Customer Reviews

Smiles Of A Summer Night (The Criterion Collection)

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

If you're a fan of Bergman's works about psychological abuse, personal disaster and disintegrating relationships, this film is definitely not for you. But it reaches a hand across to his late work, sharing a kind of sunlit-but-shadowed atmosphere that's both in the physical environment, and in the people he displays. Less stiff than Bergman's other early attempts at humor (The Devil's Stye, for example), the storyline is engaging, the characters interesting and all-too-human; and the outdoors scenes really bring some life to a director who was all too easily stagebound. There are few outright laughs in this film, but a great many smiles and a warm willingness to embrace humanity with all its flaws.

Definitely a film to treasure, and one that bears repeated viewing. I'd put it fairly close to Wild Strawberries and The Seventh Seal for its success at creating a film with a unique tone and attitude, in which all the parts contribute magnificently to the whole.

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.

"Smiles of a Summer Night" is probably one reason why Bergman hasn't made particularly many comedies, even though this is a big award-winner. This film is not at all bad - I would give it 9/10 stars for remaining entertaining throughout, but had the script--or rather, SOME LINES--been adapted or dramatized a bit, this story could easily have been presented as another one of Bergman's "philosophical dramas;" Russian roulette, suicide, and adultery (mistresses and wives meeting under social circumstances) are a few of the ingredients for this summer - this might not sound very much like typical 1955 comedy ingredients, but my laughs weren't always silent; at times I felt highly amused, and I can see how he did pull off something new in cinema with this film, but Bergman certainly has more talent in making movies that probably shouldn't be presented in their opening as "a romantic comedy," though there is a nice and warm vibe to this exceptional film. I doubt that it will disappoint any dedicated Bergman fan, or that this edition will disappoint any costumer, as Criterion rarely fail at restoring old pictures.

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.

I came to Ingmar Bergman films in the mid-sixties, as a teen, and liked them because they seemed so stark, so unlike the typical Hollywood fluff. They called 'em art films, but I liked Bergman because of the characters and the stories, not to mention the look and feel of his films. It was only when Criterion Collection released SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT this year that I finally got to see a film I had heard a lot about but never bothered to seek out. Criterion's other Bergman films were all must-haves so I ordered Smiles right away. (I have seen Sondheim's A Little Night Music on stage some three times and saw the film, so I suppose this Bergman source film seemed less unknown than his others. And, by the way, after seeing Smiles, I appreciate even more how nicely Sondheim et al adapted this film.) True to Criterion's high standards and TLC in presenting its films, Smiles looks as good as it must have when it was released almost fifty years ago. This light comedy involves several pairs of lovers who, for a variety of reasons, might be better off if the deck were shuffled and they ended up in another pairing. Aging actress, married lover; aging lawyer, too-young virgin wife; tortured soul son of lawyer, saucy maid temptress, and lawyer's too-young virgin wife; wife of military man who knows husband has mistresses, including the aging actress. Shuffle the deck a few times and a lot can happen in a movie with characters such as these. Sondheim wrote the entire score to A Little Night Music in waltz tempo, which perfectly captures the whirling intricacies of the relationships. Bergman started it all with a very entertaining and perfectly cast film, full of both comedy and the human dimension of mismatched people who may be investing too much energy in the wrong person. It all sounds confusing, but, trust me, you'll enjoy the heck out of this picture. If you think Bergman is just The Silence, Cries and Whispers and Winter Light, you're in for a real treat with SMILES OF A SUMMER NIGHT.

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.

"Smiles of a Summer Night" is one of the most elegant and charming carnal comedies ever filmed. It is clever, witty, and incredibly sexy. Did I mention that it was written and directed by The Ingmar Bergman whose name would not usually be associated with the comedies?

"Smiles of a Summer Night" was a great success with both the critics and the audiences and was submitted for the Cannes film festival...without its creator's knowledge. The film was nominated for the Golden Palm and won the Award for Best Poetic Humor. Bergman describes how he found out about his movie's international recognition, "I was sitting on the toilet reading a morning newspaper. One of the articles was entitled, The Great Victory for a Swedish Cinema at Cannes. I thought, what a wonderful news, what is the movie? And then I read the title, "Smiles of a Summer Night" by Ingmar Bergman." He recalls how poor he was then and he borrowed the money for a ticket to Cannes from Bibi Anderson whom he dated at the time.

I did not laugh a lot but I don't think I was supposed to - "Smiles... is a different kind of comedy, sensual and subtle, with the characters often weak but not ridiculous. The beauty of it is in the dialogs, ironic looks, the charming struggle of wits, and in the realization that not everyone will be blessed with the true and passionate love but the life goes on, anyway. The actresses (Ulla Jacobsson, Eva Dahlbeck, Harriet Andersson, and Margit Carlqvist) were incredibly sexy, especially Eva Dahlbeck smoking a cigar and Harriett Andersson as a chambermaid talking to her mistress about the virginity - delightful!

