Our film club continues this April with Ingmar Bergman‘s 1966 film Persona.
I’m not going to write too much about the film as an introduction, partly because I haven’t actually seen it in over two decades, but also because I wouldn’t really know where to start. Persona is easily one of the most discussed films in the history of cinema. I chose the film for the club because a number of you asked for Ingmar Bergman films, a couple of you specifically requested Persona, and because it certainly fits the theme of doubles and doppelgängers that we started last month with Stray Dog and will continue in May with Kagemusha.
As two cinema giants of their era, Kurosawa and Bergman had huge mutual respect for each other. Here is a letter that Kurosawa wrote to Bergman in 1988:
Dear Mr. Bergman,
Please let me congratulate you upon your seventieth birthday.
Your work deeply touches my heart every time I see it and I have learned a lot from your works and have been encouraged by them. I would like you to stay in good health to create more wonderful movies for us.
In Japan, there was a great artist called Tessai Tomioka who lived in the Meiji Era (the late 19th century). This artist painted many excellent pictures while he was still young, and when he reached the age of eighty, he suddenly started painting pictures which were much superior to the previous ones, as if he were in magnificent bloom. Every time I see his paintings, I fully realize that a human is not really capable of creating really good works until he reaches eighty.
A human is born a baby, becomes a boy, goes through youth, the prime of life and finally returns to being a baby before he closes his life. This is, in my opinion, the most ideal way of life.
I believe you would agree that a human becomes capable of producing pure works, without any restrictions, in the days of his second babyhood.
I am now seventy-seven (77) years old and am convinced that my real work is just beginning.
Let us hold out together for the sake of movies.
With the warmest regards,
Akira Kurosawa
The two directors also almost collaborated in the late 1960s, with Fellini also attached to the potential project. It is interesting to imagine what the result of such a mix could have been.
Ingmar Bergman’s Persona should be widely available wherever you are. I look forward to your thoughts on the film.
I just got my copy – I’m looking forward to watching it as soon as I can find a quiet evening to spare – I find films like this need my full attention.
I’ve just been doing some reading on Persona and I find it curious how its by now means the universally acclaimed film I’d assumed – even Pauline Kael gave it an ambiguous review.
I love that letter from AK – such a pity AK never really got his productive old age as he wished, I guess his fondness for cigarettes and late night drinking sessions robbed us of a few late masterpieces.