After his divorce and a short time in prison, Andreas Winkleman (Max von Sydow) lives a solitary life until, first, he sleeps one time with a lovely neighbor (Bibi Andersson) and, second, he begins a romantic liaison with the damaged Anna (Liv Ullmann).  A Passion, not The Passion of Anna, is the actual title of this 1969 Ingmar Bergman film when it is correctly translated, with passion as a synonym for suffering.  Needless to say, this being a Bergman movie, Andreas and the other characters do suffer.

What is more, Bergman was impressed by the observation of a particular philosopher that people live strictly according to their needs, both positive and negative.  He means for his people here to verify that.  At the end of the film, the needs of Andreas conflict with each other and there is painful irresolution.  A limited profundity is in this, but much more can be found in A Passion, which is also about isolation and the lies we tell to make it seem there is less isolation.

The film is brilliant, especially visually, but is yet another excessively talky Bergman piece.  Predictably, the acting is magnificent.  Max von Sydow was never more incisive, more soulful.  As well, however, Bergman is the same old skeptic about religion (unlike me).  He never—and I mean never—understood it.  A Passion is easier to take than the Swedish artist’s other movies, excepting Winter Light, but I finally cannot accept it.

(In Swedish with English subtitles)

The Passion of Anna (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Cover of Tadpole

There is fine acting from Bebe Neuwirth, John Ritter, Sigourney Weaver and the newcomer, Aaron Stanford.  There is a fairly funny and unpredictable script by Heather McGowan and Niels Muller.  Gary Winick‘s decision to shoot the film in DV is acceptable because Tadpole (2000) is, to use another critic’s proper adjective for it, unassuming.

Nevertheless, this Graduate-like film with a 15-year-old Benjamin and Neuwirth’s Mrs. Robinson would have been far better had the precocious boy (Stanford) not been in love, or “in love,” with his fiftyish stepmother (Weaver).  With Neuwirth the boy is not smitten; with his father’s wife he is.  It’s a sleazy and ill-fitting item.  It knifes the otherwise successful confection right in the back.

Cover of Tadpole

There is fine acting from Bebe Neuwirth, John Ritter, Sigourney Weaver and the newcomer, Aaron Stanford.  There is a fairly funny and unpredictable script by Heather McGowan and Niels Muller.  Gary Winick‘s decision to shoot the film in DV is acceptable because Tadpole (2000) is, to use another critic’s proper adjective for it, unassuming.

Nevertheless, this Graduate-like film with a 15-year-old Benjamin and Neuwirth’s Mrs. Robinson would have been far better had the precocious boy (Stanford) not been in love, or “in love,” with his fiftyish stepmother (Weaver).  With Neuwirth the boy is not smitten; with his father’s wife he is.  It’s a sleazy and ill-fitting item.  It knifes the otherwise successful confection right in the back.

The characters in the new Japanese picture, Our Little Sister (proper title: Umimachi Diary), hold our attention, but I find the story mediocre because certain things are laid on so thickly (a now dead woman became involved with Sachi’s married father; now Sachi is involved with a married pediatrician).  In addition, the film is so humanistic—and finally so sentimental—that all the major characters are, or become, virtual saints.  It is as though every fault has melted away.  This is not the case with a great film like Ozu’s Tokyo Story, which I bring up since Sister resembles an Ozu production.

The movie is based on a comic-book novel which director Hirokazu Kore-da probably should have left alone.

Cover of Shopgirl

I’ve never read Steve Martin‘s novella Shopgirl, on which this 2008 film is based, but I mostly admire his script for the film—more than I do his wan acting.

Directed by Anand Tucker, Shopgirl stars Claire Danes as an L.A. sales clerk for Sak’s.  Lonely and sans a beau, she takes up with a near loser (Jason Schwartzman) whom she can’t possibly love.  By and by he changes for the better, but by then the Danes character, Mirabelle, has drifted into the arms of a friendly, fifty-something swell (Martin).  The swell is not quite the man for her, though, albeit Mirabelle decisively wants him.  But will she, can she, fall for Schwartzman too?

Martin’s little opus surveys the pleasure and heartache of love without mutual commitment, romance which is sexual but of limited potency.  Note how falling in love spurs Mirabelle to give up antidepressants, only to eventually find she still needs them irrespective of whether she has a beau or not. . .  A histrionic angel, Danes creates a tender Mirabelle, and Tucker makes sure she has presence.  There are shortcomings in the film, such as Martin’s unnecessary voiceover and the fact that the last sentence he speaks will not do.  But, too, it is feelingful and pleasantly Chekhovian.  And, yes, not very comedic but it doesn’t have to be.