In Memoriam

Gone, But Not Forgotten

March 10, 2020

Max von Sydow

April 10, 1929 – March 8, 2020

A Man Who Etched a Place Among the Cinematic Greats  

Max von Sydow was a working actor, and he was so prolific that he racked up 163 screen credits, two of which he earned from voicing video games. He had a memorable voice, an expressive face, and a towering physical presence that made him a tremendous force on the silver screen. He appeared in masterpieces, as well as B-film fluff that would have been forgettable without him, and his work with Ingmar Bergman is vital to our understanding of the power and possibility of film. He will truly be missed.

A Good Starting Point:

The Seventh Seal (1957)

Wild Strawberries (1957)

The Virgin Spring (1960)

The Exorcist (1973)

Voyage of the Damned (1976)

Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)

Pelle the Conqueror (1987)

Hiroshima: Out of the Ashes (1990 TV Movie)

Minority Report (2002) 

Review – Voyage of the Damned

July 7, 2008

Voyage of the Damned – U.S., 1976

There is no doubt that the offer arose suspicion, and yet there is also no doubt that it was tempting to believe in the opportunity it promised, in the sense of safety and renewal it seemed to dangle in front of them. It was 1939, three years after the night of broken glass and just a short time before World War II would officially erupt, but for Jews living in Germany, the terror had already begun and many could sense that it was about to get worst. Given this context, it is understandable that 937 people would decide to take a chance and trust that - maybe just maybe – the German government would keep their word.

Saturday, May 13, 1939, begins like normal days do. Hundreds of people arrive to embark on a cruise. They check in their luggage, get their passports stamped, and board, many of them decked out in their best formal wear, giving the moment the pomp and circumstance of a night at the opera. However, this is not a normal cruise. Passports are stamped “J” to indicate the religion of the passengers, bags go missing before the ship even leaves the port, and a mother sends her children on the boat without her and without telling them why. “Which truth should I tell them?” their mother wonders aloud. “The truth about why I’m staying or the truth about why they must go?” Moments later, the S.S. St. Louis sets sail for Havana, Cuba, a place where the passengers have been promised refuge from the chaos engulfing their homeland.

The trip offers an escape from the rules and segregation of Germany. Young White Germans meet and have brief encounters with young German Jews. White German waiters serve their Jewish customers politely and respectfully, and doctors who would ordinarily be banned from lifting a finger to treat a Jewish customer tend to them with an amazing degree of attention. Former concentration camp prisoners, originally fearful of expressing their desires and preferences, become comfortable enough with their surroundings to begin to believe that the worst is behind them. However, fear still grips many of the passengers, especially a lawyer named Carl Rosen (Sam Wanamaker) and a doctor named Egon Kresiler (Oskar Werner), the first who suffered terribly under the Gestapo for two years and the other who followed the Hippocratic Oath and treated wounded and sick SS officers. Their fears are in fact justified, for at that very moment, German officers are sowing the seeds of anti-Semitism in Cuba and ensuring that the passengers will never set foot on Cuban soil.

Voyage of the Damned unfolds in a way that does not reveal the motivation of key characters. We see German officers meeting with Cuban officials, but at times, the German officers appear to be arranging for the passengers to be allowed to disembark; at other times, they are clearly satisfied that they will not be permitted to. We know that a member of the crew is working against the passengers, but the captain of the ship, Capt. Schroeder (Max Von Sydow) a man who has refused to join the Nazi Party and is therefore believed to be beyond suspicion, is working equally hard for the passengers. At one point, he even refuses to allow the ship’s crew to visit Cuba, arguing that if the passengers can’t leave the boat, neither can the crew. And what about the visas that the passengers were issued? Aren’t they valid? Apparently, that depends on who is doing the bribing. As a man named Estedas (Orson Welles) explains to a man desperately trying to get his two daughters off the boat, “Your Jews are for sale. Their lives are a matter of negotiation.”

