existence.

          Set in a remote country estate sometime in the 19th century, the film follows two sisters, Karin (Ingrid Thulin) and Maria (Liv Ullmann), as they care for their dying sister Agnes (Harriet Andersson) with the help of a God-fearing maid, Anna (Kari Sylwan). The sure knowledge that Agnes will die after a long period of suffering compels the other women to search their souls, and none likes what she finds. Despite having already suffered a terrible loss, the death of a child, Anna endures the least torture, because she has God for comfort, but even she experiences shattering emotional pain. Karin approaches madness thanks to the unhappy dynamics of her marriage to Fredrik (Georg Arlin), and Karin’s story culminates with a ghastly scene of Karin mutilating herself while an appalled Fredrik watches. Maria, haunted by memories of her dead mother (played in flashbacks by Ullmann), withstands the cruelty of her lover, David (Erland Josephson), because he’s the one who bombards Maria with withering criticisms of her aging facial features as well as her “laziness, indifference, boredom.”

          Bergman observes all of this anguish with a mixture of chilly distance and disquieting intimacy. Sometimes he trains the camera so closely on a face that every microscopic nuance of emotion is visible, and sometimes he composes stylized tableaux that are rich with visual metaphors. Bergman’s frequent collaborator, cinematographer Sven Nykvist, won an Oscar for his work on this movie, and his images—laden with the color red, motifs of clocks, and other loaded signifiers—are exquisite whenever mise en scène takes the fore and unobtrusive whenever performance is the focal point. Not every effect that Bergman renders here is perfect. The dialogue often addresses complex emotional states too perfectly, leaving the way that real humans speak behind; the nonstop onslaught of misery becomes distractingly oppressive; and some of the more art-designed elements border on the pretentious. If anyone has license to venture too far into these areas, however, it is Bergman, who proves again with this film that he is, was, and probably always will be the cinema’s boldest and most incisive psychological clinician.

Cries and Whispers: GROOVY

Lost Horizon (1973)

          Despite the commercial failure of its 1937 adaptation, which was directed by Frank Capra, Columbia Pictures took another shot at bringing James Hilton’s 1933 novel Lost Horizon to the screen. The bloated 1973 version, featuring twee songs by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, fared just as poorly at the box office as its predecessor. Key among the 1973 movie’s problems is the way the songs clash with everything else onscreen. For instance, the first properly sung-through number doesn’t appear until nearly an hour has elapsed, which has the effect of suddenly changing the picture from a straightforward drama to a ridiculous musical spectacle. The remaining 90 minutes of Lost Horizon boast such attributes as an inherently compelling storyline and some vivid performances, but it’s impossible to take the movie seriously.

          Lost Horizon begins with diplomat Richard Conway (Peter Finch) fleeing a war-torn country in the Far East, accompanied by several other refugees. The group’s getaway plane is hijacked by a mysterious stranger, who crashes the vessel in the snowy peaks of the Himalayas. Soon afterward, Richard’s party is rescued by the enigmatic Chang (John Gielgud), and then escorted to the glorious realm of Shangri-La. Despite its storm-tossed surroundings, Shangri-La is a tropical utopia where people live in seemingly perfect harmony. Friction divides Richard’s party. Some, including Richard’s swaggering brother, George (Michael York), want to leave Shangri-La in order to resume their old lives. Others, including troubled reporter Sally (Sally Kellerman), embrace the chance to start anew. Meanwhile, Richard is introduced to Shangri-La’s spiritual leader, The High Lama (Charles Boyer), who explains that Richard has the opportunity to fulfill a special role in Shangri-La.

          Narratively and thematically, this is fascinating stuff, even though pundits have spent years parsing political (and even racist) messages from the source material. Ironically, the strength of the storyline is what makes the intrusion of songs so absurd. Had the songs added anything, the result would have been different. Alas, the tunes merely express infantile notions, as when Kellerman and costar Olivia Hussey warble the line “different people look at things from different points of view” during the spirited duet “The Things I Will Not Miss.” As for the movie’s performances, they’re all over the place, an issue compounded by the use of professional singers to lip-sync vocals for many of the actors. Finch is expressive and regal; leading lady Liv Ullmann is luminous, within the constraints of an underwritten role; York is impassioned; and dignified costar James Shigeta is as welcome a presence as ever. Boyer and Gielgud acquit themselves well despite outrageous miscasting. Hussey, Kellerman, and costar George Kennedy, however, play their roles so melodramatically that the actors come across as cartoonish.

