Cries & Whispers (1972) User Reviews

A quietly disturbing work of genius

[j30bell · 9/10 · 20 December 2004]

In a perfect demonstration that horror and trauma are the stuff of real, everyday life and not the macabre vision of fantasists, Cries and Whispers marked Bergman's recovery as one of Europe's greatest film directors.

Like most Bergman films, Cries and Whispers is concerned with death, the suffering before death and the re-evaluation of life that death brings. It centres on three sisters: one dying of cancer, another trapped in a repellent marriage, and the last engaged in an uncomfortable affair. Moving between these three women is the maid, who tends the dying woman in her agony and, in one stunning scene, holding her to her naked bosom like a mother holding a child.

It is not, then, a barrel of laughs. Bergman films are not often for casual viewing, and I certainly won't be taking this one home to watch with my mother.

Like a great classical composer, Bergman uses contrast to enormous effect. Muted sounds which force you to strain to listen are punctuated with heart-rending screams from the dying Agnes. The colour scheme is a disquieting red, fading into pastoral greens and blues as the women reminisce about their younger life.

The characters also contrast uncomfortably. The two younger sisters, Karin and Maria, are sitting the deathwatch for their sister, but their task arouses no compassion in them. They are appalled and repelled by their sister's suffering, but they will not hold her hand or comfort her. The mutual dislike for each other is palpable. This contrasts with the simple humanism of their maid Anna – whom they callously talk about firing, once their sister is dead.

Set in the late 19th Century, the story flits intermittently between present and past, fleshing out the motivations and the stories of the sisters. One of these flashbacks confronts the audience with one of the most disturbing image in cinema, a repressed Karin cutting her vagina with glass to avoid sex with her husband.

Only a director of Bergman's calibre could make such a film riveting. Yet riveting it is. Bergman gets sensational performances from his four main leads; regulars Liv Ullmann, Ingrid Thurin and Harriet Andersson and a majestic, understated Kari Sylwan. To call this film Ibsenesque would be a slur on the originality of Bergman's vision. It is a testimony to his genius that this may not be his best film, yet it is one of the most striking films in modern cinema. I cannot recommend it highly enough. 9/10.

The Unfathomable Depths of Despair...

[Xstal · 8/10 · 5 February 2023]

Cocooned within a shell, an echo chamber close to hell, as your resonance rebounds, and your conscious thoughts just hound; in a prison made so strong, it encases all lifelong, only two ways to escape, one involves a lifelong wait; though you put on a brave face, mask reality with grace, to remain a little distant, the façade is inconsistent; it's the curse of who you are, the situational bazar, as you're nurtured to be who, the polar opposite of you.

Ingrid Thulin is immense, Harriet Andersson is outstanding, Liv Ullmann is brilliant, the direction and cinematography surreal, the story far from pleasant and often full of pain.

One of Bergman's Most Powerful Works

[gftbiloxi · 9/10 · 21 April 2005]

Upon its release CRIES AND WHISPERS was hailed as one of Bergman's finest films. Although it has not quite held onto that original evaluation, it remains a very fine film--a subtle and delicately performed drama as remarkable for its silence as for its occasional moments of dialogue. And in many respects it offers an extremely good introduction to Bergman's work.

Like many of Bergman's films, CRIES AND WHISPERS shows the director's preoccupations with memory, communication, time, community, and death. The story is bleak: Agnes is dying and her sisters Karin and Maria have come to attend her during this final illness--but they prove unable to communicate in a meaningful way with either Agnes or each other, and Agnes' emotional care is left largely to her long-time maid, the devoted Anna.

As the film unwinds, we are bought into the memories of each woman in turn. The dying Agnes (played with powerful realism by Harriet Andersson) not only grapples with increasing pain, she recalls with regret the emotional separation that existed between her long-dead mother and herself. Sister Maria (Liv Ullman), a mindless sensualist, recalls an act of adultery that has poisoned her marriage; Sister Karin (Ingrid Thulin), who is emotionally cold, recalls an act of self-mutilation designed to thwart her husband's desires. Only the maid Anna (Kari Sylwan), with a peasant's directness, actually works to be of comfort, even going so far as to cradle Agnes' head on her naked breast and dreaming of comforting Agnes while her sisters fail.

The film is ever so delicately tinged with subtle elements of lesbianism, sadomasochism, and incest, and the emotional problems experienced by Maria and Karin are at least partly sexual in nature--but these are not the focus of the film so much as they are surface indications of a deeper internal turmoil. As to what that deeper turmoil is... Bergman might say it is the nature of life itself. We each stand alone, usually in denial of our own mortality, usually unable to reach each other in any meaningful way. A deep film, and in spite of its occasional awkwardness a memorable and touching film. Recommended.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer

The Anatomy of Dysfunction

[nycritic · 10/10 · 17 February 2005]

Cries and Whispers is a powerful study of three sisters and a faithful maid who share a manse in a remote location. One of the sisters, the sympathetic and essentially good-hearted Agnes (Harriet Andersson in a gut-wrenching performance), is dying from an indeterminate cancer, and it is her slow journey towards death, its effect on her sisters and Anna the maid, and its aftermath that is the center of this story. Though why she, and not her sisters, should be afflicted, neither the movie nor Bergman can explain, and rings out as an injustice.

