Monday, July 30, 2007

Ebert on Bergman

A recent piece of great news has been Roger Ebert's release from an extended hospitalization for thyroid cancer. I love reading his reviews. Agree or disagree with his individual assesments, Ebert is always excited about movies, intelligent in his opinions, and fair to individual artists. He has the ability to judge movies based on whether or not they accomplished what they set out to for their audience, even if he might not be that particular audience. Imagine having to watch movies like I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry in this spirit! But Ebert pulls it off.

Not surprisingly, he has written something meaningful about Ingmar Bergman today. It's all worth reading. This stands out:

"There are so many memories crowding in, now, from the richness of Bergman’s work, that I know not what to choose. A turning point in his despair occurred, perhaps, in “Cries and Whispers,” a chamber drama in an isolated Swedish estate where Harriet Andersson is dying painfully of cancer and her sisters have come to be with her. After she dies,they find a journal in which she recalls a perfect day in the autumn, when the pain was not so bad, and the women took up their parasols and walked in the garden. "This is happiness. I cannot wish for anything better," she writes. "I feel profoundly grateful to my life, which gives me so much.""

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