          On a technical level, director Charles Jarriot and cinematographer Robert Surtees shoot the movie quite well, providing scope and splendor even if their presentation of singing-and-dancing nonsense feels indifferent. In the end, Lost Horizon is a bizarre mess, though patient viewers can conceivably power through the musical sequences and latch onto the dramatic scenes, which are vastly superior. FYI, the screenplay for Los Horizon is a minor credit for the important writer Larry Kramer, whose activism and creativity coalesced in his iconic play The Normal Heart (1985), which was endured through celebrated revivals and an Emmy-winning 2014 television adaptation.

Lost Horizon: FUNKY

The Abdication (1974)

          As a piece of film art, The Abdication has moments of tremendous beauty. Cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth’s imagery is simultaneously delicate and spectacular, because while he captures the story’s 17th-century settings with ornately lit panoramas that suggest classic paintings, he also conveys a sense of intimacy by accentuating the way people can be dwarfed by their surroundings. Similarly, composer Nino Rota’s stately music pulses with compassion, majesty, and warmth. And then there’s the story itself, which dramatizes a unique chapter from history—the period when Sweden’s tormented Queen Christina gave up her throne, and left her Protestant country, in order to become a Catholic. Written with great intelligence and sensitivity by Ruth Wolff, adapting her own play of the same name, The Abdication is ambitious, serious, and worthy. Unfortunately, it’s not particularly entertaining, and neither is it especially satisfying.
          Part of the problem is director Anthony Harvey’s leaden pacing, and part of the problem is that both leading players give insular performances. Playing Christina, the great Swedish actress Liv Ullmann captures moods ranging from caprice to combativeness, but, like her character, Ullmann holds too many cards close to her vest The true heart of the movie’s vision of Christina becomes visible only in glimpses, a problem exacerbated by the story’s intricate structure. Wolff organizes the narrative like a courtroom drama, so Cardinal Azzolino (Peter Finch) spends the whole movie interrogating Christina, under orders from the Vatican to determine the validity of her conversion.
          Accordingly, most of the key moments in Christina’s life are shown in fragmented flashbacks, culminating with a sequence during which Christina addresses widespread rumors that she was romantically involved with another woman. Concurrently, Wolff explores historical innuendo by implying that Azzolino and Christina became lovers, spiritually if not necessarily physically. The material is so interesting that it should work, and Finch is at least Ullmann’s equal. Yet it all feels chaste and flat and polite—so much so that The Abdication becomes boring after a while. Even the scenes of Vatican officials debating Christina’s political significance—which should be incendiary—feel overly mannered. Students of religious and/or royal history will undoubtedly find more to enjoy here than general viewers, and it’s inarguable that The Abdication is a sophisticated piece of work. Nonetheless, a sterile approach to storytelling prevents The Abdication from realizing its own tremendous potential.

The Abdication: FUNKY

Cold Sweat (1970)

          British director Terence Young made a wide variety of action films and thrillers following his triumphant work on the first James Bond movie, Dr. No (1962), as well as two follow-up 007 adventures. For instance, in the early ’70s, Young made three pulpy flicks in a row with badass leading man Charles Bronson—in addition to this tense crime thriller, the duo made the offbeat Western Red Sun (1971) and the violent mob movie The Valachi Papers (1972). Like the other Bronson-Young collaborations, Cold Sweat is entertaining if not especially distinctive. Bronson stars as Joe Martin, an American fisherman living in France with his European wife, Fabienne (Liv Ullmann). One day, a crook busts into Joe’s house claiming to know the fisherman from some shady episode in the past. Joe shocks Fabienne by calmly murdering the assailant. Then, the minute Joe and Fabienne discard of the intruder’s body, more unwanted visitors arrive, led by cruel American ex-soldier Captain Ross (James Mason). Turns out Joe and several other men participated in criminal enterprises while they were serving in the U.S. military, but Joe bailed during a robbery. Since Joe’s disappearance led to jail time for everyone else, Ross is back for revenge. Caught in the middle are Fabienne and her teenaged daughter.