The reason if, the other two sisters are variations of monstrous people who are successful: Karin (Ingrid Thulin) is what seems to be an icy control freak, not a horrible woman, but close, who cannot stand human touch of any kind, and we're privy to her torment in a flashback where she uses a piece of a broken wine glass to literally mutilate her vagina, seemingly enjoying it (as she shocks her husband), while writhing in unspeakable pain. Maria (Liv Ullmann) shows less, is more of an enigma and a hard character to pinpoint, but she's equally manipulative if not flatly repulsive: she not only tries to resume an affair with Agnes' doctor (who points out she her internal ugliness is starting to show through her facial expressions as she apparently enjoys this criticism) but she also fails to help her husband at a critical moment when he stabs himself in the stomach. Later on, both sisters (particularly Karin) verbally express their hatred for each other in a powerful montage that leads to a moment of equally intense reconciliation that comes without the use of dialogue and is emphasized by the swell of music (Chopin). Ingrid Thulin stands out, letting the gamut of Karin's sheer rage our out of her visage while suddenly changing back to a softer self, then to her steely image of self-control and back to fury in a snap of fingers.

There's a lingering question throughout the movie: there must have been some extreme trauma, some truly horrific event (or events), that must have set forth the deluge of pain that rips throughout the entire story right up until the end. Karin herself alludes to the "tissue of lies" that could mean anything: possible sexual abuse by the unseen father, a complicity between Maria and her mother, and Agnes in the center, rejected. Although Karin does mention the revulsion she felt towards Maria, one can only wonder what it was that transpired which seems to have driven her into momentary lapses of insanity. In fact, her self-hatred mirrors Agnes' intense suffering rather closely, although both characters rarely interact and are on entirely different planes. In some ways, it wouldn't be out of place to say that Agnes, despite the unimaginable suffering she endures, serves as merely a catalyst, a materialization of the horror Karin herself has had to face. At least Agnes has experienced a form of love, if selfless, under the guise of Anna who comes to her aid, gives of her breast in an almost saint-like passion. Karin only has the cold future of her own dismal life to face. And Maria isn't even alive, but sadistically observing.

Aside from PERSONA this has to be one of Ingmar Bergman's most powerful works, one that hits an audience at a gut level (cliched as though it may sound). The dominant color red only adds tension to the already tense scenes between the quartet of women (and the men, who only make pat but indelible appearances). Woody Allen would use these stylizations of the face looking dead at the camera, telling a story of its own in INTERIORS, another looks at three sisters, neither of them sympathetic. Grueling, sometimes unwatchable, this is movie watching at its best.

The Sounds Of Cries And Whispers Or A Study In Red

[Galina_movie_fan · 18 March 2006]

The idea of this film that is considered by many as Bergman's crown achievement came to him in his house at Faro where he lived by himself for sometime in a melancholy state of mind after a rather painful breakup. One image kept coming to him and it was a very vivid and persistent image of a red room (red walls, red furniture) and four women sitting at the window in the room and dressed by the fashion of the beginning of the 20th century. He could not shake the image out of his mind and he knew that the only way to deal with it would be to start writing about the women – who were they, what was their relationship, their lives, their fates?.. He also knew that should the movie be made of his writing, the dominating color of it would be red. Bergman talked with affection and gratitude about his friend and long time collaborator Swen Nykwist who spent many days creating the passionate haunting red world of "Cries and Whispers. The title came to Bergman from one of the reviews on a Mozart's sonata (he does not remember which one). The sonata was described as sounds of cries and whispers…

"Cries and Whispers" is about pain, death, love, lust, hate, and self-loathing. There are more than one scene in the film that I found unbearable, horrifying and depressing. In the same time, it is about beauty and power of life, every minute of it - how little we appreciated it until it is too late. Typical Bergman's subjects, Bergman's actresses giving amazing performances, strikingly beautiful – it even hurts your eyes cinematography by Sven Nykvist - typical Bergman's masterpiece - what less do we expect from him? I admire the brilliance of it: acting, cinematography, Bergman's simple but devastating approach to Death as an inevitable part of life. The ending is heartbreaking - with Harriet's face and her words from beyond the grave about appreciating every minute of life...

Powerful and devastating film.

Pain, Hate, Love, God, Death...Yet Another Bergman Masterpiece.

