What do you think?
Rate this book
Cris et chuchotements: suivi de Persona et de Le Lien
Il n'est pas nécessaire d'avoir vu les films de Bergman pour prendre plaisir à la lecture de ces scénarios dont l'histoire se déroule comme une «simple ligne mélodique», avec ses temps forts, laissant de côté le détail du découpage.
Persona, qui met en scène l'actrice Elisabeth Vogler et son infirmière Alma qui la soigne pour une dépression nerveuse et cherche à la faire sortir du silence où elle s'est enfermée, Le lien, où nous voyons Karin prise entre son amant et sa vie conjugale, Cris et chuchotements où trois sœurs, dont l'une se meurt d'un cancer, sont réunies dans la maison familiale avec la servante Anna, figurent parmi les chefs-d'œuvre d'un art qui cristallise «le désir de briser l'isolement et la distance». Tensions, passions, affrontements, déchirures sont les hantises de Bergman, qu'il nous livre ici, avec un peu de lui-même, discrètement exprimé. Ainsi à propos du rouge des décors de Cris et chuchotements : «Ne me demandez pas pourquoi ce doit être ainsi», mais il ajoute que peut-être cette idée vient de très loin, de l'enfance, et que cette couleur a toujours représenté pour lui l'«intérieur de l'âme». Cinéma, écriture : deux moyens d'expression. Bergman a conscience que les mots ne pourront jamais rendre dans son intégralité ce qui se passe dans un film. «C'est pourquoi j'offre au lecteur un texte très sommaire, un cryptogramme qui, dans le meilleur des cas, touchera l'imagination et la réflexion de chacun.» Une telle modestie ne fait que souligner l'évidence de la réussite.
Persona, qui met en scène l'actrice Elisabeth Vogler et son infirmière Alma qui la soigne pour une dépression nerveuse et cherche à la faire sortir du silence où elle s'est enfermée, Le lien, où nous voyons Karin prise entre son amant et sa vie conjugale, Cris et chuchotements où trois sœurs, dont l'une se meurt d'un cancer, sont réunies dans la maison familiale avec la servante Anna, figurent parmi les chefs-d'œuvre d'un art qui cristallise «le désir de briser l'isolement et la distance». Tensions, passions, affrontements, déchirures sont les hantises de Bergman, qu'il nous livre ici, avec un peu de lui-même, discrètement exprimé. Ainsi à propos du rouge des décors de Cris et chuchotements : «Ne me demandez pas pourquoi ce doit être ainsi», mais il ajoute que peut-être cette idée vient de très loin, de l'enfance, et que cette couleur a toujours représenté pour lui l'«intérieur de l'âme». Cinéma, écriture : deux moyens d'expression. Bergman a conscience que les mots ne pourront jamais rendre dans son intégralité ce qui se passe dans un film. «C'est pourquoi j'offre au lecteur un texte très sommaire, un cryptogramme qui, dans le meilleur des cas, touchera l'imagination et la réflexion de chacun.» Une telle modestie ne fait que souligner l'évidence de la réussite.
240 pages, Pocket Book
First published January 1, 1979
1 person is currently reading
25 people want to read
About the author
Ingmar Bergman
164 books601 followersErnst Ingmar Bergman was a nine-time Academy Award-nominated Swedish film, stage, and opera director. He depicted bleakness and despair as well as comedy and hope in his explorations of the human condition. He is recognized as one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers in cinematic history.
He directed 62 films, most of which he wrote, and directed over 170 plays. Some of his internationally known favorite actors were Liv Ullmann, Bibi Andersson, and Max von Sydow. Most of his films were set in the stark landscape of his native Sweden, and major themes were often bleak, dealing with death, illness, betrayal, and insanity.
Bergman was active for more than 60 years, but his career was seriously threatened in 1976 when he suspended a number of pending productions, closed his studios, and went into self-imposed exile in Germany for eight years following a botched criminal investigation for alleged income tax evasion.
He directed 62 films, most of which he wrote, and directed over 170 plays. Some of his internationally known favorite actors were Liv Ullmann, Bibi Andersson, and Max von Sydow. Most of his films were set in the stark landscape of his native Sweden, and major themes were often bleak, dealing with death, illness, betrayal, and insanity.
Bergman was active for more than 60 years, but his career was seriously threatened in 1976 when he suspended a number of pending productions, closed his studios, and went into self-imposed exile in Germany for eight years following a botched criminal investigation for alleged income tax evasion.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
April 15, 2021
Honestly life-changing.
October 10, 2025
Cries & Whispers, written and directed by Ingmar Bergman
Nine out of 10
If not the greatest ever, Ingmar Bergman is surely one of the most outstanding, fabulous filmmakers, the genius that has given the History of World Cinema some tremendous, inestimable works of art:
Fanny and Alexander (reviewed here: http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/03/f...), The Virgin Spring (http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/t...)
Smiles of a Summer Night (http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/02/s...), The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries, Persona, Scenes from a Marriage (http://notesaboutfilms.blogspot.com/2...) and many more…
Cries & Whispers has been nominated and won to multiple awards – it won for the famous collaborator of Ingmar Bergman and then other legends, Sven Nykvist, the Academy Award for Best Cinematography and the film was nominated for Best Picture – not just in a Foreign Language – Best Director, Writing and Costume Design.
The work of art is also included on the New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made List:
https://www.listchallenges.com/new-yo...
It is nevertheless a film that is painful to watch at times, although not in the horror genre, the pain, suffering, trauma presented are overwhelming and rendered without kid gloves.
