Description

This masterful early Bergman (Autumn Sonata, Cries and Whispers) film is the second installment in a "shrewdly ironic, lewdly hilarious trilogy" (Time).Along with A Lesson in Love and Smiles of a Summer Night, Dream ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Another Bergman Comedy
Along with Smiles On a Summer Night and A Lesson in Love, this is one of a series of sex comedies Bergman made in the late fifties, just before hammering out The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries. It is probably the weakest of the trilogy, but like most of Bergman's sex comedies, it is a vibrant, witty, and at points somber examination of the strange boundry between the sexes. Dreams, in particular, explores the theme of age and love.

Eva Dahlbeck plays an aging model who runs a modeling agency. She is locked in a frustrating affair with a married man in Gothenburg, who refuses to see her again. Driven by an obsessive infatuation, she decides to take her next photo shoot to Gothenburg. Harriet Anderson, the young model working for Eva, breaks with her boyfriend over the trip and goes. In Gothenburg, Eva reconnects with her lover and Harriet is wooed by an elderly aristocrat (Gunnar Bjornstrand -- the best performance in the film).

There are brilliant scenes in this film that remind us of its quickly maturing author. An early, dream-like sequence with Eva on a train is a disturbing portrait of the painful obsession of love. The train's straight, forboding tracks are echoed later in a similar sequence with Harriet Anderson on a roller coaster. The most extraordinary piece of this film is a Strindbergesque sequence in which Gunnar, whose wife has gone mad, is confronted by his daughter. The taut and well-written exchanges are watched by a perplexed Anderson through a crack in the door. This scene rates among the best in any of Bergman's films.

The characters are very well-composed. As usual, Bergman has a unique strength in writing about women. The film's weak point is its split plot, which doesn't really reach a satisfying coherence. Bergman later claimed the split plot was "interesting" in the way it worked together, and that the film was crushed only because of the heavy air of depression on the set (he and Anderson had just ended their relationship). You can judge for yourself what the shortcoming is.

Bergman fans will not be disappointed -- particularly those who enjoy the original and surprising flavor of his sex comedies.

An early Bergman stab at the relationship between two women.
Two women - proprietor of a fashion agency and her top model - two stories. the middle-aged Eva Dahlbeck stalks and reunites with a former lover, now married with children; the filming of this section is very intense, claustrophobic, theatrical, as three characters come to terms with their lives and the lies that prop them up.

The youthful Harriet Andersson has a paralell experience, but hers is much more cinematic - including a Big Dipper point-of-view sequence anticipating 'The 400 Blows' - as she is approached by an elderly Consul. This story is almost Gothic or fairy tale - the couple first meet through ghostly window reflections; the consul, with pointy beard, refers to wizards and vampires; he, like Cinderella's godmother, dresses her in riches; he lives in a secluded town mansion with a 'Rebecca'-like portrait of his wife, stricken mad, convinced she gave birth to a wolf. This supernatural plot is countered by bathetic realism, such as the Consul getting sick at the funfair - not very Mephistophelian.

These separate strands cohere in Bergman's vision of women's place in Swedish society - interior, emotionally dependent, identity mediated and fragmented by men. Bergman balances oppressive melodrama with brief glimpses of freedom - this is one of his most appealing early works.

dreams can be fairytales
This early Bergman reminds me of Hitchcock in it's inventive visual style, though Hitch's treatment of women is very different to Bergman's. The opening sequence of a fashion shoot has no dialogue and is like a lesson in film language, though I could have done with less of the fat man tapping his fingers. There is also a remarkable train suicidal panic, and a subjective camera funhouse sequence. Plus Bergman gives himself a quick cameo. The overall lightness of tone seems preferable when one considers the depths of emotional torture Bergman would later delve into. This is not to say that this title is unemotional - there is a telephone sequence with a woman attempting a liaison with her married lover which is superbly done. The narrative concentrates on two women, Eva Dahlbeck as a modeling agent, and Harriet Andersson as her model. Andersson's story is the more successful, a variation on Little Red Riding Hood, with a witty wolf character, and Gunnar Bjornstrand in poorly done old man makeup. Andersson is a delight, whether fighting with her boyfriend or drunkenly flirting with Bjornstrand, and she bares her neck and bosom in a daring scene when she is given a necklace. Dahlbeck is styled like a lesbian Marilyn Monroe, undermining her parallel confrontation, which begins as soap opera but then improves with a tender kiss, and then the appearance of the married man's wife. It is a tribute to Bergman's writing that what the wife says isn't tainted by jealousy and that she becomes a more emphathetic character because of it. I also liked the scene where Dahlbeck is angry at Andersson, then later has insight into her own behaviour. How very Bergman!