          Based on a story by celebrated fantasy writer Richard Matheson, Cold Sweat actually feels a bit more like a narrative that Elmore Leonard might have contrived, which is a compliment—operating outside his usual supernatural safety zone, Matheson establishes a nasty situation fraught with unexpected complications. For instance, much of the picture involves a race to save a dying man (explaining any more would spoil the story), and this suspenseful element gives Young license to film a crazy car chase through a twisty mountain road. Whenever the movie’s action scenes are juiced by exciting music from composer Michel Magne, Cold Sweat becomes an enjoyable exercise in escapism. Bronson gives an uncharacteristically lively performance, playing a even-tempered survivor instead of his usual sociopathic executioner, and Ullmann’s dramatic chops give a strong emotional counterpoint. Not so impressive are Mason, ridiculously miscast as a refugee from the Deep South, and Bronson’s real-life bride, Jill Ireland, who gives a shrill turn as a hippie chick. Compounding the casting problems, Cold Sweat is easily 20 minutes too long. That said, buried amid the bloat and tonal missteps are plenty of adrenalized thrills.

Cold Sweat: FUNKY

Autumn Sonata (1978)

          Although Autumn Sonata borders on self-parody because writer-director Ingmar Bergman indulges his pain-freak sensibilities to an excessive degree, the innate humanism and sophistication of his style—combined with two extraordinary performances—give the picture resonance. A tough drama about the ways parents and children hurt each other when they’re unable to connect, the film is particularly noteworthy as the only project on which cinema’s two most famous Bergmans collaborated: Swedish-born Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman returned to her native land (and her native tongue) to give one of the most affecting performances of her career.

          Swedish-cinema icon Liv Ullmann plays Eva, a middle-aged woman living in a remote part of Sweden with her husband, meek pastor Viktor (Halvar Björk). Eva excitedly prepares for a rare visit by her mother, Charlotte (Bergman), a world-famous concert pianist. Immediately upon Charlotte’s arrival, however, myriad complications in the mother/daughter dynamic become evident. For instance, Charlotte is supremely chilly and withholding. Accordingly, while Eva was growing up, Charlotte was an absentee parent who expected her domestic existence life to be sunny and undemanding; by shunning family-oriented stress, Charlotte made real emotional connection with her daughter impossible. As a result, Eva became bitter, insecure, and needy. Thus, upon reuniting with her mother, Eva can’t stop herself from dumping loads of resentment onto Charlotte given the slightest opportunity. Furthermore, Eva surprises Charlotte by revealing that Charlotte’s other daughter, Eva’s sister Helena (Lena Nyman), is living in Eva’s house. Helena is severely disabled, and Charlotte finds time spent in Helena’s company excruciating—Helena radiates emotional thirst that Charlotte cannot quench.

          Filmed in extremely close quarters (the story rarely leaves Viktor’s humble house), Autumn Sonata is suffocatingly bleak. Writer-director Bergman almost never leavens the intense psychodrama with brightness or humor, so viewers are smothered by the dysfunction and pain of two complex women caught in an abusive cycle. At one point, the picture gets so heavy that Eva muses, via voice-over, how much she wishes she could simplify her existence by committing suicide. It is a testament to both leading actors that neither Charlotte nor Eva comes across as caricatured or contrived; these people seem agonizingly real.

          Adding to the grim quality of the experience is Ingmar Bergman’s choice to treat the piece more like a novel or play than pure cinema; actors speak in long, unbroken monologues and, on many occasions, speak directly to the camera or in theatrical soliloquies. Were it not for the amber-tinged beauty of Sven Nykvist’s cinematography and the consummate skill of the leading performances, the film’s arty flourishes would be fatal flaws. But with writer-director Bergman’s masterful hand pulling the strings, Autumn Sonata feels less like indulgence and more like an experiment—it’s as if the filmmaker deliberately discarded arbitrary storytelling conventions and used whatever tools he could in order to push as deeply into the anguished souls of his characters as possible.

