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• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 0780022998
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #595,752 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Liv ullmann's Private Confessions" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

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Private Confessions begins with a casual conversation that turns serious, when Anna (Pernilla August, now known to much of the world as Anakin Skywalker's mother in Star Wars: Episode I) admits to her Uncle Jacob (the great Max von Sydow) that she's been having an affair. Though the affair is sweet, she fears the impending catastrophe if the affair should ever be revealed. Jacob gives his advice, which proves hard to swallow. Both the results and the preceding events are revealed in four more conversations, spanning 10 years into the future and 15 or more years into the past. The subtle differences in what is told and not told to Jacob, her husband Henrik, and her lover accumulate into a powerful portrait of emotional struggle and resignation. Written by Swedish cinematic giant Ingmar Bergman and directed by one of his star actresses, Liv Ullmann, Private Confessions continues Bergman's exploration of family conflict and religious struggle. This script, like that of The Best Intentions (directed by Bille August), charts the difficult relationship of Bergman's own parents; the earlier film also featured Pernilla August and Samuel Fröler in the roles of Anna and Henrik, but at an earlier (and perhaps more hopeful) point in their lives. The film is not for everyone: Private Confessions is slow, driven entirely by dialogue, and the atmosphere lacks the feverish intensity of Bergman's own direction--but the mounting turmoil in August's deep, sphinxlike eyes is an event unto itself. --Bret Fetzer

Product Description

Written by Ingmar Bergman and directed by his long time friend and leading actress Liv Ullmann, Private Confessions is the continuation of Best Intentions (1992), exploring Bergman's childhood memory of his parents' turbulent marriage. Anna

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Kudos For Liv, March 24, 2000

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Reviewer - See all my reviews

This review is from: Liv ullmann's Private Confessions (VHS Tape)

Written by Ingmar Bergman and aptly directed by Liv Ullman, "Private Confessions" continues the chronicle of Bergman's parents which began with the 1992 film "The Best Intentions." Now, twelve years into the marriage of Anna and Henrik (Pernilla August and Samuel Froler), the story unfolds through a series of five "conversations" which are actually pivotal intervals in Anna's life. The first is with her Uncle Jacob (Max von Sydow), a clergyman, and we learn of the anguish she has suffered due to her own unfaithfulness to the autocratic and demanding Henrik. Though she does not regret the affair, she realizes the precariousness of her position and the threat it poses to the well-being of her family, especially the children. Jacob tells her she must end the affair at once, and advises her to tell her husband everything. She knows how much this would hurt Henrik, and must decide whether or not to do as her Uncle insists. In the second conversation we learn the outcome of her decision.

The third segment takes place two months prior to her confession. Anna arranges a rendezvous with Tomas (Thomas Hanzon), a young theology student, at the home of a friend. When it is finished, Tomas leaves her, appalled by his own inadequacies at allowing their affair to proceed at all. Anna truly loves him though, and knows that she will always be with him, at least in her own heart. The next conversation is ten years later. Jacob is dying and has asked for Anna to come to him. They have not actually spoken with one another since he advised her in the matter of her affair with Tomas. All this time he has wondered, burdened by the possible outcome of his advice, and doesn't want to go to his grave without knowing. He is relieved to learn she has not seen Tomas in ten years, and they take communion and pray together. Then, in the final segment, Anna is eighteen years old, a confirmation student of Jacobs, and we learn of her doubts concerning her faith. Jacob, her spiritual advisor, tells her she must decide for herself whether or not to take communion, and in the end we are left pondering Bergman's familiar themes of faith, suffering and the foibles of human nature he addresses so adroitly; the pain of discovering one's own loneliness; and the guilt we all seem destined to bear. Liv Ullman has done an outstanding job of rendering Bergman's material to the screen, and should be commended for eliciting exemplary performances from von Sydow, Hanzon and especially August, and for allowing them the time necessary with which to convey as much with an expression or a gesture as with words alone. These moments enable the actors to breathe life and meaning into their characters while giving credence to the morality to which those characters must adhere. "Private Confessions," like all of Bergman's work, will make you pause and reflect on your own life and imperfections, while bringing you face to face with the reality of being mortal.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars There is nothing more interesting in Art than the human face, July 9, 2001

By 

Ian Muldoon (Coffs Harbour, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Liv ullmann's Private Confessions (VHS Tape)

There's a theory, perhaps Freudian, which claims that, for women, religious ecstasy parallels sexual ecstasy. For men the theory, perhaps Freudian, is that men's ideal woman is both mother and whore. Be these theories as they may, Ingmar Bergman's lifelong fascination has certainly had religion as a major focus. In PRIVATE CONFESSIONS the character Anna is first sexually drawn to the priest who officiates at her first communion, even though he is much older, and her uncle. In the event she marries a priest, Henrik, and bears his children. A family friend, Tomas, declares his love for Anna, and she succumbs and enters the affair with an unbridled, unleashed passion. Their relationship is peppered with expressions of fear and it soon becomes clear that Tomas is alarmed by Anna's powerful emotions, and the relationship founders. Tomas is just not "up to it". Such is the bare bones of this marvellous film. The themes I found interesting include the compulsion among many of us for control over others;the ordered versus the disordered life (there is a marvellous scene in which the husband at home notices a plant is dying, a chair is misaligned and has a squeaky rib and there are four minor stains on the tablecloth, all of which he takes as visible manifestations of his wife's neglect of her family in favour of her philandering whereas it is merely his perceptions that create this belief) family versus one's own desires which may be outside the family; the need for compromise; faith; ritual and loneliness. Pernilla August, as Anna, is frankly rivetting and it is impossible to take one's eyes off her. Indeed, the camera can remain for what seems minutes on her silent face and we read, as a book, the thoughts and feelings that are conveyed by her subtle but evident expressions.Every emotion, including rage, is a wonder to witness. There may be nothing more interesting in Art than the human face, and the cinema, in particular the cinema of the likes of Mr Bergman, has made the most of that fascination. In the film before us Ms Liv Ullman has done a brilliant directing job of bringing Mr Bergman's writing to the screen.