Voyage of the Damned is a tragic and powerful tale that reminds us of a time when nations failed a people in need. It reminds us of the tricks and bluffs that devious governments play in an effort to embarrass nations that verbally attack injustice yet are reticent to put their words into action. The sad thing is that in the case of the 937 passengers on board the S.S. St. Louis, the bluff was not called. According to the film, of the 937 passengers on the St. Louis, only 337 would survive the German concentration camps, an example of what can happen when good people turn a blind eye to injustice. (currently unavailable on DVD)

4 stars

Review – Wild Strawberries

June 20, 2008

Wild Strawberries – Sweden, 1957

In 2002, Alexander Payne’s film About Schmidt told the story of a man who struggles to find meaning at the end of his life. The job he had for years did not distinguished him, his marriage was not as happy as he thought it was, and he struggles to find activities to occupy his days. In fact, the only impact he appears to have had is on his daughter, and it’s hard to see that impact as positive. Forty-five years earlier, Ingmar Bergman told a similar story in his much heralded film Wild Strawberries. However unlike Payne’s Warren Schmidt, the lead character in Bergman’s film could hardly be said to be invisible to society. Professor Isac Borg (impressively played by Victor Sjöström) is a retired doctor who is both celebrated and loved, so much so that a prestigious university sees fit to give him an honorary degree. The day of the ceremony should be a glorious day for him, the culmination of a life full of distinction, yet the beginning of the film finds Borg explaining his recent decision to withdraw from most of his relations, a move that seems odd coming from a man with as many accolades as Isac Borg. What unfolds throughout the film is the fascinating journey - both physically and psychologically – that preceded Isac’s decision.

On the day before he is to receive his degree, Professor Borg chooses to drive to his son’s house. Accompanying him on this journey is his daughter-in-law Marianne, who calls her father-in-law Uncle Borg, perhaps as a way of making the distance that exists between them apparent to all in earshot of the two of them. To Marianne and Borg’s son Evald, Borg is anything but the life saver that others see him as. To them, he is the cause of their marital woes, having loaned Evald money to go to college and then demanded repayment, not an unreasonable demand, but one that Marianne credits for her husband’s tendency to work excessively, a habit that has increased the distance that exists between them. Marianne even says that Evald hates his father, for while being nice on the ouside, he is hard on the inside, a characterization that doesn’t match what the viewer has seen so far of the professor’s personality.

Much of Wild Strawberries focuses on this apparent contradiction, the esteemed figure of the doctor, a man of medicine, and the figure that inspires resentment and accusations of callousness. Evidence of the latter comes from Marianne, who reminds him of a recent conversation he had with her in which he said things that if true are certainly harsh, and yet we have no reason to doubt Marianne’s version of events. This creates a paradox for viewers. Is the gentle man they see before them a façade, a role played by a man needing to be seen in a positive light? It is a question that Professor Borg himself is wrestling with and which his dreams are increasingly shedding light on. The answers he finds are not the ones he was hoping for.

As the journey progresses, others on their own personal escapades join them. One of them, a young woman named Sara, is torn between the two men that are accompanying her, Anders and Viktor, who each represent a side of human reasoning; mainly, religion and modernity. The five of them also have the unfortunate opportunity to meet a mutually abusive couple, one who belittles the other verbally, the other who attacks her husband physically. It is more than Marianne can bear, perhaps for more than just the shock and discomfort the sight of their verbal barrage is causing Sara, Anders, and Viktor.

With Wild Strawberries, Bergman has presented a picture of a man whose “cruelty” does not come in easily recognizable forms, for Borg’s faults are not temperament or a tendency for violence. It comes from his strict adherence to principle, his avoidance of conflict, his tendency to understand and not point fingers; in short, his desire to be the good guy. This propensity has given him a life without pain, without feelings of anger or hurt. In addition, it has given him, like it has his mother and son, a life of emotional loneliness, for which perhaps there is no cure. (on DVD from Criterion Collection)

4 stars

*Wild Strawberries is in Swedish with white, English subtitles. The film was ranked the seventh best film of all time by John Koble.