Self-analysis of a filmmaker
The Ingmar Bergman Archives. Excerpt from the essay by Ingmar Bergman
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Filmmaking is a part of me. It is a driving force like hunger and thirst. Some people express themselves by writing books, painting pictures, climbing mountains, beating their children, or dancing the samba. I express myself by making films.
The great Jean Cocteau has written in The Blood of a Poet about his alter ego staggering along a nightmarish hotel corridor, where behind all the different doors lie what has made him what he is.Without having the unique qualities of Cocteau, I am going to attempt to convey you to the workshop where I make my films. I must apologize if the visit does not come up to expectations. The workshop is at present quite a mess as the owner is too busy to keep it tidy. Moreover, the lighting is pretty bad in certain places, and some rooms we will not enter at all—these have PRIVATE in large letters on the doors—and your guide is rather unsure as he does not know what will be of interest to you.
However, let us take a look behind some of the doors. This does not mean that we will find what we are looking for, but the search may possibly provide some odd pieces for that peculiar jigsaw puzzle of filmmaking.
When I was 10 years old I received my first rattling film projector, with its chimney and lamp, and a band of film that went round and round and round
A motion picture is a perforated length of film made up of a number of still photographs, small and rectangular in shape—there are 52 of them to each meter of film—each separated from its neighbor by a thick black line. At first sight these photographs seem the same, but if examined closely slight differences can be detected; when they are projected successively on a screen, usually at the rate of 24 a second, the illusion of movement can be created.While each of these photographs is moving into position for projection a mask moves over the lens of the projector and the screen is black until the next picture is projected.
When I was 10 years old I received my first rattling film projector, with its chimney and lamp, and a band of film that went round and round and round. I found it both mystifying and fascinating. Even today I remind myself with childish excitement that I am really a conjurer, as cinematography is based on deception of the human eye, which because of the rapid movement is incapable of separating rather similar pictures.
I have worked it out that if I see a film that has a running time of one hour, I sit through 27 minutes of complete darkness.When I show a film I am guilty of deceit. I am using an apparatus that is constructed to take advantage of a certain human weakness, an apparatus with which I can sway my audience in a highly emotional manner—to laugh, scream with fright, smile, believe in fairy stories, become indignant, be shocked, be charmed, be carried away, or perhaps yawn with boredom. Thus I am either an imposter or, in the case where the audience is willing to be taken in, a conjurer. I perform conjuring tricks with a conjuring apparatus so expensive and so wonderful that any performer in history would have given anything to own or to make use of it.
This involves—or ought to involve—a serious moral problem for those who work in the film industry. I do not propose to go into the misuse of the cinema by commercial interests, though it would be of interest if a scientist could one day invent an instrument that could measure how much talent, initiative, genius, and creative ability have been destroyed by the industry in its ruthless, efficient sausage machine. At the same time it ought to be recognized that the rough must be taken with the smooth, and there is no reason why film work should be an exception. Its brutality is unmasked, but that can be an advantage.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
Filmmaking is a part of me. It is a driving force like hunger and thirst. Some people express themselves by writing books, painting pictures, climbing mountains, beating their children, or dancing the samba. I express myself by making films.
The great Jean Cocteau has written in The Blood of a Poet about his alter ego staggering along a nightmarish hotel corridor, where behind all the different doors lie what has made him what he is.Without having the unique qualities of Cocteau, I am going to attempt to convey you to the workshop where I make my films. I must apologize if the visit does not come up to expectations. The workshop is at present quite a mess as the owner is too busy to keep it tidy. Moreover, the lighting is pretty bad in certain places, and some rooms we will not enter at all—these have PRIVATE in large letters on the doors—and your guide is rather unsure as he does not know what will be of interest to you.
However, let us take a look behind some of the doors. This does not mean that we will find what we are looking for, but the search may possibly provide some odd pieces for that peculiar jigsaw puzzle of filmmaking.
When I was 10 years old I received my first rattling film projector, with its chimney and lamp, and a band of film that went round and round and round
A motion picture is a perforated length of film made up of a number of still photographs, small and rectangular in shape—there are 52 of them to each meter of film—each separated from its neighbor by a thick black line. At first sight these photographs seem the same, but if examined closely slight differences can be detected; when they are projected successively on a screen, usually at the rate of 24 a second, the illusion of movement can be created.While each of these photographs is moving into position for projection a mask moves over the lens of the projector and the screen is black until the next picture is projected.
When I was 10 years old I received my first rattling film projector, with its chimney and lamp, and a band of film that went round and round and round. I found it both mystifying and fascinating. Even today I remind myself with childish excitement that I am really a conjurer, as cinematography is based on deception of the human eye, which because of the rapid movement is incapable of separating rather similar pictures.
I have worked it out that if I see a film that has a running time of one hour, I sit through 27 minutes of complete darkness.When I show a film I am guilty of deceit. I am using an apparatus that is constructed to take advantage of a certain human weakness, an apparatus with which I can sway my audience in a highly emotional manner—to laugh, scream with fright, smile, believe in fairy stories, become indignant, be shocked, be charmed, be carried away, or perhaps yawn with boredom. Thus I am either an imposter or, in the case where the audience is willing to be taken in, a conjurer. I perform conjuring tricks with a conjuring apparatus so expensive and so wonderful that any performer in history would have given anything to own or to make use of it.
This involves—or ought to involve—a serious moral problem for those who work in the film industry. I do not propose to go into the misuse of the cinema by commercial interests, though it would be of interest if a scientist could one day invent an instrument that could measure how much talent, initiative, genius, and creative ability have been destroyed by the industry in its ruthless, efficient sausage machine. At the same time it ought to be recognized that the rough must be taken with the smooth, and there is no reason why film work should be an exception. Its brutality is unmasked, but that can be an advantage.
Page [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]
The Ingmar Bergman Archives
Hardcover + DVD, 41.1 x 30 cm (16.2 x 11.8 in.), 592 pages
$ 200.00
$ 200.00
The complete works of Ingmar Bergman: an homage to one of the most esteemed film and theater artists of all time, began in cooperation with Bergman himself and made with full access to his archives
Summer with Monika, 1953. Photos: Louis Huch, (c) Svensk Filmindustri