In the early '60s, Bergman's visual and narrative style became ever more austere in focusing on tormented souls seeking guidance and comfort from an empty heaven, thus paving the way for a stark foray into extreme close-up in the enigmatic "Persona."
A modernist masterpiece, the film initiated an introspective trilogy about the ivory towers built by artists as a defense against the horror of existence It was Bergman's first completely innovative work, acknowledging itself as artifice through the regular insertion of non-narrative images such as projectors burning, film breaking, fragment of silent movies
"Persona" depicts the vampiric relationship between a talkative nurse and an actress who refuses to speak or work after a traumatic realization of the futility of creation in a loveless world surrounded by war Psychology, philosophy and social comment are mixed to brilliant effect in a complex, clear interrogation both of filmic illusion and of the illusory values of modern life
A modernist masterpiece, the film initiated an introspective trilogy about the ivory towers built by artists as a defense against the horror of existence It was Bergman's first completely innovative work, acknowledging itself as artifice through the regular insertion of non-narrative images such as projectors burning, film breaking, fragment of silent movies
"Persona" depicts the vampiric relationship between a talkative nurse and an actress who refuses to speak or work after a traumatic realization of the futility of creation in a loveless world surrounded by war Psychology, philosophy and social comment are mixed to brilliant effect in a complex, clear interrogation both of filmic illusion and of the illusory values of modern life