Autumn Sonata: GROOVY

40 Carats (1973)

If Harold and Maude is the most interesting older woman/younger man picture released during the ’70s, then 40 Carats is quite possibly the least interesting. Originally produced as a stage play, the piece is painfully contrived and old-fashioned, its artificiality exacerbated by terrible casting. Liv Ullmann, so great in Ingmar Bergman’s chamber dramas and other serious-minded European films, flounders delivering cutesy rom-com banter. Her costar, Edward Albert, the would-be leading man whose career sputtered from dubious promise to an indifferent level of accomplishment throughout the early ’70s, plays fluffy scenes with too much intensity and heavy scenes without enough substance. Together, they achieve supreme mediocrity. The story begins in Greece, where vacationing New Yorker Ann (Ullmann) meets Peter (Albert), a young American roaming the Continent on a motorcycle. They enjoy an unexpected sexual tryst, and Ann withdraws the next morning, expecting never to see Peter again. Yet upon returning to New York, Ann discovers that by sheer coincidence, Peter has been fixed up for a date with her adult daughter (Deborah Raffin). Unfortunately, he still wants Ann. Meanwhile, a wealthy Texan (Billy Green Bush) is fixed up with Ann, but he secretly wants Ann’s daughter. The resulting slog of trite misunderstandings drags on for the better part of an hour. Eventually, the movie gets a smidgen of energy once Ann and Peter throw aside social conventions to pursue their relationship. For instance, a long scene in which Peter’s nasty father (Don Porter) tears apart his son’s romance has edge, so Ullmann finally gets to showcase dramatic chops. Alas, far too much of the movie comprises limp dialogue like this exchange between Ann and her charmingly irresponsible ex-husband, Billy (Gene Kelly). “You are a multi-carated blue-white diamond,” he coos. Then the phone rings, so Ann says, “That must be Van Cleef & Arpels.” 40 Carats tries mightily to entertain, and watching the filmmakers exert so much wasted effort is exhausting. (Available through Columbia Screen Classics via WarnerArchive.com)

40 Carats: FUNKY

A Bridge Too Far (1977)

          Go figure that a movie about a military operation that was thwarted by excessive ambition would itself be thwarted by excessive ambition. Based on the doomed World War II campaign code-named Operation Market Garden, which was staged in late 1944 by Allied forces eager to maximize the gains of D-Day by ending the European component of the war with a push across Holland into Germany, A Bridge Too Far features one of the most impressive all-star casts of the ’70s, in addition to spectacular production values and a few powerful depictions of heroism and tragedy. Furthermore, the movie deserves ample praise for bucking war-movie convention by dramatizing a campaign that didn’t work. And, indeed, the theme evoked by the poetic title—sometimes, just one X factor stands between glory and ignominy—comes across in several key performances. Yet occasional glimpses of effective storytelling do not equal a completely satisfying movie, and A Bridge Too Far fails on many important levels when analyzed in its entirety.

          The movie is hard to follow, because it tracks too many characters in too many locations, and because, quite frankly, director Richard Attenborough fails to give greater dramatic weight to crucial moments. Everything in A Bridge Too Far is presented with almost exactly the same measure of gravitas, so Attenborough squanders interesting potentialities found throughout the movie’s script, which was penned by two-time Oscar winner William Goldman. Clearly, Attenborough and Goldman were both stymied, to a degree, by the sheer scale of the undertaking; producer Joseph E. Levine made it plain he wanted this movie to equal the 1962 epic The Longest Day, another all-star war picture based on a book by Cornelius Ryan.

          Yet while The Longest Day had the advantages of a triumphant subject (D-Day) and a receptive audience (moviegoers still embraced pro-military themes in the early ’60s), A Bridge Too Far is a far different creature—a story of battlefield hubris made at a time when America was still reeling from the traumas of the Vietnam War. So, even if the movie possessed a clearer narrative, chances are it still would’ve been the wrong movie at the wrong time.

