is it possible that anna's dreams in black and white were actually out takes from bergman's slightly earlier 'shame'? a lot of clues are there; b @ w photography, same actress and the boat. does anyone have any information?
listen dear, they are playing our tune.
I had the same reaction when I saw the dream. In addition to the black and white and the boat, the part with all the women walking and in distress seems like it could have been in Shame. I am not sure, though.
Accentuate the negative
I've been a huge Bergman fan for decades, and the more I watch Shame and Anna, the more parallels I see. I'm pretty sure both films were made on the same island in the same locales, for one. Then there's the use of the same main two actors, and Anna's dream.
But what really cements it for me is the final line: "This time he was called Andreas Winkelman." I truly think he intended the two films to be companion pieces.
Your thoughts?
Definitely. Also, the house/greenhouse is the same one in both films, I'm sure of it. It's shot from different angles to make it look different, but you can tell it's the same.
shareYes, I have no doubt about it...what we saw was probably the alternate ending to Shame (remember how that film...spoilers...ends with them all on the boat adrift at sea where presumably they'll drown?) I found it interesting how Bergman included so many experimental touches in this film which could have been a very straightforward drama. I'm not sure they all worked, but it's fascinating nonetheless.
shareI had the same reaction as well, and to me it is very clear that there is a connection.
*********SPOILERS************
First of all remember Eva's comments in "Skammen" that sometimes she felt that she was living somebody else's dream? Bergman might be hinting that this was Anna's(from "En Passion") dream. I am of the viewpoint that "Skammen" (altough it is perfectly solid on its own) is an expression of the deep subconscious shame and longing that Anna feels after the death of her family. I could not help but gaping in awe at the surreal and abstract atmosphere in "Skammen", but at the same time it reinforced (even before seeing "En passion") my idea that the whole movie was a dream.
Anna dream's (in "En passion") that she is "all alone by the side of the road, longing for someone to hold their arms around her, but she knew that would never happen again". This to me, is her mind trying to process the feelings she endured in the hours she waited by the road side after the car accident. These feelings manifested themself in her dream, and the result is what we see as the movie "Skammen".
I don't think the other connections like the boat, the same clothes, the burning houses in the background, the execution and the "refugees" are a conicidence. Bergman very intentionally put all the evidence there for us to make the connection. Although my interpretation may be way off, there is definately a connection.
One thing about those two movies which really sends a chill down my spine is the last lines. They both seem so mysterious, almost as if they hold the key to some connection, some deeper understanding of the movie...or contains a message in itself. They are so abstract and seriously made me ponder as to the meaning of their placement.
Someone mentioned above that "This time his name was Andreas Winkelman" refers to "Skammen" in the sense that this time he is not Jan(?). I find it highly interesting and plausible. The last lines from "Skammen" though, completely eludes me. It is also probably something most people have experienced in a dream: The compelling sense that you have forgotten something important, but you don't know what it was.
This is a pretty old thread, so I might be talking to myself here, but...
I'm glad I read this thread as it adds a whole different light in which I could see this movie. Thinking about it now, I could see how the dream sequence could be some reflection/connection to Shame. The boat, the people, the fire...I like both movies so this new perspective is welcomed. And if by chance, this association is true, Bergman was a more interesting director than I've thought.
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Well, I still didn't watch Shame, but you are talking about Anna's dream, and something that I couldn't figure out is who the woman whose son was going to be executed represents in Anna's life. Why is Anna asking her for forgiveness? She feels clearly guilty, and she had inmediately shots of the car accident with the two bodies lying dead. She's the blame for her son and husband's death, but why is she pleading for "absolution" to that woman?
If someone knows it, I would appreciate an answer.
Thanks in advace.
Martha, I believe your question is the most pertinent to this.
But first: There is definitely a connection to "Shame" in that sequence and it is perfectly logical to connect Anna in "Passion" with Eva in "Shame." But I don't think it's an outtake from the earlier film, much as it looks it might be one. But only the bit in the boat.
First of all, both films were shot on Bermman's island, Faro, so they have a similar look already.
Second, Bergman uses a different film stock, much grainier, for the "Passion" sequence.
But mostly it's because that dream sequence relates most squarely with Anna. And now I can attempt to answer Martha's question. The "son who is about to be executed" is, in Anna's dreamworld, Anna's own son, whom she killed along with her husband when she drove her car off the road. The woman she's asking for forgiveness is her own sense of herself, because she knows what she did was abominable and can never be forgiven. It's a bit narcisistic, but it's her own subconscious realization of how self-destructive her delusion she's all about "truth" actually is.
Just my opinion.
jlent thanks for your answer.
I have to admit about this, the only possibility that came to my mind was (since I'm one of those who think that Anna had a psycho/schizo side and was the person who was cruel to the animals, at least the puppy and the sheeps), that her subcoscious was showing her in a dream that an innocent man (Johan) was going to die because of what she did, and that woman was sent to her mind to show her how despicable her behaviour was.
But I have to say I totally stick to your theory, I think is very plausible, all the narcisistic thing fascinates me. I second your interpretation!
While an obvious reference to Skammen, I've compared the two and the dream sequence is not an outtake from it - it's not the same boat and the film is much grainier. However, Liv Ullman is wearing the same scarf and coat (although here she's more muffled up).
shareWhile there are the connections noted between the two films, arguing for an intentional congruence in their meanings, even an implied notion that one film reinforces the point or meaning of the other, is problematic in several respects.
First of all, the Andreas character strikes me as quite different from Jan. Perhaps one might answer that the two films are really seen from Anna/Eva's point of view, which in itself I largely agree with. But why have two different men played by the same actor? All men are the same despite surface dissimilarities? That seems kind of lame.