[tony mcarea · 10/10 · 26 October 2006]

How many masterpieces can one director make? In the case of Ingmar Bergman, the answer would be plenty. This is one beautiful, but very painful and at times horrifying film. I think I've yet to see another film that depicts the pain, suffering and despair of dying to such vividness that like the characters, one almost feels the need to look away. The story itself is fairly simple - a woman is in the final stages of cancer/tuberculosis and her two sisters and maid take care of her in her final days - but Bergman's unique narrative style and the complexity and depth of his script turn what at first seems a horror show into a profound meditation on faith, love and mortality. Bergman's direction is simply too perfect. The way the film is conceived visually couldn't be more evocative of its themes. The intensity of the color red to convey the hell these characters are living, and the chamber-like, claustrophobic atmosphere it creates is suffocating and exhausting. Sven Nykvist's Oscar-winning cinematography is simply one of the most inventive and unique I've ever seen in a movie. Bergman's narrative strategy is incredibly thoughtful and effective; it's like the scenes flowed into each other, and despite the horror we are to endure, there is such tact, sensitivity, attention to detail and a feeling of intimacy to every scene. It's simply glorious to behold, appreciate and let yourself be taken by the emotions and insights this film has to offer. All four actresses give spectacular performances: Harriet Andersson (Agnes) is searing physical pain personified, Liv Ullmann (Maria) is so nuanced and real in her flight sensuality (one extended scene that is a close-up to her face is astonishing in the incredible nuances of expressiveness and what the character is trying to conceal but can't), Ingrid Thulin (Karin) is chilling to the bone (and that one scene that is about mutilation in a very sensitive place is for sure one I'll never forget) and Kari Sylwan (Anna) is pure warmth, dedication and love. Bergman has a fame for depicting a bleak and pessimistic view of the world, and I won't argue with that, but I don't think his humanism is addressed very often. I had heard so many things about how depressing and horrifying this film is, and it is indeed, but it is not hopeless. Yes, Bergman suggests that the world can a horrible place and the human experience is full of pain, loneliness and cruelty, but he also suggests that if we extend our love to one another and let ourselves be loved, the burden won't be as hard to bare, and that there will be moments that will bring us love, happiness and grace, as Agnes says in her beautiful and haunting soliloquy. Agnes manages to find solace and consolation even though she's living the most excruciating hell because she allows herself to love and be loved, and her confrontation with death won't be as terrifying. Maria and Karin on the other hand, as the film suggests, will have to endure the pain and fear of dying in utter loneliness because they don't allow themselves to be loved and have lost the ability to love as well. The film is also bold and insightful enough to suggest that the most awful of circumstances in which a human being can be is paradoxically what strengthens one's faith and love, therefore sustaining one's existence.

A Masterpiece.

Death, pain, grief, guilt... and love

[Jon Kolenchak · 9/10 · 3 December 2001]

Death is one of those things that no one really likes to talk about. When a family member or loved one is terminally ill, the lives of all that surround the individual change, sometimes forever.

This film deals with a terminally ill woman, her devoted servant, and the woman's two sisters, brought together by the tragedy. As the women live through the last days of their dying sister, the superficial layers of each begin to disintegrate, and we eventually see the very core of their being --and it isn't always pretty.

Also not pretty are the deathbed scenes. I found them harrowing, painful and frighteningly realistic. No one at the bedside had any sense of the purpose of so much pain -- not even the priest.

Bergman uses silence like other directors use explosions. The ticking and chiming of the clock are almost startling as time drags on and on. Everyone waits for the inevitable, and the inevitable takes it time.

The cinematography is extraordinary, as is the use of color. Red is used to an almost overwhelming degree, but also used to perfection. When I think of red, several ideas or images come to mind, such as blood, passion, and heat. Each of these are presented in various degrees in this film.

The redeeming figure in this film is the servant. Her love for the dying woman is completely unconditional and selfless. It was for her grief that I wept.

Sad, cold, profoundly desperate

[DennisLittrell · 9/10 · 31 December 1999]

To see Liv Ullmann, whose nature is so warm and natural, play a role in which her warmth is superficial and fraudulent, is a little offsetting; yet, great actress that she is, she pulls it off, so that if I had never seen her before, I would believe she was that way.

"Cries and Whispers," much ballyhooed, I recall, when it appeared, seems too psychoanalytically intense today; dark and mysterious, beautifully filmed in an intense red-yes, very striking against the northern cold, but somehow not entirely convincing. The people are cynically presented as tortured animals caring only for themselves, without a scrap of genuine feeling for others. Anna, the maid, is the exception, so that she may serve as a foil for the rest of them.

Harriet Andersson gives a striking performance as Agnes who is dying of cancer. I have seen what she portrays, and can tell you she expressed it in all its horror and hopelessness. Ullmann plays Maria, one of her sisters who touches others easily, but without real feeling, so that the touches mean nothing. For those who grew up cinematically during the seventies, she was a great, expressive, sensual, flawless star of the screen, one of Ingmar Bergman's jewels. Bergman himself of course was already a legend by the time this film was made, a great master who did what he wanted and what he felt, yet never lost sight of the audience. What he seems to be saying here is we are desperate creatures living a cold and ultimately empty existence. The ending clip seems an after thought that seeks our redemption, but it arrives too little too late. We are lost.

(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon!)

