Amazon.com: Notorious: The Life of Ingrid Bergman: Donald Spoto: Books

Notorious: The Life of Ingrid Bergman (Hardcover)

by Donald Spoto (Author) "IT HAD BEEN A BRIGHT, CLOUDLESS DAY IN STOCKHOLM, AND BECAUSE it was summertime, the sun shone brilliantly through the evening, casting long, shimmering rays..." (more)
Key Phrases: ski holiday, typical review, Ingrid Bergman, New York, Miss Bergman (more...)

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Written with the exhaustive thoroughness readers have come to expect from Donald Spoto's celebrity biographies, Notorious moves smoothly through the details of actress Ingrid Bergman's life. Although most will equate the book's title with the 1946 Hitchock film that provided Bergman with one of her more complex and unusually dark roles, the very definition of the word proves an appropriate description of her life; derived from the Latin notus, notorious is defined as "famous or celebrated; secondarily, known for something not generally approved." Disapproval of Bergman--both virulent and far-reaching--stemmed from her extramarital affair with director Roberto Rosellini and the subsequent birth of their son (conceived before their marriage). It is this fall from grace that intrigues Spoto.

In 1939 Ingrid Bergman was hailed as a fresh-faced girl, "dignified, gracious, unpretentious and spiritual," who represented everything good that America loved and needed. Although already a wife and mother, she was most often described as innocent, even virginal. But in 1949 this perception changed, and Bergman was no longer a martyr for the sake of her movies; at the time, she was regarded as the foulest of sinners, a renegade whose "powerful influence for evil" was soon to be condemned in churches, schools, and even on the floor of the U. S. Senate. However, Spoto doesn't neglect Bergman's artistic drive and integrity; he creates a portrait of a woman on trial for aspiring to both professional success and intellectual fulfillment. The details accrue to portray a disarmingly modest professional--at times idolized, at times disparaged, but always skilled and committed.

From Library Journal
The title of this biography has a double meaning: it's the name of one of Bergman's greatest films, the 1946 collaboration with costar Cary Grant and director Alfred Hitchcock, and it also refers to her adulterous affair with director Roberto Rossellini and resulting exile from Hollywood during the early 1950s. Bergman is also notable for winning the Academy Award for best actress for Gas Light (1944) and again for Anastasia (1956) and is perhaps most remembered for her role opposite Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca (1943). Spoto, a prolific celebrity biographer who won a Baker & Taylor/FOLUSA Award at this year's ALA meeting, has produced a very readable and mostly laudable portrait of one of Hollywood's most charismatic figures. He's on more solid ground when he sticks to the facts of the Swedish-born Bergman's (1915-82) life; his psychoanalysis, while generally sympathetic, is more open to question. Though a worthy portrait, it is hardly complete; Bergman's first 35 years are covered in 300 pages, while the next 32 slide by in under 150. For larger public libraries where celebrity biographies are popular.?Thomas J. Wiener, "Satellite DIRECT"
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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