Persona

[e-ssam]

Does the scene happen in Elisabet's imagination, and Bergam is hinting at that via the extreme close-ups and dreamlike aspect of the entire thing? Regardless of whether or not either of these interpretations is true, to be able to deduce what "really" happened at this point, you'd have to track the allusions, internal relations, and explanations(while maintaining chronological consistency), and then contextualize these things within the film holistically. There are more allusions and interrelations in that scene alone than the ones I just pointed out, and throughout the whole film; it's all hard to even write about.

It could be Alma or Elisabet's pretty much imo, or maybe it switches, it wouldn't make much of a difference.
but i don't think anything happens in imagination, or anyone's imagination imo, that sequencing is a bit irrelevant, even for Bergman since he is tracking more or less the tension occuring in the whole social sphere, and the more merged they get the whole film goes in that direction more, which is mainly what he attempts for in close ups, (and probably the main reason too he likes them )

So you're saying you think everything that we see on the screen actually happens, though it might be out of sequence?

(sorry I phrased it weirdly, hopefully this makes more sense)

I'm not fully sure what "actually happens" is (as you said it all happened on some level)..like
if you wake up in a dream but you're still dreaming, does is it a different dream or is it the same one?
It feels like that, but in addition to sharing the same dream with someone, whose dream is it? and which perspective is it from?
Whatever the plane is, where it is coming from doesn't change that it's happening/had happened.

Elisabet and Alma switch attitudes with the husband after each shot, and if we go with those scenes as "dreams/nightmares" within the events, it could be a fantasy/dream "of winning" for one of them or a nightmare for the other. Elisabet speaking too at the hospital towards the end, at whose end is it happening?
And it doesn't completely happen out of the blue either, the film is structured to fit that "episodic" form from the beginning, although it starts normal and unambiguous and it does keep getting weirder after the middle transition and more on "moment to moment" happenings connected via the emotional intensity. And if it wasn't that from the start, then I don't see a point in the opening sequence at all, it could've had the middle act and the ending ones only then.

So, I *think* what it is, is yes. Everything between Alma & Elisabet occur on one plane and we see it from that one plane throughout the whole film

[Vincent]

In my opinion, nature was portrayed quite interestingly throughout the film—

To provide an example, I'd urge you to look closely at the shot at 43:50: this is the scene directly after Alma discovers Elisabet’s letter, and we see Alma outside, under the shade of some trees. Alma remains in high-key lighting, but the trees, despite being in the forefront, are in very low-key lighting, almost black. However, although the camera placement in the mise-en-scene definitely seems intentional, the lighting itself seems natural, untouched by Bergman. I was inclined to see this almost as though Bergman was using nature 'subliminally;' by depicting nature authentically, almost non-diegetically, and contrasting it with the inauthenticity of the film’s narrative world, he reminds the viewer of the distinction between the shadowy inexplicability/background presence of our natural condition and the lenses we see our condition through—the human experience, the “roles” and “personas” we interact through, and experiential lenses we see our lives through as opposed to seeing life-in-itself.

In addition to your guys' notes, what did you guys think of the way Bergman represented nature?

For me, there isn't really anything ultimately inauthentic about the narrative of the relationship between the two women on the island; they revert to a primal, animalistic state, alternating roles of predator and prey. This is why it doesn't matter in the ambiguous parts what 'really' happens, because they're partaking of an elemental consciousness together. So they fit in very well as part of that rather unforgiving isolated nature.

Yes, i could not agree more.
It was very obvious to me from the first watch that Alma and Elisabet were both going wild together on that island, hunting each other.

Now that i watched it for a second time, i just remembered a word i learned when i was reading Norse Sagas as a kid.
Holmgang
Etymologically, it means "going to the island"
But it was an euphemism for a kind of ritual duel; or trial by combat.
A (beta) dare that couldn't be refused and that, interestingly enough, usually stopped when the first blood was dropped.

That island is just the perfect setting for Alma and Elisabet's Holmgang.