I just did not "get" this one

[AlsExGal · 6/10 · 12 June 2016]

If you're sick of the current trend of having movies use a mostly teal color palette with orange for the explosions, then this is the movie for you. Ingmar Bergman and his cinematographer, Sven Nykvist, use a palette of red, red, red, red, and red as a backdrop for their story of three sisters in circa-1900 Sweden. Agnes (Harriet Andersson) is dying of cancer, and her two sisters Karin (Ingrid Thulin) and Maria (Liv Ullmann) come to comfort her in her final days. Not that they're much comfort, since the whole family is dysfunctional for reasons that are never clearly delineated. And they all have bizarre sexual hangups.

I'm sure I'll be in the minority, but I found that when it comes to dysfunctional families, this movie pales in comparison to Bergman's later Autumn Sonata. There, the characters are real people and it's easy to identify with them. Here, they seem like little more than ciphers standing in for basic human emotions. It doesn't help that the film is grindingly tedious when it isn't being gratuitously creepy (in the creepy old uncle way, not in the horror movie way). What was the point of the "dream" sequence toward the end, anyways? 5/10 for the story, 9/10 for the cinematography, which won Nykvist an Oscar - it's not just the overwhelming use of red that makes the cinematography interesting. Since I think story is worth more than cinematography, at least to me, I give it a six, mainly because it is Bergman and I want to cut him some slack.

One of Ingmar Bergman's most personal statements, one of his best

[Quinoa1984 · 10/10 · 7 February 2003]

Cries and Whispers is a film that will strike at least one chord with any viewer on its emotional placement, the almost unflinching (and absolutely masterful) camera technique by Sven Nykvist, and with the characterizations from the four female leads, in-particular the dying Harriet Andersson. This is also a film that will be very hard to stomach for most (it was at times for me), with it's sheer display of constant despair and grief, and the overall state of mind these characters hold. Ullman plays Agnes, marked with Tuberculosis, she lays on her death bed like a zombie writhing in pain for the eventual end, with her two sisters, Maria and Karin, and the servant Anna, at her bedside, though seeming at a distance (except for Anna). Bergman also views Maria and Karin's relationships with themselves and their husbands, both rather brutal (Karin has a scene with a shard of glass that had me gasp).

The examination of these roles, and the entire feel of the house, which is always shown as red as blood, make this in the realm of cinematic drama a shocker, and a masterwork to be certain. There's only one aspect of the film that I can criticize: many times in the film Bergman uses a red screen to fade in and fade out, and then again a few seconds later, and this seems to have not much purpose to the symbolic impact since the inside of the house conveys enough that these people are in a metaphorical house of hell already, and the fadings don't add any weight to it. Nevertheless this is one director's great films, a landmark in fact, though this doesn't mean it's quite as accessible as The Seventh Seal or even the epic Fanny and Alexander.

This is cinema for those who almost enjoy, paradoxically, their intestines ripped out and stomped on the floor only to find out it was just an unforgettable dream. Swedish movies rarely get this visceral. A+

Not my cup of tea

[nicholaslalich · 6/10 · 6 June 2011]

Cries and Whispers, is one of the most depressing, disturbing, and sickening films that I have ever seen, and left some haunting images in my mind. If there was a positive note that I could take from viewing this movie, is that Bergman does a tremendous job of really rubbing in those brutal moments. Along with disturbing images, we are forced to stare at the soulless faces of the characters due to close-ups that can last minutes at a time. Unfortunately these close-ups result in extremely slow story development, and makes the viewer beg for a disturbing image to pick up the pace. A classic movie for some, but just not my cup of tea.

A true masterpiece

[elaurens88 · 10/10 · 20 September 2000]

This is one of the most affecting films ever made. I saw it about a year ago and I still can't get it out of my mind. It is one of the few films that manages to ponder profound philosophical questions without becoming self-consciously arty and pretentious. Amazingly, Cries and Whispers is poignant and tender, yet also tough minded. If you haven't seen this film yet, I urge you to rent it. If you like this film I recommend Wild Strawberries, which is an earlier Bergman film.

I was highly disturbed.

[thedarkhorizon · 7/10 · 7 February 2021]

I can't lie: I was highly uncomfortable throughout the film. The topics, the uncomfortably close/intimate visuals, the tensions between the characters, the expressions of pain, the unbearable silence for minutes after minutes. It was not "fun" to watch the film... and difficult to sit through: but I think this makes it a brilliant film, if it could create such strong emotions. It was HIGHLY beautiful, the crimson, the women, the visuals. The images and atmosphere will stay with me a long time. Bergman shows raw conflicts between life and death, beauty and ugliness and the inevitable pains of being human.

"Cries and Whispers" is about pain, death, love, lust, hate, and self-loathing. There are many scenes in the film that I found unbearable, horrifying and depressing. In the same time, it is about beauty and power of life - how little we appreciated it until it is too late. Bergman's actresses giving amazing performances, strikingly beautiful (unreal beauty?). Bergman's simple but devastating approach to Death as an inevitable part of life. The ending is heartbreaking - with Harriet's face and her words from beyond the grave about appreciating every minute of life... Powerful and devastating film.