          Having said all that, A Bridge Too Far has many noteworthy elements. The subject matter is fascinating, since Ryan’s book itemized the innumerable strategic errors made by the Allies in planning Operation Market Garden—beyond problems of scale, since the campaign involved things like an air drop of 35,000 paratroopers, the plan was so contingent upon component elements that if any one piece of the plan failed, the whole campaign would collapse. Therefore, the movie is a study of men who represent the margin of error that Operation Market Garden cannot afford—whether they’re Americans, Brits, or Poles, the soldiers in this movie try to achieve the impossible even when it’s plainly evident success is beyond their grasp.

          The most vivid moments involve Sean Connery and Anthony Hopkins as British officers trying to hold the Dutch town of Arnhem for days on end despite a crippling lack of reinforcements and supplies. Robert Redford dominates a key sequence in the third and final hour of the movie, playing an American officer who leads a seemingly suicidal charge across a heavily fortified river in broad daylight. Maximilian Schell makes an elegant impression as a German commander capable of mercy and ruthlessness, while Dirk Bogarde is appropriately infuriating as Schell’s opposite number on the Allied side, a British general who refuses to acknowledge the possibility of failure.

          Unfortunately, many promising characterizations are merely sketches: Actors Michael Caine, Edward Fox, Elliot Gould, Gene Hackman, Hardy Kruger, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O’Neal, and Liv Ullmann each have colorful moments, but all are badly underutilized. And as for James Caan, his entire showy sequence could have been deleted without affecting the story, since his subplot feels like a leftover from a World War II movie actually made during World War II. Ironically, though, his are among the film’s most memorable scenes.

A Bridge Too Far: FUNKY

Zandy’s Bride (1974)

          Of the many peculiar ’70s subgenres for which I have undying fondness, the revisionist Western is perhaps the most rewarding. Filmmakers in the ’70s went nuts overturning the tropes of a beloved Hollywood genre, using gritty realism to transform Westerns into social commentary. Those highfalutin ambitions go a long way toward explaining Zandy’s Bride, the story of a grudging romance that develops between a son-of-a-bitch rancher and his mail-order bride. While the underlying story is familiar, the sort of thing John Wayne might have made in the ’40s or ’50s, the execution is unsentimental. It’s hard to envision Wayne proclaiming, as the lead character in this film does, that he doesn’t need his wife for sex, because he’s content with “the five sisters,” meaning the fingers of his right hand. Similarly, it’s difficult to picture the Duke ditching his long-suffering spouse every time the local tramp comes sniffing around. None of this should create the illusion that Zandy’s Bride fully overcomes the trite rhythms of its storyline. Rather, these remarks should contextualize Zandy’s Bride as a nasty ride through terrain that, seen previously, might have seemed idyllic.

          Gene Hackman, adding yet another scowling meanie to his gallery of cinematic pricks, is frightening as reclusive rancher Zandy Allen. Eking out a rugged existence on his small California homestead, he sends away for a spouse, expecting nothing more than someone to share his workload and spew children. Matching Hackman’s energy is the formidable Swedish actress Liv Ullmann, who plays Hannah Lund, the woman who accepts Zandy’s overture. She alienates Zandy the moment she arrives, because she’s in her 30s and not the dewy young thing he expected. Having left her old life behind, so she has no choice but to endure his abuse for as long as she can. Once the couple experiences assorted frontier travails together, they fight burgeoning affection, as if warmth is a sign of weakness. Yet the more they fortify their respective emotional boundaries, the more they realize they’re compatible enough to coexist.

          The picture’s evocative portrayal of the natural world makes sense, seeing as how director Jan Troell previously made the acclaimed foreign films The Emigrants (1971) and The New Land (1972), which dramatized the experiences of Swedish people relocating to the American frontier. The film’s dour portrait of life for women in the Wild West also rings true, and vivid characterizations by supporting players Frank Cady, Eileen Heckart, Harry Dean Stanton, and especially Susan Tyrell add to the effect. Though Zandy’s Bride is too long at 116 minutes, the ending pays things off nicely, and the picture is replete with gorgeous images: Cinematographer Jordan Cronenweth creates the palpable sense of a frontier that’s simultaneously liberating and oppressive.

Zandy’s Bride: GROOVY