There are no words to describe the beauty, splendor, charm, humor, and sensuality of this film. The best I can do - to paraphrase Woody Allen's line -"that was the most fun I've ever had without sex."

Fredrick Egerman (Gunnar Bjornstrand) is a forty-something lawyer of precise calculation, a bit of a dandy among the mercantile. He has a young wife Anne (the very pretty Ulla Jacobsson) whom he married when she was sixteen, but somehow never got around to unintacting her virgo. He has a sometime mistress Desirée Armfeldt (the voluptuous Eva Dahlbeck) from whom he has recently been estranged. He has a son Henrik (Bjorn Bjelvenstam) full of angst and love's confusion who lusts after the saucy maid Petra (a blonde Harriet Andersson) while he studies theology and his father's wife.

The night for Fredrick and Anne (after a Platonic nap during which Fredrick inadvertently pronounces Desirée's name) begins with the theater; and who should be starring in the production but Desirée. Anne suddenly takes ill and they rush home. Fredrick now steals away to see Desirée. After a pratfall in some water he ends up in some night clothes that belong to Desirée's current lover, the militaristic Count Malcolm (Jarl Kulle as a sprung-steel bantam) who, as it happens, arrives upon the scene much to the merriment of Desirée and to the embarrassment of Fredrick.

The culmination of love's labors and intrigues takes place at the chateau of Desirée's mother, Mrs. Armfeldt (Naima Wifstrand). The action includes a most amusing duel, some hanky-panky atop a haystack, musical beds, an attempted suicide, some Chateau Mouton-Rothschild (if I caught the label right), the amorous kiss of young lovers, the triumph of the fairer sex, and the very proper lawyer's final humiliation.

If you haven't seen Smiles of a Summer Night you are in for a rare treat: a comedy by Ingmar Bergman. And it is no ordinary comedy. Shakespearean and Oscar Wilde-like in its sharp, satirical (and oh so worldly wise) dialogue, this playful romp with the Swedish landed gentry and servants of a hundred years ago is a delight that will satisfy the most sophisticated viewer as well as the most middlebrow.

Owing something to the French farcical tradition (in particular Molière), to light opera (maybe Mozart), and even the Greek theater, Bergman's romantic comedy sparkles with love's intrigues and pratfalls. According to Pauline Kael, whose review is part of a 24-page booklet that comes with the Criterion Collection DVD, Bergman had just finished directing a stage production of The Merry Widow which accounts in part for the fin-de-siècle setting and the genteel treatment that he finally settled upon for his comedy of manners. Also I think this examination and satire of the class structure with hilarious asides on the foibles of human nature owes something to Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Ernest which was set in approximately the same time period and had a similar cast of characters including a Grand Dame, an ingenue, some rustics, a clergyman, but most directly in the fact that both Wilde and Bergman aim their sardonic wit directly at the burghers and the bourgeois. Bohemians need not apply. Indeed the closest thing to a Bohemian in the play is the actress Desirée who is the very calculating and dominate personage of the film.

By the way, Bergman's future protege, Bibi Andersson, does appear in this movie, but only for a moment as an actress on stage at the theater.

The final, cynical bemusement comes as one reconsiders who ends up with whom. Not to spoil the plot, but notice that in every case there is something less than perfect in each romantic partnership, something slightly amiss that may cause problems down the road, something unsettled that suggests that nothing has really changed. As the French say, the more things change, the more they remain the same. It is this ironic underpinning to this delightful comedy that lends to it something of the timeless. Bergman is good at that.

As a Swede I found this film continuously slapstick doubled-over slap-my-thighs funny, while the Englishman I watched it with kept a straight face and explained that the sense of humour was on the wry side. We both loved it though - cinematographically it's a feast, the casting and acting is top class, and the plotting is effortlessly genius. It's so well played and scripted that you could probably identify with more than one of the wildly varying characters. As opposed to the general view of Bergman, this film is easy on the brain, and other than reading subtitles, you don't have to make an effort to love it. I wish they still made movies like this.

An amazing COMEDY OF MANNERS by auteur INGMAR BERGMAN.

Grand Dame NAIMA WIFSTRAND's stellar turn as the 'dowager aunt' who ties everything together in the misplaced tale of mixed-up love [almost along the lines of 'A Midsummer Night's Dream' - Nordic style] is well-worth this admission price.

Still charming after all these years, it's chiefly a tale about husband, young wife, mistress [read famous actress], disgruntled son, lady-friend with paranoid [homicidal?] husband, throw in a few randy servants, a revolving bed [those sconces!], attempted suicide [very necessary to the plot line], mild hysteria, and there you have it!

Very well adapted as "A Little Night Music" - the original still holds up rather well!

It's especially noteworthy for its period perfect costumes, sets, and art direction.

The performances? Always superior - but then we do have Master Bergman orchestrating it all!

But Oh, that country air!