It is a very interesting, out of the ordinary composition - but I'll also won't watch it again, because it was too depressing and difficult to bear.

Beautiful but Disappointing

[nanana-batman · 3/10 · 6 June 2011]

I found this film really hard to watch. It's probably the fact that I lost someone close to me recently and the movie evoked some negative emotions from me so maybe that is actually a good thing. Pain, hate, and judgement serve as the premise for this film, which happens to be my first Bergman experience so I had no real idea of what to expect. The world within the film is cold and dull, a reflection on the movie itself in my opinion. I couldn't get myself to care for the characters whatsoever. I don't think there was one thing I enjoyed during this film. It's just too simple and too slow for my liking, but hell this is a movie about the human condition and when you're following three depressed souls like these you can't exactly go in a different direction than the way this film went.

My first brush with Bergman

[jrc007 · 30 May 2003]

It was a haunting and shattering film experience, as promised.

I've never before seen a Bergman film, however, judging by the praise awarded to "Cries and Whispers," I decided to try this one out first. And I couldn't have been more rewarded. The film, even though it clocked in at a short ninety-one minutes, I estimate less than half of those minutes contained dialogue. As Gloria Swanson put it in "Sunset Boulevard," they "had faces." And how they used them! The facial expressions and mannerisms the characters in this film used were breathtaking. Going from Liv Ullman's smug, teasing grin in her flashback scene with the doctor to Ingrid Thulin's anguish-cum-rhapsody in the scene with the broken class (that undoubtedly stays in the minds of all who see the film for one reason or another!) is truly incredible. Each character uses their body language to convey the meaning of their characters and their situations. In fact, I could have watched the film in Swedish without English subtitles and still have known perfectly well what was going on. The dialogue was truly superfluous and unnecessary. Combining the characters' body language with Bergman's masterful use of color to convey the personalities of the characters as well as their environment in general is something that (1) I've scarcely, if ever, seen used in a film before and (2) could not stop marvelling at its brilliance.

The performances were top notch. All of the performances by the four leading ladies were exceptional and perfect in every way. The homoeroticism that pervades the film is perfectly captured by the ladies in a manner that is not sexual, but rather something the farthest possible being from sexuality.

I do not even need to speak of Sven Nykvist's cinematography beyond that it is perfection incarnate.

I am now convinced that Bergman is a master, and I cannot wait to see another of his films! Sure, the film is depressing and certainly is not for those who think that "The Italian Job" is the best film of the year, however, for those who can just watch the relationships of the sisters unfold in all its splendor and anguish, this is truly a work of art rivalling those of any medium.

MY RATING: 10/10 (and I don't give tens lightly)

HIGHLIGHTS: Liv Ullmann, Harriet Andersson, Ingrid Thulin, Kari Sylwan, Sven Nykvist's cinematography, Bergman's use of color and his direction in general

A true portrait of human intimacy

[seancriswell · 10/10 · 18 February 2013]

A simple story, but I have never seen a more beautiful portrait of human intimacy. The story follows a women on her deathbed and the 3 women in her life, her two sisters and her maid. Each character is fabulously drawn and fleshed out. Each relationship is as unique as the characters, complicated and diverse. What is beautiful about Bergman's films is the care and precision that goes into every frame. Nothing is wasted, nothing is done by accident. Couple that with someone who truly knows how to pace and tell an interesting story and you have a master of the art. Put all that with his best work and you have a perfect film.

A moving and intelligent film about women

[davidmvining · 10/10 · 25 November 2019]

This movie is more red than Krzysztof Kieslowski's Red. It's more visually precise than perhaps anything Bergman ever made, and the color scheme is just part of it.

Cries and Whispers is the story of three sisters and a maid who have gathered in their childhood home as one of the sisters, Agnes, reaches the end of a 12-year long illness. She's due to die, and everyone knows it. The home itself is a stately manor in Sweden, and every wall is red. With the movie's preoccupation with death and women, the prevalent color brings to mind menstruation and the womb at the same time.

It's obvious from the beginning that there is a great distance between the three sisters. Agnes' illness has kept her isolated from the other two, but Maria and Karin (three always seems to be a Karin in a Bergman film, doesn't there?) simply don't connect. Their talk is halting and brief. In fact, as the movie opens, we understand that there are three sisters and a maid, but the relationships aren't obvious because of how everyone treats each other. Anna, the maid, is assumed to be a sister because of how affectionately she interacts with Agnes.

Through the movie, we see three different flashbacks for each sister. Agnes' revolves around their mother (played, like the adult Maria, by Liv Ullman) and the distance she felt towards her contrasted with her mother's very close relationship with Maria. Maria's flashback deals with an affair she struck up with the local family doctor (played by Erland Josephson, recreating the married couple from Scenes from a Marriage) when her husband was away in town on business. Her husband instinctively knows that the affair happens and makes a sloppy attempt at suicide that we learn, at the end of the movie, didn't work. Karin's flashback demonstrates the complete lovelessness of her own marriage and her self-destructive tendencies. At dinner, she breaks a glass to which her husband barely acknowledges. She then cuts her vagina with a piece of the glass as she prepares for bed and smears the blood over her face in open defiance of her husband who looks on in horror.