This is actually the only reason why one might choose to watch Daddy’s Home or stupid comedies of the same caliber – although including gifted and wasted talent – over this drama.
Looking back at it, one might say that there are traces, difficult to observe indeed, of sarcastic, morbid humor.
Take the scene where the family considers the fate of the dedicated servant – the one who would actually embrace, nurse, love the moribund perhaps more than any relative, in scenes that are so complex as to suggest motherly care, humanity, perhaps loyalty, lesbianism, compassion, pity all mixed together.
The sisters and their husbands are talking about the selling of the house, now that Agnes is dead, the imminent departure of the woman who has cared for the dying woman for the last ten years.
In its rigidity, absurd pomposity, inflexibility, preposterous arrogance and indifference, Isak seems to be laughable, not just loathsome, and despicable in the paucity, mendacity, the abhorrent lack of compassion for the servant who is going to be fired.
His wife, Karin is pleading for a few weeks extra wages, given the torment the woman has suffered, her loyalty, the patience, dedication, hard work, kindness, generosity she has shown during all these years.
The spouse dismisses this with grimace, detachment, inhumanity that seem almost cartoonish, buffoonish.
Agnes had been suffering for many years when her sisters come to try to help sooth her pain.
Maria is portrayed by one of the most magnificent actresses in the world, Liv Ulmann, an important figure in cinematic history with Ingmar Bergman, in whose films she is omnipresent and whom she has married.
The pain and suffering are excruciating.
The public feels it.
The red walls, backgrounds, furniture, dresses and even stops between chapters all contribute to an overwhelming emotion.
There are some scenes that recall horror pictures and one that resembles a climactic moment in The Piano Teacher – directed by another phenomenon, Michael Haneke, staring yet another Legend, Isabelle Huppert.
Karin cuts herself in the intimate zone, then takes the blood and wipes it over her face and mouth, apparently even tasting it.
Other moments are enchanting, suggesting and mentioning extreme happiness, love, merriment, ecstasy, elation, with the exulting sisters, Maria and Karin, embracing each other in bliss.
It even looks like they may get incestuous.
The film is extremely complex, suggesting and representing an outlandish spectrum of emotions, thoughts, feelings that range from terror to glorious exuberation, from ultimate depression to the ecstasy of pure love.
Nine out of 10
If not the greatest ever, Ingmar Bergman is surely one of the most outstanding, fabulous filmmakers, the genius that has given the History of World Cinema some tremendous, inestimable works of art:
Fanny and Alexander (reviewed here: http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/03/f...), The Virgin Spring (http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/t...)
Smiles of a Summer Night (http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/02/s...), The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries, Persona, Scenes from a Marriage (http://notesaboutfilms.blogspot.com/2...) and many more…
Cries & Whispers has been nominated and won to multiple awards – it won for the famous collaborator of Ingmar Bergman and then other legends, Sven Nykvist, the Academy Award for Best Cinematography and the film was nominated for Best Picture – not just in a Foreign Language – Best Director, Writing and Costume Design.
The work of art is also included on the New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made List:
https://www.listchallenges.com/new-yo...
It is nevertheless a film that is painful to watch at times, although not in the horror genre, the pain, suffering, trauma presented are overwhelming and rendered without kid gloves.
This is actually the only reason why one might choose to watch Daddy’s Home or stupid comedies of the same caliber – although including gifted and wasted talent – over this drama.
Looking back at it, one might say that there are traces, difficult to observe indeed, of sarcastic, morbid humor.
Take the scene where the family considers the fate of the dedicated servant – the one who would actually embrace, nurse, love the moribund perhaps more than any relative, in scenes that are so complex as to suggest motherly care, humanity, perhaps loyalty, lesbianism, compassion, pity all mixed together.
The sisters and their husbands are talking about the selling of the house, now that Agnes is dead, the imminent departure of the woman who has cared for the dying woman for the last ten years.
In its rigidity, absurd pomposity, inflexibility, preposterous arrogance and indifference, Isak seems to be laughable, not just loathsome, and despicable in the paucity, mendacity, the abhorrent lack of compassion for the servant who is going to be fired.
His wife, Karin is pleading for a few weeks extra wages, given the torment the woman has suffered, her loyalty, the patience, dedication, hard work, kindness, generosity she has shown during all these years.
The spouse dismisses this with grimace, detachment, inhumanity that seem almost cartoonish, buffoonish.
Agnes had been suffering for many years when her sisters come to try to help sooth her pain.
Maria is portrayed by one of the most magnificent actresses in the world, Liv Ulmann, an important figure in cinematic history with Ingmar Bergman, in whose films she is omnipresent and whom she has married.
The pain and suffering are excruciating.
The public feels it.
The red walls, backgrounds, furniture, dresses and even stops between chapters all contribute to an overwhelming emotion.
There are some scenes that recall horror pictures and one that resembles a climactic moment in The Piano Teacher – directed by another phenomenon, Michael Haneke, staring yet another Legend, Isabelle Huppert.
Karin cuts herself in the intimate zone, then takes the blood and wipes it over her face and mouth, apparently even tasting it.
Other moments are enchanting, suggesting and mentioning extreme happiness, love, merriment, ecstasy, elation, with the exulting sisters, Maria and Karin, embracing each other in bliss.
It even looks like they may get incestuous.
The film is extremely complex, suggesting and representing an outlandish spectrum of emotions, thoughts, feelings that range from terror to glorious exuberation, from ultimate depression to the ecstasy of pure love.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews