Review of Loving Couples

There is no doubt that the Swedish actress Mai Zetterling, in her feature-length directing debut, had Ingmar Bergman in her mind: the cast is full of Bergman veterans, the cinematography is by the emblematic Bergman collaborator Sven Nykvist, and the whole style of the movie is modelled on her famous compatriot. Technically, the imitation is accurate: the film is well-made, the acting is fine, and I liked how Zetterling contrasted three different types of women - one happy all the time, one never happy, one somewhere in between. But the stories are too long and meandering, and for a movie so heavily dependent on flashbacks (about 80% of the running time), the flashbacks themselves are not especially revealing. **1/2 out of 4.