This is one of those “love ain’t the right word” moments… but I loved this movie. It’s a completely devastating portrayal of how war affects people etc, but on a broader level, to me, how the basic rocky road of life, its various insanities, etc, affects us too. There’s a moment at the end when our heroes are finally escaping to (hopefully) a new, more peaceful life, and the man steering the boat simply gives up and slides into the water; I couldn’t help seeing that man as “god” (or whoever’s ‘steering’ the world), and the way Max Von Sydow simply watches him, passive, uncaring, eyes glazed, as he leaves them practically dead in the water, is the true picture of abandonment.

The style of the movie is that which I love the most – it’s thrown together out of big, intense chunks of film, it’s in your face, and you’ve just got to go with it: some of the negative reviews I’ve read of the movie seem to be thinking about it too much; to me, quite simply, it’s a portrayal of the insanity of the human condition to which we can all fall victim to. To that end, it’s a masterpiece.

There’s no score which would usually bother me, it’s a rare film that can get into my head without some great music behind it, but this one works. The first half hour or so is almost too much to bear, and the effects are perfect. Max Von Sydow and Liv Ullmann are, of course, brilliant as always. My favourite Ingmar Bergman movie so far, I’m beginning to really really love this guy.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 1st, 2005 at 4:11 pm and is filed under 5 hearts, Movie Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.