Reviews

"The Flowers of Kirkuk" is formally movie of Italy/Switzerland, but the entire crew is Kurdish, and it was photographed in Iraq. Almost all talking is Kurdish and Arabian. On the one hand, it is a political film about the oppression of the Kurds during the Saddam Hussein regime. Partisans are tortured and murdered. Groups of women and children are just collected, driven to a place without witnesses, and shot. On the other hand it is a love movie with a triangle. Najla has just finished her study in Rome and is a medical doctor. There is deep reciprocal love between her and Sherko, who is not an organized partisan but conceals many sick and injured fugitives. But Mokhtar, a police officer, loves her as deeply. He follows her trail, and the police arrests both Najla and Sherko. After some initial beating Najla is offered to become a police doctor. She accepts, because then she can collect and pass over the names of people who are murdered and tortured. She even stops an execution of women and children by fabricating that one of the girls has cholera and her disease may kill several soldiers.

However, when Mokhtar understands that he cannot get Najla's love anyway, he risks his life – and is indeed shot – by helping both Najla and Sherko to escape the country. - This is not the end of the movie.

During the last two or three decades many political movies have been produced, and many contain much violence. The prominence of love is very different. Half a century ago numerous movies contained intensive love, which might be the central part of the plot. It would be a matter of routine to compile a list of one hundred such movies.

But during more than two decades movies with deep love have almost become exceptional. One of the best of these exceptions is "The Flowers of Kirkuk". It is as much a love drama as a political drama. And it is one of the best movies released during quite a few years.

If anyone should obtain a video or DVD of this movie, which is not subtitled in a language he/she can understand, my annotations may be of some help. Well, I do not know a single word of any of these Baltic languages, and presently I have only a copy in which the Latvian and Lithuanian episodes are subtitled in Estonian. But in 1994 I saw this movie thrice at Stockholm Film Festival with English subtitles.

It is foremost the Lithuanian episode that I love. And here we are in the fortunate situation that the Lithuanian priest student and the Estonian stripper do not want to talk Russian. Therefore they talk English, the only other language that both understand.

About the Estonian episode I cannot tell more than what is said in the plot summary.

But in The Latvian Episode I can provide my recollections of the dialog before one of the Russian soldiers (of course not the boyfriend) throws the beer from the glass down on the table, instead of drinking together with the Latvians, there is a dialog something like this:

Latvian: "One thing I would like to know. Why are you in this country?" Russian: "Don't you know? We are protecting you?" L: "What are you protecting us from?" R: "From invasion." L: "So you are protecting us from invasion. Who are those who would invade us? Are those the Swedes? Are those the Finnish?"

And after the two Russians had torn the cloth of the girlfriend, one of them says:

"We were in Afghanistan together. Everyone thought he was dead. They even informed his family. Only we did not believe it. For four days we searched for him. Therefore he belongs to us."

In the Lithunian Episode a young man (the priest student) is running as morning gymnastics. A girl is doing the same thing. They compete about who could run most speedily.

The uncle of the priest student is a priest, and is writing a book. He is distraught and might himself have mixed up the pages. But it is also possible that the police had searched the house when no one was at home. He does not know and is clearly in doubt.

When the nephew is helping his uncle to dress before morning-prayer, the uncle blames him for not having participated in the evening prayer yesterday. The nephew says: "I would rather miss evening prayer than morning gymnastics."

In this scene, and before they pray together, he also says: "I have never slept with a girl." (From the uncle's facial expression it is easy to see just when the nephew said this sentence.)

The first time we shall see the uncle with eye-glasses the nephew says: "I do not think I was made to be a priest. I would like to draw off the pants of girls and see what secrets they hide there."

In the same scene, a little later when both are sitting down, the nephew asks: "Uncle, have you always kept your promise of celibacy?" Uncle: "My answer would be of no help for you. I came directly from the seminary into the fight for freedom. I spend 15 years in Siberia. There, God was the only thing to hold on to."

When the nephew the first time bows on his knees out of the house he tells his uncle that he is in love with a stripper. I think it is in this scene that the uncle says: "I bless you whichever road you choose to go."

In the yard outside the house, with many pillars, the nephew will eventually go around the pillars, so that he can sometimes hardly be seen. He is very upset, and he talks in a very exalted tone of voice. When he goes around he quotes the most erotic verses of the Bible, chap. 2 and 4 of "The Song of Songs", in which even the beauty of female breasts and hips are described in plain words.

Many priest students are playing basket-ball. A non-playing student says: "Look, your uncle has written an article in the newspaper. (Evidently an attack on the Soviet Union.) The nephew sees the article, and on the very same page there is a picture of the girl who ran morning gymnastics. The newspaper informs that a restaurant has engaged three naked Estonian girls, "Jazz-sex".

And from this moment the lines that are not in English are not highly important.

On the whole, the user comment by Dennis Littrell above is excellent. But even excellent comment may contain doubtful details. I do not agree that Pomme was proud and hopeful.

When Francois visited Pomme at the mental hospital, she told him that she had had other lovers and had been in Greece with one of them. This was obviously not true. Then why did she say so? Dennis Littrell thinks that she was proud. I take him to mean that Pomme would give Francois the impression that she was quite capable of going on living without him.

I cannot imagine that she could have such motives. Although SHE is the one who became sick when he abandoned her, and even so ill that she had to attend a hospital, HE is the one who "needs" support from two friend when he goes to see her, and HE is the one who cries (when nobody sees it). My conception is that Pomme even here revealed her good heart. She tried to make things easy for Francois – he should not need to have any feelings of remorse because of what he did to her.

Moreover, I disagree that Pomme's face in the last shot shows a vague hope. I think that it reveals the greatest hopelessness.

One Swedish reviewer wrote that things go bad when Francois lets Pomme remain at her own level, and they go bad when he tries to draw her up to his level. – But this is double nonsense. Things are excellent when he accepts her as she is. Moreover, Pomme is realistic. FIRST Francois must finish his study, and afterward they may see what they can do about her. At the present time they cannot even afford to go to the cinema without saving the money elsewhere.

Much more important is the other side of the coin. Pomme would really love to be like Francois. In a bookshop she looks at the volumes with paintings by famous artists. But she cannot learn to understand such things without help. And the idea never strikes Francois that he might help her. He just scolds her for being as she is.

There are several key scenes. In one of them Pomme is afraid of crossing a street full of motorcars. Francois had soon run over, and now he is standing there and shaking from impatience and irritation. The idea never occurred to him to take her hand and lead her over the street. And when she asks him what is the meaning of the word "dialectic", he gives her no reasonable answer.

By and large, the idea of "sexual Samaritans" is unrealistic. Extremely few people are prepared to sleep with another individual toward whom they feel little attraction and expect no other gain. There are nevertheless a few unusual situations in which I would seriously recommend such things. Francois just throws Pomme away, giving no thoughts to the consequences. He does no even participate in the last meal, when he is at home in front of her and will drive her to her mother's home as soon as the meal is over.

I claim that Francois did have enough personal strength to continue the relation a little longer, and to try to make the break more gradual and as little harmful to Pomme as possible. He could have seen her sometimes after she had moved to her mother, and he could sleep with now and then for a while.

I do think that he had an amount of responsibility for her, and should have done something to help her overcome the breaking of their relation.

Claude Miller directed Francois Truffaut's posthumous manuscript "La petite voleuse" (The Young Thief) (1988). In one scene the girl is standing outside a cinema. All over the front are pasted 50 or more identical placards of the movie shown just now. Such PLACARD ABUNDANCE was only used for a "greatfilm" (yes, it is one single word in Scandinavia). It belongs to the definition of a greatfilm that it is highly admired by both experts and ordinary spectators. The placards belong to "L'épave" (The Wreck / Sin and Desire) (1949). They prove that "L'épave" was at that time generally perceived as a greatfilm.

It also had a central place in my own cinematic history. I immigrated to Sweden in 1952 when I was almost 19. My first five years was an odyssey through a dozen of towns, but then I settled in Stockholm.

I have never changed my mind what were the two best movies I had seen prior to my immigration (listed first), nor about the two best movies I saw during my odyssey:

"L'épave" by Willy Rozier (France, 1949) & "A Woman Without a Face" by Gustaf Molander (Sweden, 1947)

"Les Enfants du Paradis" by Marcel Carné (France, 1945) & "A Streetcar Named Desire" by Elia Kazan (USA, 1950)

I saw "L'épave" thrice in 1951, but never again until the DVD was released in 2005.

(Just a passing remark: "Le grand bleue" (The Big Blue) by Luc Besson (1988) is clearly inspired by "L'épave". Note in particular the parallel of the last scenes of both movies.)

"L'épave" could be considered a tragic love romance, but there are complications. The diver loves Perrucha. Did she love him? She would not have given up her virginity if she had not been sure of his serious and permanent feelings. The couple might have had a lasting and happy monogamous relation that would also have satisfied the girl - - - albeit with one question mark. She had a great talent for singing, and she would later have a career. While the couple was together she did long for doing a good artistic job and being admired by audiences.

The diver had a friend who schemed about the relation. When I was 18 years old I never understood the friend's motives. As far as I could see, the friend had no intention to harm the diver. Then WHY did he actually harm him so seriously?

I have eventually learned how some people think. In the friend's eyes Perrucha was not good enough for the diver. So the friend felt that he had both the right and the duty to interfere and do "what was best" for the diver.

The diver had a serious accident at the bottom of the sea. He spent no brief time in a hospital. The friend told Perrucha that the diver had just run away without leaving any address. He also succeeded in stealing and destroying the diver's letters to Perrucha.

There is no difference between my private feelings today and my feelings when I was a teenager. May heaven save me from such friends! I and only I want to decide what blunders to do (even if they are indeed blunders). Don't give me any advice! Don't try to arrange things behind my back!

As things developed we never got a chance to see whether Perrucha could have pursued her singing career even if she had married the diver. When the diver finally came home from the hospital, Perrucha was not there, and the friend told lies about how she had departed. – The diver might never have found her again, if he had not heard her voice in broadcasting.

But when he went to her, she had a new lover from a different social class. I had no other attitude in 1951 than today. It is neither surprising nor blameworthy that her love for the diver had ceased. Nor is it blameworthy that she was not prepared to break with her present lover and go back to the diver. Nevertheless, Perrucha had good reason to like, perhaps also to love the diver (although love is not often based on good reason). Nevertheless, I sometimes wonder if their relation could have been resumed if he had had some patience. Unfortunately, his friend had done his best to make both the diver and Perrucha live in the worst of all possible worlds.

Admittedly, I am a Romantic. I still think it was tragic that the relation of the couple was destroyed.

My reflections have left out many important aspects. It is no wonder that the diver in the end goes down to the sea bottom and cuts the air tube and the rope.

I belong to the special fans of Alf Sjöberg. But I feel contempt of Strindberg, and most of all of his play "The Father". I think it is no more than a pale imitation of the very funny CLASSICAL FRENCH TRAGEDY "Love Without Stockings" written in the late 18th century by the Norwegian writer Johan Herman Wessel. Both Mads and Johan want to marry Grete. She definitely wants Johan, but he has a great handicap: he has no stockings, a necessary constituent for the wedding ceremony. As a consequence Grete is more inclined to marry Mads. - - However, Johan steals a pair of stockings from Mads and then they are ready to marry. Though at the ceremony Mads turns up and proves that his name is found on the stockings. When exposed as a thief the bridegroom sees no other solution than to take his life by sticking a knife in his heart, after having said some very tragic lines. When Grete has no husband, she cannot live longer, and she says her tragic lines and sticks another knife in her heart. When Mads realizes what disaster he has caused, it is his turn to die. And all other people present will follow them, until the whole scene is full of suicided bodies. - - For 25 years after Wessel's play no theater in Norway or Denmark dared show a tragedy. - - Now, what is it that Strindberg's old Adolf makes so much fuss about? It is, whether or not he is the biological father of Bertha. Strindberg wants us to believe that this is a more rational and praiseworthy motive for murdering Bertha, than Johan's motive for killing himself. - - - In this world there are thousands of stepfathers who take much better care of their stepchildren, than many biological fathers do of their "own" children. I have met many of them in legal courts. - - Two generations ago many people said, "It is just because you have not yet got any biological children that you think that you really love your stepson. Just wait until you get children of your own." But as our world changes there are going to be more and more step parents and stepchildren. If Strindberg's ideas were true, then there would be reason for writing A REAL TRAGEDY about real misery for thousands of children. Since the basic idea of the play is sick, the latter cannot be saved by well-formed lines or excellent direction.

'Une chambre en ville' was thoroughly underrated from the start. In 1982 audiences no longer favoured tragic movies. BUT WHY? A generation earlier television had strongly reduced the audience of the cinemas. But television had NOT changed the taste. Video had a more profound influence. Take a standard situation. A group is watching a video which may evoke strong emotions in some of the spectators. Suddenly another catches the remote control, rewinds the movie and makes some comment (e.g., 'Girls should never have such a coiffure'). Repeated exposure to experiences of this kind may reduce the capacity for becoming emotionally aroused by movies. - Note that this is a recent development. It is easy to assemble a list of 100 very tragic movies produced 1935-1965, which at that time were highly appreciated by the average film-goer. I am even convinced that the average film-goer of this period would have loved contemporary movies such as 'Stormy Weather' (by Solveig Anspach) and 'Les diables' (by Christophe Ruggia).

If your aim is not emotional experience, you are likely to be disappointed by 'Une chambre en ville', despite its excellent merits. But please note that my review is one-sided and might be misleading. I intend to say much about the music, and shall reduce all other aspects to the bare minimum. What is the plot? Workers are striking. During a demonstration one of them (Francois) is shot by the police. He dies in the arms of his beloved (Edith). But only one day earlier he had abandoned his pregnant girlfriend (Violette), because he had met a very beautiful over-class girl. Francois and Edith were immediately overwhelmed by genuine and reciprocal passion.

Even among film musicals it is infrequent that every line is sung. Hence, it is natural to compare 'Une chambre en ville' with 'Les parapluis de Chèrbourg'. Jacques Demy directed both. But different composers (Michel Colombier and Michel Legrand) wrote the music. I think both got the manuscript most suitable for their specific talent.

The music of 'Une chambre' differs from that of 'Les parapluis' foremost in three respects. Without ceasing to be real film music, it is more introverted, and it is closer to opera music. But the largest difference is the director's relation to the singers.

Whenever two persons sing simultaneously in 'Les parapluis', you can clearly perceive the words of each. Also, simultaneous singing never transgresses the kind of dialogues that may be found in purely spoken theatre. By contrast, 'Une chambre' contains a real duet: the loving couple sings the same text together in parallel sixths; a device clearly borrowed from the opera. - - - To avoid misunderstanding as regards my next point: numerous great composers have borrowed melodies or other things from each other. Borrowing is not a fault if the borrowed thing is used for new purposes. Since 'Une chambre' finishes with a love scene in which one of the couple dies, it is not far-fetched to associate to Wagner's 'Tristan and Isolde'. During the final scene of the movie the main musical theme is presented for the fourth time, and this time with new accompanying melodies played by the orchestra. Rightly or wrongly, I think that these melodies are to some extent inspired by Wagner's opera (bar 63-73 of the overture).

Any competent musical conductor would tell the singers to take some impression of the mood of the text. But the soundtrack of 'Les parapluis' never differs much from a neutral performance. Hence, it is hardly possible to decide whether or not Jacques Demy actually directed the singers before the soundtrack was made. But in 'Une chambre' it could hardly be more manifest that Demy has devoted as much direction to the singers as to the actors seen on the screen. From Violette's singing voice alone, no one could mistake her distress when Francois abandons her, and her feeling of being treated unjust when Francois tries to excuse his behaviour. - - - Suppose you do not understand French, and that you are listening to the soundtracks of both movies without seeing the pictures. You will nevertheless have a fair chance of correctly perceiving the emotions of many scenes of 'Une chambre'. You will be much less successful with 'Les parapluis'.

This is not a great movie that will be remembered because of its cinematic merits; it suffers heavily from the low budget. But it would definitely deserve a remake, because it throws new light upon things that should never be forgotten. Leibniz said that we live in the best of all possible worlds. The deep tragedy, which is gradually unfolded, is that this is indeed true of the young boy, and even more of his mother.

The most important aspect of this film is the action and the events. First we see a family: mother (Lily), son (Malin) and the stepfather, with a poor relation between the latter two, although they avoid rather than fight each other. In one scene the man wants to make love and Lily defends herself. But the moment Malin tries to teach the stepfather a lesson, Lily very aggressively turns against her son.

Who was Malin's real father? Lily always refused to tell. But searching the house for cues Malin finally finds a love letter with a photo of Lily and a man (Ivan). Further search reveals that Ivan presently works at a youth correction school. Malin goes there. Standing outside the fence he intensively looks at Ivan, until the latter realises that he has an errand and opens the gate. They embrace each other, and Ivan says, 'You must excuse that I don't remember you. We have many hundreds.' A little later they sit down at a table with two glasses of beer, and Ivan says, 'Well, what can I do for you?' Malin is enraged by this reception, and when Ivan denies being his father he shows the evidence. But then comes the next piece of the puzzle. Ivan and Lily were indeed in love, but they never had any opportunity to sleep together. One night they met on the cemetery, but the home defence found them and cut their cloths to pieces. Soon afterwards Ivan was drafted into the army, and somehow the mother disappeared.

When Malin had found out that much, Lily no longer conceals the rest. She was raped by the son of a communist government official, and became pregnant. The People's Tribunal decided that the rapist and the raped should marry. Even in communist Bulgaria it was a shame to be an unmarried mother, so Lily resigned to her fate. However, the husband did not even attend the wedding ceremony and the wedding feast (although the marriage was no less legal for that reason). But after such an insult Lily refused to sleep with him. He revenged himself by imprisoning her in a concentration camp. There she witnessed another female prisoner being tortured to death. Later, she was confined to a mental hospital. But she made it clear to a young doctor that she would do anything for him, if he helped her out, and he accepted the deal.

Lily's freedom might not have lasted long, if she had posed as the respectable married woman she actually was. Better to conceal this. But the price was heavy. If she took a job at a real enterprise, her identity would be disclosed. Hence, she could only take whatever she could get of home work. Nor could she improve her economy by stealing from the enterprise (a pattern presented as perfectly normal). Lily had reason to be satisfied that any man would accept her at all.

And now we have come to the end of the road. COULD Lily have told the truth to her son without danger to both of them? Did she have any better option than the one she had chosen? But could Malin have any understanding for the continual strange behaviour of his mother, as long as he did not know her reasons?

Some countries have a long tradition for making movies about children. I do not mean children as lovely and charming little dolls, but children as genuine human individuals, with basically the same kinds of emotions as adults. Sweden is one of these countries, and this film is a good example. However, the actors consist of three age groups: the middle-aged adults, who are little more than extras; the two teenagers, who also have a subsidiary place; and the 11-year-old boy and girl Peiter and Anna, who constitute the centre. The director has devoted all his energy to the children, and it must be admitted that his person directing of the two other groups is mediocre. But I, for one, am willing to forgive this shortcoming, because the performance of the children is so much better. Both the director and the children, in particular the girl, deserve praise for the outcome.

Anna, her parents and her younger brother live on an island. Peiter's parents are divorced, and only during one summer week will he stay with his father, who likewise lives on this island. Hence, the children will be together for no more than seven days a year. Nevertheless, they had been friends for years. Unfortunately, in the summer that this movie is about, they have difficulty in getting in real touch. Day after day they fail. Finally all seven days have gone, and the gap or whatever it was that prevented full contact, is still not closed. Though when time is up Peiter is permitted to stay for one more day. And during 'the eighth day' (= the Swedish name of the film) they succeed.

What did they do together during the week? Many things are not very conspicuous. While they are standing outside a cheap café, Peiter boasts that he can manage any task. Anna gives him the task of fetching the thing inside the café, which she is thinking of. Peiter goes inside, looks at everything. But then he asks a certain guest to rise from his chair. When the guest has done so, he takes this chair and brings it outside to Anna. This was indeed the right thing, and this chair will re-appear several times until the end of the movie. - - - On another occasion Peiter boasts that he is not afraid of being locked up in a desolate tower for a few hours. Anna closes the lock on the outside. But when she comes home her parents prevent her from going out again during this day and the following night. Peiter remained alone in the tower for the entire night.

Eleven years is a 'between-age'. Children may begin to have an embryonic feeling that opposite-sex friendship is not quite the same as same-sex friendship. Perhaps this was the reason of Peiter's and Anna's difficulties, but also of their final success. On the eighth day they show their sex organs to each other; and they are neither motivated by curiosity, nor by indecent interest. This is the only external sign of anything they could not have done during the preceding years. - - - I think this movie may be appreciated by anyone liking to see children presented as genuine human individuals (as they are indeed), and with the difficulties this involves.

1995 was the centennial of the invention of movies. In Stockholm the event was celebrated, inter alia, by showing 'Les enfants du paradis' free of charge on the French National Day. It was presented as the best French movie ever made. Perhaps it was felt not to be polite toward other countries to talk of the best movie made in any countries. But many (not all) experts agree that it is indeed so. And so do I. I saw the film for the first time in 1954, and have never changed my mind about its paramount position. But whatever you may think in this respect, one of the most prominent features is that the movie is a 'GESAMTKUNSTWERK'. This word was invented by Richard Wagner to indicate a work in which music, text, and visual arts fuse or amalgamate into a unity. Concerning the movie at hand, the word is of course taken in a different sense. The movie contains all kinds of cinematic categories: mass scenes perhaps with 10'000 extras, chamber play with close-up photos of emotional faces, deep and genuine love, superficial sex, friendship, comic pantomime, tragic pantomime, comic theatre (that is, both the theatre scene and the public on the screen), tragic theatre, murder, hand-to-hand-fighting, pocket-picking, etc. And everything put together into one single film. Even more, whenever a section is comic, it rests so completely in the comic mood that the spectator cannot imagine that the entire movie was not comic from the first beginning, and will not remain so to the last end. Whenever it is tragic, it rests equally completely in the tragic mood, as if it had never been anything else than tragic and would never leave the tragic mood. Despite this heterogeneity, the movie does not split up in disparate fragments, but forms a genuine whole. The writer was the really great poet Jacques Prévert, and it tells much about his unusual competence that, on the one hand, each scene is superb when seen in isolation and, on the other hand, each scene does not therefore fit less perfectly in the film as a whole. - - - To some people it may be interesting to know that four of the roles are real historical persons: the actor Frederick Lemaître, the pantomimic performer Baptiste Debureau, the mediocre gangster Jean-François Lacenaire, and the latter's assistant Avril. Lacenaire was executed in 1836. His memoirs, which were written while he awaited execution, are published in English translation.

The original script was written by the existential philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre. It has been significantly changed by other writers before the movie was shot. But we can be sure that it was hardly altered in those respects upon which I shall focus. It is usually assumed that philosophers have undergone a specific training in logical and clear thinking. Hence, Sartre's participation should guarantee that the movie was free from elementary and flagrant errors, whether of a logical or empirical nature. Unfortunately, when their private and favourite ideas are concerned, many philosophers are prepared to throw all logic and clarity overboard. Numerous thoroughly analysed examples can be found, inter alia, in my own academic writings. It is an incidental fact that I have not yet discussed Sartre in print. He is no exception. For some reason he was emotionally attracted by psychoanalysis. Therefore, he opened his mind for all conventional propaganda, and came to perceive Freud in the same mendacious way, in which Freud always tried to present himself, viz. as the lonely and uncompromising searcher for truth who, despite prejudiced resistance from his colleagues, made revolutionary and highly unexpected discoveries.

Some of the lies of this movie can be unmasked by any laymen. Others may need advanced research. I shall start with the latter. Today, no genuine scientist denies that no trace of interesting observations can be found in the writings by Freud or his followers. Much more prominent is their capacity for giving treatment to a patient during as much as 15 years, without detecting conspicuous circumstances which are crucial to therapeutic success, and which a competent clinician could have found out in 15 minutes. (This is not a rhetoric exclamation of mine. Cases of this variety have been thoroughly documented.) Nor is any part of the theory supported by any observations. And despite extensive labour, no one has found a single patient who had been cured or improved by Freud (or by any of his followers). It is a pattern of lies that neurotic symptoms are caused by ‘repression' (involving complete amnesia) of childhood experiences; that psychoanalysts have invented a specific method for lifting repression; and that patients undergoing psychoanalytic treatment will suddenly recollect childhood experiences, which it is absolutely impossible to get access to by any other method. - Michael Yapko has established that 28 % of those licensed psychologists in the U.S. who attend conferences, believe that recollections from the patient's earlier reincarnations can be obtained by means of hypnosis. This fact tells little about patients, hypnosis, or reincarnation. Instead, it tells much about many people who are attracted by the psychological profession.

Let us try out the possibility that every result of modern research about Freud and psychoanalysis is faulty. Can other lies be found in the movie, which will be manifest to any layman? Definitely. In the beginning of his career Freud applied hypnosis in order to unearth experiences which supposedly had caused the symptoms and the disease. This is not a category of misinformation that a layman could expose. But note the subsequent step: Freud abandoned hypnosis and proceeded with non-hypnotic treatment. The movie depicts how patients nevertheless recall the same kind of hitherto repressed events. However, what is the nature of Freud's non-hypnotic treatment? If we may believe the film, it is nothing else than ordinary conversation. Almost all people have often participated in such colloquies. Of course, if I talk with a friend about my school days, I may recall many events I may not have thought of for 40 years, and may gradually recall things I did not recall immediately. But Freud makes it absolutely clear that lifted repression is altogether different from this pattern. He asserts that the variety of recollections he helped forth could never have emerged during ordinary colloquies. - - - If Sartre had applied his capacity for critical thinking, he would have felt that Freud's account COULD NOT be true. And any layman who devoted a few seconds to reflect on the logic of the movie, would have arrived at the same conclusion. In other words, if the movie mirrors the true state of things, the recollections and symptom removals were a kind of supernatural miracles.

It is a widespread superstition that when a book is filmed, the movie is usually inferior to the book. The most probable explanation of this groundless idea is that many people have read this or that book, say, Tolstoy's 'War and Peace'. When they learn that the book has been filmed, they are induced to go and see the movie. And often they become disappointed. By contrast, only a negligible minority will first see a movie, discover that it is a filmed novel, and therefore read the book. I happen to belong to this minority. And I am capable of presenting a long list of books which turned out to be inferior. Gabor von Vaszery's novel 'Monpti' is merely one example among many others. However, von Vaszery also wrote the script for the movie. I have carefully studied every difference between the movie and the novel. It is my view that in each and every case the film version is superior if assessed in itself, while the book version fits more properly into the work as a whole. But I also claim that the film version is invariably so much improved, that only a formalist could prefer the book version. Besides, the movie is also superior whenever there is no obvious difference between both. - - - In my youth I thought that Romy Schneider is beautiful, but not more beautiful than many other actresses or even extras in her own movies. I also meant that she is a skilled actress but not more skilled than many others. Later, my fascination was caused by two movies, 'Monpti' and 'Claire de femmes'. I was 53 when I saw 'Monpti' for the first time. Whether or not it is a subjective idea, I still think that 'Monpti' is the best German movie ever made.

A triangle has three corners. Let us see if the same thing is also true of this movie.

Corner no. one. The son of a psychoanalyst steels a fossil at school. He had no more serious aim than to play a practical joke against one teacher, and then to return the item. Unfortunately, the item breaks. Therefore, the son denies the stealth altogether. The school contacts his father. To his father the son tells the whole truth without any pressure. But before his misbehaviour is cleared up, he dies in an accident. Such a pattern might lead to emotional difficulty for any father, regardless of his profession. But for this psychoanalyst the consequence is that he can no longer (I repeat: NO LONGER!!) help his patients. He has no other choice than to wind up his clinical practice altogether and tell his patients that they should not to return.

Corner no. two. Before the son's death we will observe the end of a consultation with a female patient. She tells the psychoanalyst that she will stop the treatment, because it is of no help. The analyst's concomitant inner dialogue is also played up: 'This is what she had said continually for five years. And it is true, I really cannot help her. What will she do now? Finding another psychoanalyst? Or resign?' Just before the patient goes she says: 'We will see each other again on Tuesday.' - This is a pattern the director and writer would not want the audience to pay much attention to. It is a clear-cut instance of unethical exploitation to let a patient pay a very high fee for five years, with full knowledge of one's inability to provide any help. Moreover, this is in glaring contrast to the explicit theme of the movie, viz. that the psychoanalyst can NO LONGER help his patients BECAUSE OF his recent private problems. Here the implication is that he DID help them BEFORE he got his personal difficulties.

Corner no. three. Patients are described as crazy and irrational creatures. This is exemplified of the female who for five years announced her decision to stop the treatment. It is also exemplified by another patient, who goes to violent attack against both the furniture and the psychoanalyst, when the latter announces his decision to stop his clinical practice. But nowhere do we see any aggressive or irrational action by the analyst directed against any patient. Nevertheless, it is an established fact that analysts often apply effective persuasive techniques if the patient wishes to end the treatment. It is likewise an established fact that analysts evoke a state of extreme dependence in their patients. An analyst would hardly need more than three hours for liberating the patient from this dependence. But if the patient is suddenly thrown out the result may be disastrous to the patient, although only a minority will react with physical aggression.

The friendly and passive psychoanalyst is a myth, more often encountered in the cinema than in the consultation room. The best theoretical scrutiny of the technique is still the last chapter of Jay Haley's 'Strategies of Psychotherapy' (1963). Very few audio-recorded dialogues have been published, and with only one exception they are selected by analysts. Consequently, any section revealing the nature of the techniques, or other non-friendly behaviour by the analyst, have carefully been omitted. To this date, there exists a total of one set of dialogues that are selected and investigated by a non-psychoanalyst. I myself am this non-psychoanalyst. The dialogues and the investigation of their nature are found in chapter 57-68 in my 1996-book 'Textual Analysis...'). - - - Hanns Sachs, who was trained by Freud himself, claims that even if a patient had no neurosis when he or she started psychoanalytic treatment, he/she would definitely develop a neurosis. Because of Swedish law about Internet I am not permitted to mention the name of another psychoanalyst who was thrice the chairman of the Swedish Association of Psychoanalysts. He has written in print that the patient shall NOT have from the treatment what the patient wants (e.g. symptom removal). Instead, he shall have something else which the patient in the beginning does not in the least want, viz. 'psychic health'. MS: It goes without saying that this pattern would keep few patient in treatment, unless they were deceived into believing that they would obtain what they wanted. Obviously, the chairman thinks he has the right and duty to deceive his patients. He proceeds to tell that the treatment will often lead to nervous breakdown and suicidal attempts (a strange variety of 'psychic health'). Recently, the French psychiatrist Jacques Bénesteau investigated how many patients did not merely attempt, but actually succeeded in taking their life. He found that two psychoanalysts held the record concerning the proportion of patients they had driven to suicide, viz. Anna Freud (Sigmund Freud's daughter) and Paul Federn. - - - Movies is a very dangerous propagandistic weapon, and indirect propaganda is much more effective than direct hammering of a message. In 'Kiss of the Spider Woman' the non-political of the two prisoners had seen a movie, and had correctly understood who was the kind and sympathetic hero and who were the scoundrels. And, of course, he sided with the hero. But he had not understood that the hero was a nazi while the scoundrels were Jews. It is frightening that hardly any movie expert is capable of detecting the real nature of the 'kind and sympathetic' psychoanalyst.

This is neither a detective story, nor an 'unmasking drama' à la Ibsen. Hence, you will miss little, and may actually gain something, if you know in advance how the movie will end, and what is the underlying background of the events. Not until closely before the end will the grievous dilemma be revealed. The husband of the seriously mentally ill middle-aged Icelandic woman (Loa) is a latent alcoholic. Whenever Loa leaves him, he submits to his addiction. And whatever additional feelings Loa may have for her husband, one set may best be compared with those of a mother for her child. When she is at home, she is living a (rather?) normal life, going to her monotonous job and performing well, taking care of her children etc. I said a 'rather' normal life. We will see her taking her husband's head in her hands with real love. But there is no scene in which she TALKS a single word to him. - - - Sometimes Loa cannot stand this state of things any longer, and just runs away. During one such tour she was eventually found in England and send back to the small volcanic island, distant from the capital. During the tour connected with the present movie, she ended up in a mental hospital in France, without identification papers and apparently being mute. With one exception, no member of the staff got the idea that Loa might not be French. - - - There is a wealth of movies about a single idealistic psychiatrist fighting against the prejudices of all colleagues. I am no clinician, but I am a professional expert as regards the theories of the field. Most movies of this variety consist of unethical propaganda. Usually, the theories and approaches of the 'idealist' are conclusively known to be harmful to patients. It is an admirable fact that in 'Stormy Weather' no psychiatric theory is presented, discussed, praised, or attacked. The young female psychiatrist (Cora) is simply a genuine idealist. Since the first task is to establish rapport with Loa, some of the patient's 'whims' must be accepted. For instance, Loa likes to go up and down in the lift. Quite a few persons are needed for drawing her out of the lift at the hospital. But Cora takes her out in the town, finds a glass lift on the outside of a really high building. And while they go up and down Cora talks incessantly. This is not the only example of unorthodox procedures. - - - Unfortunately, Cora's suggestion that the patient might not be French made the chief doctor engage Interpol. Loa was soon identified, and during Cora's day off she was sent back to Iceland. However, now follows the extraordinary idealism of the young psychiatrist. She immediately flies to Iceland. The local inhabitants take for granted that Cora is a tourist wanting to see the volcano which recently had an eruption. There is even a scene when Cora eats dinner with Loa's family. The husband explains everything that a tourist might want to know about the volcano. Wisely, Cora and Loa give no indication of knowing each other, until they are alone. Loa is prepared to follow Cora back to the French hospital. Unfortunately, the local doctor happens to see them on their way to the boat. He knows nothing of psychiatry. There is only one psychiatric hospital in the entire country, and only extreme cases are sent thither. The local doctor prevents what he perceives as 'criminal kidnapping'. Hence, Cora's attempt ended as a complete failure. - Cora is excellently played by Élodie Bouchez, and this may well be her best performance so far. - - - You will need empathy for being able to appreciate this sad story. To some people, such deadlocked situations constitute a part of the reality they must face. - Apart from other merits 'Stormy Weather' also proves that the set of topics upon which films may be made is far from exhausted. There is still room for unexpected innovations.