The similarity in the look of teh settings in the two films is partly attributable to their being shot on the same island. But did Bergman intend something more out of that other than merely that he liked to, for whatever reason, shoot on the island? Did he not shoot other films there as well?
Perhaps the similarities pointed out derive from not much more than some shared themes and uses of visual elements.
I will watch Anna again soon to see how much this argument holds up for me.
Well, I did rewatch The Passion of Anna, and first of all what a great film! I am reminded...
I think both Shame and Anna concern the subject of alienation and emotional isolation. Andreas speaks directly to wanting to return to his personal isolation after finding his relationship with Anna to be, on several levels, unsatisfying and even disturbing. Jan by comparison is not literally isolated from Eva, but their alienation is if anything even further advanced, entrenched in fact.
The main surface difference, distinguishing the similar setting of the island, is what is going on socially, specifically that Shame takes place during a period of war, probably a civil war. Despite the fact that Shame was made earlier, does this suggest that the environment in Anna led to what we see in Shame? I don't think this is meant to be the case in any literal sense, of course. Anna contains no references to any pending civil strife or other warlike context.
But that does not mean there is no connection. Perhaps the connection has to do with understanding the context of strife in Shame as a social manifestation of the alienation that is the subject matter in both films. But that is a rather general connection, and does not require seeing them as companion pieces.
Still, comparisons can be instructive. And here the comparison between Jan and Andreas is worth pursuing. Jan, if one follows the view that Shame in effect follows the setting and time found in Anna, is so alienated as to be inept, removed, nearly incapable of genuine emotional connection. Andreas may have been literally living in isolation as the film begins, but he is not socially inept or so alienated as to choose to remain uninvolved with Anna and both Vergeruses. Even in isolation Andreas has a friend in Johan.
Andreas also has a sexual encounter with Eva (here Vergerus - why the same first name as Eva Rosenberg??? - No "This time it was Eva Vergerus") and a relationship with Anna.
But still, at the film's end, are we meant to see Andreas in his physical isolation, now also leaving a relationship with Anna, as a prelude to the kind of emotional remove we see Jan in? I think so.
Andreas on one hand focuses on Anna's specific shortcomings, what it is about her that makes him unhappy with her. But we also sense that he has left this relationship with little appetite or interest in another, a next one. This despite understanding that he had warnings about Anna from the very beginning, that letter from Anna's husband being a huge red flag.
Comparing Anna and Eva is actually more complicated. While Eva in Shame engages in an act of adultery, Anna is not an adulterer - that again is left to the Eva in Anna. They do share the having of explicit and bizarre dreams. But in the end I am not sure we are shown enough about how Eva became the person we see in Shame to compare her on any more direct level. Some obviously feel that the more negative aspects of Anna's personality reflect the fact that Bergman and Ullman were literally breaking up their real life relationship, and that was not the case with Shame. Frankly I think I may want to revisit Shame again at some point to better speak to this aspect.
''Hour of the Wolf'' (1968), ''Shame'' (1968) and ''The Passion of Anna'' (1969) are all connected.
http://is.gd/flVDMj
Well, fwiw the linked article asserted those three were linked with Persona as well.
I have no issue with saying they were certainly linked in the sense they were of the same time, and beyond that it is not ridiculous to wonder whether the director might have been concerned in that period with similar themes that, to a varying extent, cropped up here and there. I know the argument goes much beyond that, but as a starting point, there are the obvious connections. The four were all shot on Faro, all share a certain extent of social isolation both physical (on a barren island!) and emotional.
Beyond that, there are some fairly explicit connections (although not with Persona, I don't think). One obvious one is how the scene where Anna runs away from the violent Andreas, and the landscape and movement directly refer to the dream Eva has in Shame while she was (in her dream) encountering a number of people, including hte mother who looked at her with such scorn (or was that in Anna? Well, perhaps that is the point).
I coincidentally have seen the latter three films over the last three months. I think they each stand on their own, and have obviously differing surface concerns. Perhaps the notion that the three were done in sequence and those connections noted above suggest more thematic connections than really exist. Perhaps. And I am skeptical that they can be viewed as too closely tied together.
But of course that does not mean there are no thematic connections. One obvious connection is that we find in each that the man (von Sydow) in all three one some level seems to choose an estrangement from the woman (Ullman). In Wolf it may be that it is his mental disorientation that drives him to estrangement, or perhaps even that Alma's seeming begining of an identification with that disorientation encourages that estrangement rather than, if you will, giving them something in common. And in Anna it is arguable that what leads him to choose estrangement is literally what Andreas describes as the reason for it, which in so many words is that Anna for him (as it would likely be for most) has become unlovable (did he ever really love her though?).
This common tendency is, frankly, disturbing to me in a way that some other disturbing elements are less so, but that could for some have been more disturbing. What makes it disturbing is the general notion that in that isolate setting, where in effect the characters have, at least initially, chosen to put themselves, that the common experience and interaction between the couple essentially leads them to estrangement. Familiarity breeds contempt in these films, and of course THAT is shared with Persona.
This in turn makes one wonder if it is the particulars of the characters themselves that leads to this result, or is this somehow a comment on the human race mroe generally? I suppose we need not merely assume that Bergman meant these films to stand in for his comment about human nature as a whole. Perhaps as suggested this reflected his own feelings and views during this period.
But given the pasage of the trilogy before Persona, I thikn it fair to conclude that a fair statement can be made that the turning away from even speculating about God's existence, or lack therof, did not seem to provide Bergman with much else in the way of answers. Perhaps he would say that was not to be expected.
In any event, they are all in my opinion very interesting and arguably great films.