A frequently recurring theme in the NYAFF Shorts Program, Emerging Voices from the Maghreb – and perhaps, in the entire festival – is the history of culturally enabled marginalization of women in contemporary society, and this theme clearly resonates in Ali Benkirane’s Amal, an understated portrait of a cheerful and precocious girl living in a […]
Revisiting the irreparably splintered middle-aged couple Marianne (Liv Ullman) and Johan (Erland Josephson) of Scenes from a Marriage as they reunite 30 years later, Saraband represents a continuation as well as a culmination of Ingmar Bergman’s spare, late period films, most notably in the purgative confessions and emotionally resigned acceptance of Autumn Sonata. Opening with […]
In a garishly decorated basement room of a tawdry, erotic cabaret, amidst the ambient pulsating, rhythmic drone of risqué music, an impassive prostitute nicknamed Ka (Rita Russek) embraces a solemn and diffident client, Peter Egermann (Robert Atzorn), caressing his face through the motions of sleep. The seemingly tender moment soon inexplicably turns to aggression when […]
Autumn Sonata is a provocative, moving, and intensely honest film about the complexity of familial relationships. Eva (Liv Ullman), a timid and reserved wife of a country parson, invites her mother, Charlotte (Ingrid Bergman), to stay with her after a seven year separation. Charlotte is a concert pianist, whose career has dictated prolonged separations from […]
Cries and Whispers is a powerful, richly textured exploration of the human soul. The story is set on a remote country house, stripped from the distractions of the outside world (the only “guest” is an attending physician). Agnes (Harriet Andersson) is a terminally ill woman who is cared for by her two sisters: Karin (Ingrid […]
Persona is arguably Ingmar Bergman’s most challenging and experimental film. Elisabeth Vogler (Liv Ullman) is an accomplished stage actress who, in the middle of performing Elektra, ceases to speak. Sister Alma (Bibi Andersson), the young nurse assigned to care for her, learns that there is nothing physically or even psychologically wrong with Elisabeth – she […]