THIS SHOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER
I'm a very big Bergman fan! And enjoy most of his films to a great degree,but somehow this film doesn't amount to what it could have been. The story is typical Bergman. Infact it was taylor made for Bergman's style! At first renting this I thought it would turn out to be Bergman's best! The story is about two women: Susanne(Eva Dahlbeck)and Doris(Harriet Anderson). Dahlbeck is a photographer and Anderson a model. They plan to visit Gothenburg. There they meet two men. Anderson meets a older gentleman played wonderfully by Gunnar Bjornstrand( You'll remember him in the "Winter Light") and the other has been having an affair with a married man! When these's two encounters break through, all each of them have is their DREAMS of love. With a story like this you'd think Bergman really had something here. But the movie moves at such a slow pace. It's even BORING after a while. You find only isolated moments that add up to sheer greatness. The script lacks a certain passion that was most desperately needed in this film, given the story line. Bergman unfortunately really striked out with this one.

VERY ENTERTAINING
This film is very well acted and well-written ... Read more

Reviews (12)

Not there yet....but miles away from everybody else
Smiles of a Summer Night it's not one of my Top 10 Bergmans,but it's a fine example of 50's European cinema.Bergman said : "a mixture of operetta and comedy".Pauline Keal said : "One of the few classics of carnal comedy." Woody Allen said :"Even Smiles of a Summer Night, which some consider his 'comic masterpiece', is a very charming film, it has a warmth to it.." Enough said.

Send In The Clowns
This was director Ingmar Bergman's break-through film, the winner of the 1956 Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival, the first of his many internationally acclaimed films. The story is a time honored one, referrencing the same tradition of romantic complications found in Shakespeare's A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM and Rostand's LA RONDE: every one is either in love with or married to the wrong person.

A famous actress with two very different lovers invites both, their wives, and the son of one lover to her mother's country estate in the hope of sorting out the romantic entanglements to her satisfaction--and the result is considerable charm and unexpectedly dry wit. All the performances are excellent, with Eva Dahlbeck's Desiree a standout, but the real star of this ensemble piece is the unexpectedly witty script. Never quite veering over into broad farce but never sinking into romantic sentimentality, it is a very precisely written tale, and both cast and director make the most of it.

In the face of Bergman's later work, SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT may seem rather slight, and indeed both psychology and cinematography is considerably less complex than one expects. Even so, it is very much a Bergman film: the visual style is distinct, and the themes of appearances vs. reality, the inability to correctly interpret another's behavior, and the failure to understand one's self are very much in evidence--only here to comic effect. It is in every way a charming film that Bergman fans will enjoy.

Incidently, SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT was successfully translated to the stage as the musical A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC, the score of which includes the famous "Send In The Clowns." Fans of the original film will be interested to compare the two works.

A rating of 5 and then some.*******
This film is perfect -- comedy, drama, you name it. Performances are all tight and Bergman weaves a marvelous tale of how people make fools of themselves at almost all times. They deceive each other and themselves, only wasting large portions of their lives in the process. He is always teaching us a lesson, and I like that in a film. Comic moments abound, however, and the result is uplifting, honest and very real.

The film is touted as his only comedy, however, I would not categorize the film this way. There are deeply felt moments not to be ignored by the viewer. I have seen the film several times and I am very excited that it is now available on DVD. I recommend it highly and I hope that you enjoy it. It is a more than worthy film that satisfies on high ground. It is adult and insightful. Please, do not let this one pass you by if you are at all serious about filmmaking and Bergman's considerable contribution. Let's be grateful for his vast upus.

Intriguing Deceits in Terrific Bergman Comedy...
Ingmar Bergman directed a romantic comedy when he filmed Smiles of a Summer Night that is as playful as Shakespeare's A Midsummer Nights Dream and is set in a small scale backdrop of Renoir's Rules of the Game (1939). Despite the similarities of other stories Bergman creates a unique comedy that is full of conspiring intrigue as it revolves around a small number of characters at the turn of the century in a small Swedish town.

Fredrik Egerman (Gunnar Björnstrand), a successful middle-aged lawyer and former widower, has remarried with Anne (Ulla Jacobsson) who is at least twenty years younger than him. Fredrik's son, Henrik (Björn Bjelfvenstam), from his previous marriage, is of the same age as Anne and has recently arrived home from completing his theological examinations. Petra, the family maid, flirts with Henrik as he expresses his liking for the opposite sex. As a consequence, Henrik is struggling with an overwhelming inner guilt originating from his incapability to live by his lofty values stemming from his Christian faith. In addition, the prominent actress Desiree Armfeldt (Eva Dahlbeck), a previous lover to Fredrik, is performing at the town theater. Fredrik makes nightly visit to Desiree which puts him in harms way as Desiree's current lover, Carl Magnus (Jarl Kulle), a military officer known for his success in duels visits at the same time. However, this is just the beginning for all the predicaments that Fredrik is about to experience.

Smiles of a Summer Night is a well-written comedy with several subplots that drive the main theme, love, forward as it displays Bergman's wide range of story telling. Bergman displays a simple story which becomes complex as the characters are continually dishonest. It is the profound level of deceitfulness in the story that produces intrigue and brings about the comedy. As the final scene fades away in memory, the audience has gone through a first class cinematic experience that will lighten and enlighten those who participated.

Bergman Gives Us Lots To "Smile" About
The first time I saw "Smiles of a Summer Night" I thought is was an OK film, nothing more, nothing less. I was use to seeing the powerful, bleak, gritty dramas such as "Shame", "The Seventh Seal", "Wild Strawberries", and "A Passion of Anna". "Smiles" was entertaining, but not memorable. It just didn't have the lasting power those other films had.

I have now seen the film again. And while maybe it is true this movie does not have the lasting power Bergman's other films have, that does not mean you shouldn't see it.

"Smiles of a Summer Night" is actually pretty funny, and I don't just mean by Bergman's standards. It succeeds on its own as a comedy-of-manners.

The only other Bergman comedy I have seen is his vastly underrated "The Devil's Eye". Between the two I prefer "Eye", but "Smiles" still has its own charm.

Fredrik Egerman (Gunnar Bjornstrand) is married to Anne (Ulla Jacobson) and is having an affair with actress and former fling Desiree Armfeldt (Eva Dahlbeck). Too bad for Fredrik, Anne finds out. But Desiree is also seeing another man, Carl Magnus (Jarl Kulle) who is also married to one of Anne's friends, Charlotte (Margit Carlqvist), who also knows about he husband's "past time". Soon all of these people get together to spend a weekend in the country as Desiree throws a party in an attempt to win back Fredrik.

This all sounds very usually for Bergman, but, as I said he is able to pull it off.

Many may find the story-line resembles Woody Allen's "A Midsummer's Night Sex Comedy", and that's because this is what that movie was based on. Though I prefer Bergman's film to Allen's. Did you ever think Ingmar Bergman would make a better comedy than Woody Allen? I know it sounds odd, but wait until you see this film.

Bottom-line: One of director Ingmar Bergman's funniest films. Surpringly filled with quirky moments and likeable performances from some Bergman regulars. "Smiles of a Summer Night" is worth watching. ... Read more

Description

Bergman takes an uncharacteristically lighthearted look at marital infidelity in Secrets of Women, a sophisticated comedy that was his first commercial success.While waiting in a country house for their husbands to arrive, three sisters-in-law share the intimate secrets of their marriages and affairs.A fourth sister-in-law declares mysteriously that she has no story to tell.Told in flashbacks, and entirely from the women's point of view, the three episodes build from straightforward realism to a colorful, dreamlike expressionism.Bergman's fascinating illumination of the ironies of life and love culminates in the famous scene in which a bored husband and wife (Bergman favorites Gunnar Bjornstrand and Eva Dahlbeck) rediscover their lost ardor while trapped in an elevator. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Love's Labours Lost (and Found!)
Bergman films not only entertain, they challenge the viewer to figure out what the director is trying to convey. 1952's Secrets of Women is no different. Here, the master explores the nature of romance from the perspective of five women who are connected by men they know. Bergman's thesis is that women start out with a romantic ideal of what a relationship should be; however, this ideal is shattered by the reality of human nature --- infidelity, selfishness, feelings of loneliness. Although women must eventually compromise their romantic ideals, they ultimately adapt in order to hang onto all the love they can.

In stark black and white, Bergman once again invites the viewer to join him on a journey to understand the meaning of life and the human psyche. And as always, his work results in mesmerizing interactive cinema. Those who enjoy the art of directing and moviemaking will find this video intellectually stimulating. Others may only find it devoid of action. But then, they don't understand what Bergman does --- that the real action takes place within the mind of man. ... Read more

Description

One of Ingmar Bergman's best comedies, A Lesson in Love belongs to that trio of films (Dreams, Smiles of a Summer Night) Time called a "lewdly hilarious trilogy." This witty look at marriage and adultery re-unites Gunnar Bjorns ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Splendid!
An entertaining comedy about about a middle age doctor who try to win his wife back. One of Bergman's best movies. ... Read more