And that's another reason we shouldn't try to over-theorize or over-interpret what happens.
We are not summoned as judges, or members of a jury. Only as witnesses.

[Vincent]

"It demands interpretation but it seems it also challenges us to resist the temptation to over-interpret it."

Precisely. To be honest, Persona frustrated me, a lot. I feel checkmated, in a cerebral deadlock, struggling to relocate and subsequently organize every internal allusion, relation and causal explanation throughout the film into some coherent, articulable whole.

Well, i feel checkmated too.
But it didn't frustrate me at all.
It kind of does the opposite.
I find this movie healing. Strongly and deeply therapeutic.
And this is in large part because it defeats the will to know and analyze.
It frees us from both the temptation of silence and from the need to articulate.

For instance, in that scene just before Alma [appears to] sleep with Elisabet's husband, we see the husband refer to Alma as Elisabet despite her protests, "I'm not your wife," which the husband responds to in the same exact understanding way that he did in his letter to Elisabet to much earlier(Elisabet's silent protest may be received by the husband also as Elisabet saying "I'm not your wife"). Then Alma resigns, Elisabet's face is only inches away (filmed in extreme close-up), and at 1:05:50 we see Alma basically exclaim "I'm cold and rotten and indifferent. It's all lies and imitation," which is exactly what Elisabet is accused of being at the beginning of the film by both Alma and the psychiatrist. Is this whole scene Alma's psychic merging as demonstrated near the beginning of their stay? Does the scene happen in Elisabet's imagination, and Bergam is hinting at that via the extreme close-ups and dreamlike aspect of the entire thing? Regardless of whether or not either of these interpretations is true, to be able to deduce what "really" happened at this point, you'd have to track the allusions, internal relations, and explanations(while maintaining chronological consistency), and then contextualize these things within the film holistically. There are more allusions and interrelations in that scene alone than the ones I just pointed out, and throughout the whole film; it's all hard to even write about.

One of the things that strikes me the most in the scene with the husband is the hands.
The hand of Herr Vogler on Alma's shoulders.
The hand of Alma around her neck.
Elisabet's hand taking Alma's hand, then guiding it to Herr Volger's face

hands.png (644.07 KiB) Viewed 3209 times

I don't know what "really happened" in that scene. There is just no way to know.

But since i was already remembering the sagas, it made me think about Loki guiding the hand of the blind God Hödr to trick him into killing Baldr, the prince of the God.

[Vincent]

Well, first of all, I don't think he's gamma. I think he's an 'evolutionary beta'. He's far too focused on our struggle for individuation, so not first slot Fi, and also on 'barbarian' elements like werewolves and vampires (which I should have mentioned when I pointed out four mythic traditions--Greek classics, Christianity, psychology, and film history. He has a fifth, which is folklore of the woods, so to say). And in interviews he's just much too chill for both SeNi and FiTe axes. But another thing is FiSe regardless of structure is Ne PolR. Everything is designed to hone in. Ni agenda is at the expense of Ne. Bergman is constantly moving the goal posts.

So yeah, I would say creative subtype FeNi with extreme Fi unignoring is still more likely than FiSe no matter how much it jumps. I watched interviews with him, Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson. Liv seems SiFe and Bibi I'm not sure but these are 'homey' people. All, including him. FiSe is 'tribe rejecting', an arch-individualist. Bergman doesn't seem so--and his films may be about how painful the societal transition from beta to gamma is.

But I should have clarified that. Pretty much everyone assumes he must be Fi > Fe.

Yes.
I know i did.
And i was really surprised by how non-gamma the movie actually is.
And by how strongly i relate to it too.

i definitely agree that Ne polr seems pretty much impossible.

At this point, i'm pretty sure that beta is right, and that he is indeed either NiFe or FeNi creative subtype.
I'm leaning toward the former right now but... i'm going to rewatch it again (and take another look at interviews).

tbcd.

[Vincent]

And if it wasn't that from the start, then I don't see a point in the opening sequence at all, it could've had the middle act and the ending ones only then.

So, I *think* what it is, is yes. Everything between Alma & Elisabet occur on one plane and we see it from that one plane throughout the whole film

I'm not sure i'm following you here.
Are you saying that if, for example, we interpret the husband scene as happening in Alma's fantasy, then we should retroactively interpret the whole film, from beginning to the end, as happening on the single plane of Alma's imagination ?

To me the opening sequence screams something like "this will be endless", and the point of it kind of is that there is no point.
And i don't see why we should "flatten" things into a single plane here, when so much of the movie is about doubling and duality

[Roshan]

In considering Bergman's type we ought not to forget such likewise auteur films of his as "Smiles of a Summer NIght", preceding The Seventh Seal and the trilogy, but when he was already more than established enough in Sweden to choose his subject. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if he turns out to be FeNi creative. And Si PolR 'counterphobic' is by no means impossible. Apparently the Swedes were horrified by the historical liberties he took with The Seventh Seal in collapsing the entire Medieval Period to make the film he felt like making. (Plus I notice this is the second time I find myself saying he just "felt like' doing something. )

I've been out and about in the Matrix looking into various things that have emerged on this thread, and it turns out he used a lot of personal names over and over in his films for different characters. Among them are Alma and Elisabet's last name, Vogler (about which more to come). That also seems beta >> gamma. The characters are just not really individuals, they are somehow intertwined in a seamless transcendent collective, no matter how much they hate it. I mean it's not that I don't partake of this view at all; I just find this thing with the names non-gamma and somewhat evocative of Eliot's fundamental stance toward Fi in The Wasteland. So I really don't see Bergman as in the opposite quadra to Alpha. CInema as 'modern Jungian folklore' also springs to mind.

tbcd. Endless...

[Roshan]

I have also come across the interesting tidbit that the teenage Ingmar was an admirer of Hitler, much to the adult's shame and chagrin.

[e-ssam]

And if it wasn't that from the start, then I don't see a point in the opening sequence at all, it could've had the middle act and the ending ones only then.

So, I *think* what it is, is yes. Everything between Alma & Elisabet occur on one plane and we see it from that one plane throughout the whole film

I'm not sure i'm following you here.
Are you saying that if, for example, we interpret the husband scene as happening in Alma's fantasy, then we should retroactively interpret the whole film, from beginning to the end, as happening on the single plane of Alma's imagination ?
Flatten in the sense of, removing the differentiation of the planes. and that one plane isn't So Alma's fantasy doesn't "exist", same reason that they are in a literal sense doubling

To me the opening sequence screams something like "this will be endless", and the point of it kind of is that there is no point.
Right, and the rest of the movie goes with that. It can't be quite interpreted because, in some way, there is nothing to interpret. I don't think that would've stayed throughout if it wasn't for the opening.
(which is what i meant by flattening but yeah, it doesn't quite fit the word )
And i don't see why we should "flatten" things into a single plane here, when so much of the movie is about doubling and duality
You're right, and flattening is not the proper term to use (couldn't think of any better tho), but Roshan said collapse which fits better, a collective one of all perspectives, sort of speak.

[e-ssam]

For anyone interested in Bergman's process
a documentary on the making of Autumn Sonata (3 and half hours long)
Covers almost everything from pre production to the end of production


There is this one on the making of Winter Light (5 parts, only the two parts on filming and the one on the premiere are on youtube though) but in a more interview-form, made for the swedish television at the time.

[Roshan]

Thanks, e-ssam!

I'd rather watch the second one first because Autumn Sonata was already late 70s. But for that I'd like to see WInter Light before I do. I have never seen it.

Not surprisingly, since I was in college then, I saw Autumn Sonata when it came out. Which could only be done at an actual movie theater. But ftr I saw Sawdust and Tinsel on late night tv on one of the three non-network channels when I was like ten. Somehow someone would occasionally sneak that type of film onto tv at like 3 a.m.