Agnes dies, and it is Anna, the maid, who has the most profound reaction. Maria and Karin seemed removed. They had expected the death and don't have the same connection to Agnes. It is here, though, that I think the movie really begins to blossom. Faced with departing the home and selling it off in the wake of Agnes' death, Maria makes a plea to Karin for them to connect. Karin rejects it at first. She confesses a strong hatred for everyone and everything, in particular Maria (and perhaps, by extension, their mother who obviously preferred Maria over the other two sisters). But that anger is fleeting and the two end up talking and embracing in the way that Maria had dreamed. The dialogue falls away, as it is not terribly important to the audience what specifics they speak about only that they speak, and they caress each other's faces in their hands (a common visual motif to imply closeness from Bergman).

But the moment ends, and the strangeness begins as Agnes' dead body speaks to Anna, begging for comfort. She is dead, but she cannot sleep. One after another, the two sisters and then the maid converse with the corpse. Karin expresses pure disgust. Agnes is dead, and this is an abomination. Maria tries to understand, but when Agnes embraces her, Maria reacts in horror and runs away. It is only Anna, the loyal servant, who holds Agnes' rotting corpse affectionately.

After the funeral, everything seems to have returned to how it was. Anna is just a servant again (being dismissed from service with little to nothing in exchange for her 12 years of service). Maria and Karin are cold against each other, but the relationship has reversed. Karin is eager for Maria's emotional warmth, but Maria's warmth suddenly feels threadbare and cold just under the surface (perhaps this is how their mother treated Karin as well whenever they got close). The movie ends with Anna reading from Agnes' diary about a time the previous autumn where the four women had gathered and everything had seemed so happy, leaving the movie on a surprisingly optimistic note considering the emotional devastation and death that we know are to follow.

The movie's central thesis seems to be about the temporary nature of human connection. Agnes' death is the most striking visually, especially with Anna desperate to keep her own connection with Agnes alive through her death. But it hits me most in the stillborn relationship between Maria and Karin. They did connect, and they connected fully, but it wasn't to last. In some ways, there are echoes of the merge of personalities seen in Persona, but Cries and Whispers makes it more nihilistic, perhaps.

It's a moving and intelligent film.

Deep, Dark, and Disturbing

[kyle-oloughlin89 · 8/10 · 26 July 2012]

This Bergman film walks us through a story of 3 sisters who you could argue, may not even be sisters due to their painfully awkward and dysfunctional relationships with one another. One of the sisters is dying from what seems to be a very painful and slow death. There is Agnes,(the sick sister) Karin, (the well off, but seemingly most disturbed) , and Maria (who seems almost soft and naive). I really loved how Bergman was able to convey the true pain of death in this film. It really stuck with me for a long time. I found myself thinking about all the families who deal with these sort of tragedies on a daily basis. I also feel that this film is conveying a method that regardless of the situation if a family has problems that go unresolved they all end up paying for it in the end. There is a lot of use of the color red in this film. Personally I took it as the color of blood and therefor death and pain, obviously in the dying sisters case, but maybe even more so with the family structure. Unfortunately, because it was so sad and dark it did leave me feeling very depressed and questioning what would it be like for myself in that situation. I have really put much more though into my family bonds and relationships since viewing this film. If you are looking for a dark film done excellent this is perfect for you. I hop you enjoy. Disclaimer: I do not recommend watching this film if you are in a dark place emotionally.

Repulsion and Desire

[xenia-shin · 9/10 · 10 February 2012]

This film is interesting in the way it plays with repulsion and desire. The border of the body seems like the border of the self, indicating when a person can go beyond themselves out of love for another. It is a quite bleak view, as even when there is love shown in the film between Agnes, the lamb, and her servant, Anna, there is a quality of repulsion we as viewers are induced to feel so that love seems unreachable.

The duality of the character of Maria/the mother makes her a universal figure raising our own issues with Mother. As Maria she is sensual when she takes in the doctor's finger in her mouth, feeding her ego, yet she fears the touch associated with death. She is almost comical in her selfishness, refusing to help her husband who is bleeding from a self-inflicted knife wound; she recoils visibly rather than reaching toward him which would be the expected reaction. It's also interesting how the doctor, who desires her, tears her apart with his words in hate, just as the sister Karin does to her later, as though in desiring too much, one comes to hate that one is so vulnerable and dependent (as with a Mother). The film shows this painful, infantile disappointment of not getting everything one needs. (This is seen at the end when Maria turns away from Karin and does what Karin probably feared most - Maria rejects her when Karin has opened herself up).

