Glad you enjoyed your revisiting of The Killers 1SO, I might want to check out Pushover... at some point.
On to Bergman, which marks the end of the Adam & Sam era, now it's this Matty guy. I hear he's funny, we'll see.
Sommarnattens leende / Smiles of a Summer Night (Ingmar Bergman, 1955)Adam & Matty's takes (starts at 37:47)Up next : Ingmar Bergman. That'll be... fun ?
Indeed it was, to my great surprise ! I was weary of Bergman (this was my first exposure), and really I still am a bit because I understand this is somewhat of an outlier in his filmography, but I couldn't have asked for a smoother introduction. This is a farce (Matty even calls it a sex comedy which I believe is anachronistic but relatively accurate), reminiscent of La règle du jeu in two ways : it features high-class people spending time all together in a rural estate, and it's great.
The film is pretty clearly divided in two parts, with the first part introducing the characters and their various entanglements before gathering them all in that familiar setting, and of course hijinks ensue. It's a good sign that I'm not sure which half I like more. The first one focuses mostly on Fredrik Egeman (Gunnar Björnstrand), a cynical lawyer and his family... and his mistress Desiree, played by the delightful Eva Dahlbeck. I'm not familiar with the name so I don't know if she'll be coming back in this marathon, but I'd love to see more of here because she just pops off the screen here. Part of me wishes the whole film was about her adventures as a touring theater actress and her adventures with various lovers... but then the other characters prove to be more than worth it.
Perhaps the funniest is the military man who, as Desiree explains in the play, is the typical example of a man who can be manipulated through his sense of pride and honor. The joke Adam points out, which has him claim that he's fine with his mistress being approached but he becomes a tiger (great delivery on that) when it comes to his wife, after having claimed the exact contary earlier, is the kind of classic comedy that's simple but works great when it's done well, as is the case here. I'm a little worried that the rest of this marathon will focus more on characters like the son (who might be a Bergman stand-in ?), brooding and righteous, but in small doses it's fine, and his arc does lead up to another obvious punchline that is nonetheless very effective.
I could go on but you get the idea : this is not particularly original but the execution is basically flawless, up to the titular saying that frames the final act. There are hints of what I assume will be more present in the next films, notably in a scene that sees the countess confess her conflicted feelings towards her husband (and men in general) while almost, not quite looking directly at the camera while another character is looking at her. Adam mentions this as being a typical Bergman shot, and it does feel very distinctive and promising.
8/10