Smiles of a Summer Night [Criterion Collection] [Blu-ray]

Director: Ingmar Bergman Ingmar Bergman

Overview

Bergman's comic masterpiece opens with middle-aged lawyer Frederik Egerman (Gunnar Bjornstrand) again failing to consummate his marriage with the much younger Anne (Ulla Jacobsson). While visiting a former lover, actress Desiree Armfeldt (Eva Dahlbeck), he crosses swords with her current lover, Count Malcolm (Jarl Kulle), after both men learn that Frederik is the father of her illegitimate child. At Desiree's behest, her mother invites Egerman, the Count, and their wives along with Egerman's grown son, Henrik (Björn Bjelvenstam) to her manor house for the weekend. Before their departure, divinity student Henrik wards off the eager advances of the housemaid by reading from the Bible aloud, but it seems clear that he and Anne are quite taken with one another. After arriving at the Ryarp estate the guests are served a dinner spiked with a love potion which provokes swift reactions. The bewildered Frederik becomes aware of the increasingly intense bond between Henrik and Anne, and the Countess (Margit Carlquist) makes a public bet with her husband that she can seduce Frederik. Shocked by the dinner-table conversation, the strait-laced Henrik retires to his room to commit suicide. In the course of his bumbling attempt, he has the good fortune to learn why so many prefer sex to death.

Product Details

Release Date:	05/03/2011
UPC:	0715515070713
Original Release:	1955
Rating:	NR
Source:	Criterion Collection
Presentation:	[B&W]
Language:	English
Time:	1:48:00
Sales rank:	14,405

Special Features

Video Introduction to the Film by Director Ingmar Bergman; ; Video Conversation between Bergman scholar Peter Cowie and Writer Jörn Donner, Executive Producer Of Fanny and Alexander; ; Original Theatrical Trailer; ; Plus: a Booklet featuring an Essay by Theater and Film Critic John Simon and a 1961 review by Film Critic Pauline Kael

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Ulla Jacobsson	Anne Egerman
Eva Dahlbeck	Desiree Armfeldt
Harriet Andersson	Petra the Maid,Actress
Margit Carlqvist	Charlotte Malcolm
Jari Kulle	Count Malcolm,Carl Magnus Malcolm
Bjorn Bjelvenstam	Henrik Egerman
Naima Wifstrand	Mrs. Armfeldt
Gull Natrop	Malla
Birgitta Valberg	Actress
Anders Wulff	Footman
Svea Holst	Dresser
Hans Straat	Almgen the Photographer
Lisa Lundholm	Mrs. Almgren
Sigge Furst	Policeman
Gunnar Nielsen	Niklas
Gösta Prüzelius	Footman
Lena Söderblom	Actor
Mona Malm	Maid
Joseph Norrman	Actor
John Melin	Actor
Sten Gester	Servant
Gunnar Björnstrand	Frederik Egerman
Åke Fridell	Frid
Gull Natorp	Malla
Georg Adelly	Legal clerk
David Erikson	Tobacconist
Sigge Fürst	Policeman
Arne Lindblad	Actor
Carl-Gustaf Lindstedt	Legal clerk
Börje Mellvig	Legal clerk,Clerk
Yngve Nordwall	Ferdinand
Margit Carlquist	Charlotte Malcolm
Sigge Fuerst	Policeman
Julian Kindahl	The Cook
Gosta Prnzelius	Footman
Ulf Johansson	Legal agency clerk
Mille Schmidt	Servant
Gunnar Bjornstrand	Actor
Erik Nordgren	Composer

Technical Credits

Ingmar Bergman

Ingmar Bergman	Director,Screenwriter
Allan Ekelund	Producer

Editorial Reviews

A welcome anomaly in the career of the famously angst-ridden director, this eight-part rondo is a dazzling comedy of manners suffused with the shimmering eroticism of summer nights. Under the influence of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Bergman sets his mismatched couples awhirl, and in the stumbling slapstick and sublime ecstasy of the chase, he gently punctures the illusions and pretensions that have made their current ties so stifling. Of course, as is the director's wont, the men are the truly benighted creatures here, in particular the hapless Frederik, who is as blind to the farcical nature of his marriage as he is to the intentions of the designing Desiree. But even amidst the Ryarp manor's lush atmosphere of abandon and sensuality, none of the players can escape an undercurrent of bittersweet longing, a sense of the transience of romantic love. Despite a characteristic dash of Strindbergian venom, one might not immediately recognize the director's signature in the elegant epigrams and polished wit of the screenplay, but his genius is evident in the inspired ensemble of acting of the entire company, particularly the ineffable work of these four intoxicating actresses.

All Movie Guide - Michael Costello