It is interesting that the film shows the scandalous nature of death - in the scene where Agnes calls (from death) for someone to warm her hands, it's asking for love to overcome the physical repulsion that is a natural response to death. Hence one could read this almost a refusal of faith and God - a desire to believe yet unable to. It is reminiscent of Flaubert's story "St Julian the Hospitaler," where Julian must warm the leper's body with his own.

Illusion

[kosmasp · 6/10 · 8 September 2011]

Just the fact, that I only gave this 6 out of 10 will make quite a few people not liking my review. And I can understand that some people are very into this movie. I would have loved to feel the same way, but although I think it superb (from a technical viewpoint) it didn't do as much as movie itself to me.

I guess the recent movie Amer might be one to compare this with, though even that did more to me, even without a coherent plot to follow that this one. One thing is for sure though: This might not be the right choice to start, if you haven't seen any Bergman before. The fact that they had a Bergman retrospective in Berlin was a good way for quite a few people to get their Bergman or rediscover him.

Discovering is also a theme in the movie, which might bedazzle or not. Depending on your view of that, it will do either wonders and make you love this or not.

The silence of a Bergman film can tear the flesh right from your body

[zetes · 10/10 · 16 January 2001]

Ingmar Bergman makes the sorts of intellectually challenging films that are almost not allowed anymore. The younger generation is basically taught that the sorts of profound questions that Bergman asks (and Bergman more than any other auteur, for even the most highly respected auteurs, Truffaut, Fellini, Kurosawa, Kubrick, shied away from subjects such as Bergman has tackled) are unnecessary. They are taught this because, if they were to willingly examine the emptiness of human existence, they would quickly fail to participate in all the lovely shadows on the cave wall, and then society would go kaput.

Truthfully, I have not seen all that many Ingmar Bergman films. This shocked me, too, as I realized this. Before I came to college, I rented his most famous film, The Seventh Seal. Even the uneducated realize upon seeing it that it is one of the best films ever made. Next, probably the next week after I saw The Seventh Seal, I rented his second most famous film: Wild Strawberries. At the time, I did not find it all that interesting. It has been four years since I saw it, and I know I should rent it again, but I remember that I was sure that I understood it when it was over, and that its profundity was slight in comparison with The Seventh Seal. Like I said, I need to see it again. It was some three years later that I saw another Bergman film, Through the Glass Darkly. I was stunned at it, as I was at The Seventh Seal, even if slightly less. And then I saw maybe the greatest film that I ever saw, and it was one of his: Persona, the film that has haunted me for months now.

And now comes my fifth Bergman experience: Cries and Whispers. At first, I found it sort of slow, but that did not last for long. Without even realizing it, at about the half-hour point, I was so drawn in that I was experiencing the same pain as was being experienced by the four main characters onscreen. This is a devastating film. Its silence hurts terribly. And sometimes subtle sound effects scrape across your skin like a fork: the clock especially. Also, the whispers, which turn up as the film has faded out and is fading back in. I know for a fact that Criterion is doing a DVD version of this film, and that is great. On a VHS tape, the static is so loud as to drown out the subtleties on the soundtrack. And then there are the cries, which made me want to cry aloud along with the characters. All in all, my understanding of this completely exhilarating and painful film are weak. But in this lies the greatness of such a film that challenges my intellect. I must think hard about this, reading up on it, and hopefully seeing it again. I do not at all mind having to do this. It is much better than the escapism of an everyday film.

And if you are reading this comment because you love this movie, may I suggest Woody Allen's Hannah and Her Sisters, which was obviously inspired by this film. It is not as great, for it is lighter, but it is a worthwhile followup to the film. Also, William Faulkner's novel As I Lay Dying, which has a somewhat similar plot. It is about a family's relationship as concerns their dead mother.

not one of my favorites but it wasn't bad

[matin_pop · 6/10 · 15 June 2009]

one of the weirdest movies i have to say. i honestly didn't find it that interesting because it wasn't the type of movie that made me want to watch more of. the overall message was a good one but the movie itself i wasn't pretty sure about. at parts i found it to be boring. its a very intense movie. some scenes were perfectly shot. the use of color was interesting as well. some scenes i got very confused but then towards the end i found out why. the actors did a very very good job in acting tho, it was very real and natural acting. the title has much to say about the movie itself. i have to admit that it had a pretty interesting moral/message to it.

Autumn attrition

[ALauff · 10/10 · 3 October 2007]

A single bell rings plaintively over scarlet credits and a dawn view of an estate's verdant courtyard. Inside, a woman lies dying in a scarlet-sheeted bed. Her auburn-haired sister rests on a scarlet chaise lounge, an easy smile on her lips. Time slowly passes on ornate Stockholm grandfather clocks. The screen fades to scarlet. Setting a mesmeric mood from the outset is vital for this, a film about staring inward and confronting the burden of existence.

