I am currently listening to and occasionally looking at the commentary of Ingmar Bergman's
Autumn Sonata.
(Liv Ullman and Ingrid Bergman)
This film was Ingrid Bergman's last feature film. She was sick with breast cancer when they shot this film.
This movie is a perfect wave good-bye from Ingrid. The movie brings me to the edge of sadness every time I watch it. I think about the way she talked about it in her autobiography and the fact that she wrote her autobiography because she knew her time was short. I think of her biography and how Liv Ullman (who played her daughter Eva in the film and was Ingmar Bergman's baby mama) talked about the powerful, long scenes that they had to film. She reflected upon Ingrid's strength when Ingrid had to lift her arms above her head while laying on the ground. She had had a mastectomy and lifting her arms that way was painful and seemingly impossible. She did it. She acted through it. I believe it's because she wasn't sick when she was playing Charlotte. I can't remember if it were she who said, or someone else who said that she wasn't herself when she was in character. I think it may have been Isabella or Ingrid Isotta (her twin daughters, that's Isabella Rossellini) who discussed how their mother was so tired after a show and had so much prep time before the show because she had to completely become the person she was portraying.
Autumn Sonata, it seems, is Ingrid's way of showing and acting through her own imperfections. The story runs closely to what happened with her daughter Pia Lindstrom, who she was forced to abandon when she chose to stay in Italy with Roberto Rossellini. She did not see Pia for 6 years, which is very similar to the character. Charlotte-- the character -- is a concert pianist and much like Ingrid with acting, she chose to play instead of be a housewife and stay at home mom with her children.
I admire Ingrid for this.
Her children may have had rough times and had to deal with difficulties, but they were cared for by others and finacially were well off. Ingrid talked about how she always wanted her children to be okay. Isabella mentioned that her mother was just so in love with acting, it was her passion.
Passion like that cannot be ignored.
I hope to be like Ingrid. I don't want to abandon my child...if I have one. I don't want to face heartache after heartache (though if I do, it will just happen). I want to live my dreams and my passions. I want to be immersed in various cultures and languages and be well versed in the world.
I have all the support I could ask for. I guess now it's just time to keep watching the movie and figure out my next step.
(Funny how this turned into being about me...)
