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Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Ingrid Bergman gives a virtuoso solo performance in this Jean Cocteau one-act. The plot of this hour-long piece is a simple one: a woman, devastated after her lover leaves her for someone else, speaks to him on the phone one last time. The piece is beautifully, perfectly written and performed--all of the little lies and desperate hopes of heartbreak are captured. Bergman’s performance is as brave as it is complex--she is willing to let her character crumble into an embarrassing weakness that few actresses would risk. Anyone who has ever nursed false hopes of salvaging a relationship will find this piece all too well done. See it, but not right after a breakup. --Ali Davis
Product Description
Ingrid Bergman plays a middle-aged woman going through a psychological crisis as a love affair ends. French playwright Jean Cocteau's one-character drama unfolds in the form of an extended monologue--a one-sided telephone conversation in which the woman tries to win back her lover despite her growing suspicion that he is calling from his young fiancée's home. "A tour de force... Ingrid Bergman gave a formidable display of passionate despair, showing a side in her talent not often vouchsafed by the movies." --Variety
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Stunning Representation of a Woman's Emotions,
This review is from: The Human Voice (Broadway Theatre Archive) (DVD)
Human Voice is initially unassuming and it takes about 5 minutes or more to fully realize the potential of this painful expose of a woman's emotions. The scenes all take place in one room.
Ingrid Bergman plays a woman in the most painful state she could possibly exist in besides the state in which she is mourning the loss of a child. She has just lost the love of her life and has tried to commit suicide. Fortunately she wakes to find she has survived taking all the pills in her medicine cabinet. What happens next is rather disturbing really. When a woman feels these emotions, she may happen to glance at herself in the mirror, but more than likely she is in bed crying her eyes out. The honesty is captivating, but painful to observe. Through a one-sided telephone conversation a woman first tries to hide her feelings and then after numerous attempts to talk to the man she loves and convince him she is handling the break up, she finally breaks down. She experienced devastation, desperation, completely heartache, longings of the soul, everything a woman feels when she has lost the man she thinks she will spend the rest of her life with; it is poetic and tragic. Ingrid Bergman wanders about in a pink housecoat, clinging to a old-fashioned phone and is stunning in this solo performance. At one point she wraps the phone cord around her neck and says that her lover's words are now around her neck. It is very provocative at times as she plays with ideas in creative ways. This movie may stir up memories from the past and may cause you to hunt down doughnuts, chocolate or anything comforting. Watching this movie is similar to riding the waves in a storm. The sad part of this movie is that women feel these emotions all too often. The callousness of her lover is especially difficult to take. While we never hear his voice, we hear her reactions. Even when she is expressing her undying affection, he seems angry with her and displays an almost inhuman disregard for her feelings. This movie might make you angry, it might make you cry and it will definitely leave you with a lasting impression. Human Voice is a true classic and one of the best representations of complete desperation and loss of self-esteem I've ever observed. ~The Rebecca Review
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
angst,betrayal,and bergman.,
By Bob Trout (State of Misery) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: The Human Voice (Broadway Theatre Archive) (DVD)
if you are a bergman fan,then this is worthy to add to your collection.she's all alone up there on the boards,trying to hold it together after her lover jilted her.Ingrid is such a pro,you never catch her acting.she's the female spencer tracy,and that's no easy task with the material she has chosen.almost an hour of dialogue,just cuts where they had commercial breaks.
picture quality is pretty good,considering it's 1967 and we have video here.sound is fine..but the bottom line is Ingrid Bergman,lovely to look at and wonderful to watch and hear.by all means pick up a copy.very reasonable price,too.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"I've never had anything to live for but you.",
By
This review is from: The Human Voice (Broadway Theatre Archive) (DVD)
Jean Cocteau's landmark "voice play," published in 1947 and produced by Broadway Theatre Archive in 1966, starring Ingrid Bergman, is a bit dated now, a reflection of a society which has changed irrevocably. A middle-aged woman, devastated because her five-year relationship has ended and her lover has moved on, tries to come to grips with her future and largely fails. When her lover calls to offer whatever support he can--and to ask for his belongings by tomorrow--his call becomes her lifeline. "I knew you would give me a ring," she says, with ponderous irony, then adds to herself, "A wring of the neck," or "a boxing ring" from which there is no escape.
The entire play consists the woman talking with her former lover in a series of increasingly fraught phone calls, as the connection keeps getting lost. Though she tells him she is "absolutely calm," she has taken fourteen sleeping pills the previous night, and though she also says "It is all my fault," the viewer sees that the lover has lied to her. Yet he has cared for her, repeatedly calling back to be sure that this increasingly hysterical woman will somehow go on--and that he will be able to pick up his things the next day. The play contains a number of dramatic effects which are now clichés--the constant ticking of the clock, the frantic smoking of the woman, a basket full of empty pill bottles, the photo of the new, much younger, woman, and especially the telephone itself, which offers the only chance for communication here. The focus is almost completely on the actress at center stage for almost an hour, however, a change of style for Cocteau, whose plays until then contained carefully circumscribed roles. Obviously, the role calls for an actress of extraordinary ability, like Ingrid Bergman, who, age fifty-one at the time of this play, has the gravitas to make the role come alive. Her instinctive ability to use body language, gesture, and facial expressions conveys her pain so that she is not dependent upon hysterical emoting into the telephone. Bergman leaves no doubt that she is at the point of total breakdown, and even her acting might be considered a bit over-the-top, but this is largely a function of the play itself and of the society, which offered little place for a rejected middle-aged "wife" whose "career" consisted of promoting her lover's happiness. She is an empty shell. What can she do now? n Mary Whipple Tennessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie (Broadway Theatre Archive), starring Katharine Hepburn Home (Broadway Theatre Archive), starring Sir John Gielgud and Sir Ralph Richardson Uncommon Women and Others (Broadway Theatre Archive), with Meryl Streep and Jill Eikenberry Death of a Salesman (Broadway Theatre Archive), starring Lee J. Cobb The Last of Mrs. Lincoln (Broadway Theatre Archive), starring Julie Harris
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