The dying woman is Agnes (Harriet Andersson), whose exterior agony obscures a divine spirit. Maria (Liv Ullmann), the auburn-haired sister, has an easily lovable face and a conditional heart. The juxtaposition of their faces at the film's beginning encapsulates one of Bergman's primary concerns: the inseparable, misleading link between exterior and interior states. Anna (Kari Sylwan), humble, lifelong servant to sisters Agnes, Maria, and imperious Karin (Ingrid Thulin), has a straightforward gaze, an open face, and a wellspring of compassion. She and Agnes form a connection apart from the sisters, as they are both selfless and pious, their souls ripe for grace.

Maria and Karin, adrift in a scarlet swirl of memories, are haunted by traumas of the past. Bergman sets up their reminiscences in identical, meditative fashion: close-ups on their half-shadowed faces, their eyes illustrating unbearable thoughts as a collection of hushed voices rise on the soundtrack before the screen fades to scarlet, commencing snapshots of their souls narrated by an omniscient male voice. What they're haunted by is far from the ethereal stuff of dreams, but tangible moments of weakness and dread: Maria's horror at her oblique cruelty at a life-or-death moment and Karin's fear of filling out an unfeeling, meaningless existence that leads her to commit an act of self-mutilation. Their mutual loneliness leads them to one another and a temporary spiritual breakthrough. The offhand cruelty with which this connection is severed is the film's greatest tragedy, which destroys one sister's potential to love and signals an apathetic regression for the other. Twelfth Night, which they've celebrated in their family home since childhood, is their tenuous next encounter, resigning them to a circuitous life of re-treading the past, ghosts in an incestuous shared dwelling.

But what of Anna's vision? It's set up exactly as Maria and Karin's memories (sans male narrator to introduce the event), but details a miraculous scenario that's a window into Anna's eternal care-giving nature. Her dream's unreality—shot with calculated zooms and tracks that depart from the entombed staging of the others—casts a modicum of doubt on the veracity of Maria and Karin's memories: did their traumas actually occur or are they merely manifestations of the sisters' interior sickness? If the latter, then the relative materiality, punitive bloodletting, and contained form fascinatingly evoke spiritual attrition, whereas Anna's "soul," with its freer form, generously courts death to help another achieve salvation, thereby exorcising its own repressed scars. Even the eulogizing priest, who prays that Agnes carry the message of human misery to God, can't boast such purity of faith. Only simple, pious Anna has the lightness of spirit to deliver her beloved Agnes into the next world and to carry within her Agnes's words of gratitude for the ephemeral joys of life.

With Cries and Whispers, Bergman gave the human soul an illuminating shape and texture, contradicting the notion that his entire vision of human existence was draconian bleakness. In his images of suffering, one encounters not a dead end but a fine light twinkling faintly with hope, a spiritual optimism embodied by Agnes's final, autumnal memory.

Great Bergman

[gavin6942 · 7/10 · 14 April 2015]

When a woman (Harriet Andersson) dying of cancer in early twentieth-century Sweden is visited by her two sisters, long-repressed feelings between the siblings rise to the surface.

It was for the saturated color and light scheme that cinematographer Sven Nykvist was awarded the Academy Award for Best Cinematography. The picture has five nominations in all, including Best Picture, which is quite a feat for a foreign film.

Bergman, despite a whole list of great films to his credit, had trouble financing the picture. Ultimately, to save costs, the main actresses and Nykvist gave their salary as a loan and were nominally co-producers. As such, depending on how their contracts were worded, they may have come out far ahead in the process.

Most interestingly, the film could not find US distribution because it was (again) deemed to be "not commercial" (which may be fair). Thus, by pure chance, this highly acclaimed picture fell in the lap of Roger Corman, who had just started his own distribution company (New World). Corman paid Bergman $75,000 for it and made $1 million in profit, which no doubt went to finance future Corman projects. This may be the single most artistic film ever associated with Corman, and surely the highest-rated.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar...

[MPsFlyingCircus · 3/10 · 17 March 2004]

...and sometimes an excructiating cinematic experience is just an excruciating cinematic experience. The sets were jarring. There is no story. There is no character development. Beauty, of any type, is sparse. However, there is pain - and lots of it! Is that the mark of a great film - pain without reason, resolution, or purpose? I don't see how that is 'art'.

Where is the deep meaning? Or, is there meant to be anything more than pain, suffering, and death? Hopefully there is some great lesson here and I'm just too ignorant to have seen it; otherwise, all those people who hold this movie in high regard must have fallen prey to Art Student Pitfall Number 1: "If you don't like it, understand it, or think it skillful, but it is held in reverent awe by the art establishment, keep discussing it in late night bull sessions with your friends and you're bound to justify it to some vague degree eventually". Why take the time to try to rationalize something this void? Just call it what it is - a pretentious, painful bore - and spend your evening watching Citizen Kane for the tenth time. You're guaranteed to get something new with each viewing.

Honestly, if you want to watch Bergman, rent "The Seventh Seal". At least there is one great image in that film; and, the idea of playing chess with Death will keep you and your friends amused into the wee hours of the morning.

However, if you insist on watching it, do yourself a favor and heed my advice: take two Coen Bros, and call me in the morning.