I am not going to present a conventional rejection, nor to justify such a rejection from a conventional perspective. Apart from people who have a professional relation to such subjects, rather few persons are as familiar with different philosophical schools and different forms of fictional literature. But I do not think that Dostoyevsky is more than a middle-sized writer: far from poor but also far from good. Perhaps a little better than Walter Scott. And I am unable to perceive any philosophy in his writings. Nor have I learned much from texts aimed at explaining his philosophy. Consequently, it would be alien to my thinking to reproach Sanders's movie for having neglected 'the philosophy' of the novel. Nevertheless, I think that Denis Sanders has reduced 'Crime and Punishment' to a kind of 'Classics Illustrated'. A boy murders an old pawnbroker woman. This is the kind of events we may read about in the newspapers or watch on television, and the same thing is true of what follows: the boy eventually gets of a nervous breakdown because of his crime. He goes to the police and confesses, and even hands over hard evidence. - However much I think that Dostoyevsky is overrated, his novel contains SOMETHING more than just mass media sensations, but Sanders's movie does not (apart from one scene). The boy's writings about super-humans with the right to discard normal moral rules reminds me foremost of a newspaper columnist trying to catch the attention of bored readers by means of funny paradoxes. - - - But there is one scene that moved me very deeply; perhaps mostly so because of its very quiet nature. Sometimes (though not always) it is a wise rule that emotions should be felt by the spectators, not exhibited by the actors. There is nothing in the girl's appearance or behaviour that reveals her profession. But one night when she goes past a cheap café, she sees the boy in there, and goes to him. She tells him, 'I go out with men. Many men.' - This is a really great scene, and it must be regretted that I do not have the proper competence for describing why it is so. After some 40 years I still would like to see this scene again. I have no wish to see any other part of the movie again.

The following is a highly subjective comment, and may not be helpful to others. The merit I admire most of all is the careful cogitation about which features of Dickens's novel should be retained and which ones should be changed. Evidently, it would have been foolish to retain Estella's biological kinship according to the novel, or to preserve the benefactor's aim about the boy. But many other alterations are not self-evident. In the novel and likewise in David Lean's movie of 1946, the man who is planned to marry Estella is arrogant rather than jealous. And this emotion derives primarily from his expectations about Estella's inheritance. His counterpart in Cuarón's new version, Walter, could hardly have been less jealous (nor is he arrogant). Walter is played by Hank Azaria, who might well have deserved an Oscar for best performance in a supporting role. - Many people who read the novel or saw Lean's movie without having any advance knowledge may during most of the book or movie be in doubt as to whether the criminal or the rich lady is the secret benefactor. However, Cuarón was faced with the problem that some spectators might already have read or seen Dickens or Lean, or both. Some might even know that Dickens never introduces a person for 'a brief visit' in the beginning of a novel, unless this person will toward the end turn out to have a key position. How do Cuarón and his credit writer Mitch Glazer manage to retain such doubt in these spectators? After his escape the old gangster is caught and returned to the prison, where he is scheduled to be executed very soon. It is improbable that a convict with a death sentence could escape twice. Hence, the new version might include the radical innovation that the rich lady was indeed the benefactor. (I, for one, was never deceived). - - - The virtue to which I give the second place is Patrick Doyle's music. It is my honest conviction that we must go back to the 1960s and 1950s to find even one movie with music of a comparable beauty and congenial character. A few examples: 'The lady with the dog', 'The cranes are flying', 'Last year in Marienbad', 'Muriel ou le temps d'un retour', 'Phaedra', 'Repulsion', 'A taste of honey', 'Asphalt Jungle', 'Miss Julie', 'Cybèle ou les dimanches de Ville d'Avray'. - - - I will not be able to rank all other virtues of the movie. But it is a fact that during the four months it was shown in the cinema in Stockholm I saw it 15 times. I may subsequently have seen it as many times on video, laser, or DVD. Probably I have not seen David Lean's version more than four times during 50 years. The local film reviewers of dailies had promised that Cuarón's movie had few positive qualities except beautiful pictures which may be more suitable for a commercial. Now, I have no great admiration of this profession, and I perceived genuine qualities almost from the beginning. But the first scene to overwhelm me as really great was the sequence when the children kiss each other. Cuarón applies a number of photographic and other devices, all of them adequate for achieving his purpose. During this sequence I felt: However poor the rest of the movie may be, this scene alone will justify the inclusion of the entire film among significant movies. I never got the chance to test my thought because the subsequent movie was far from poor. - - - Other scenes or sequences that have spoken directly to my heart are, foremost, Estella's first visit in Finn's room; every detail of the long and heterogeneous sequence from the moment Estella tells Finn that Walter had asked her to marry him, and until Estella and Finn sleep with each other; and the scene when the rich lady tells Finn that Estella had just married Walter. - - - I imagine I have detected all physical errors of the movie (e.g., at the club Walter performs a quite different task without moving his lips, while his voice tells the story of the artist and the dog). But I do not think that they retract from the value of the movie. There is one more shortcoming I am also prepared to excuse. Alfonso Cuarón is evidently highly skilled in person directing. But if I may say so, Ethan Hawke has profited less than the others from Cuarón's skill. - - - A final word: I know of no other instance in which so many works of art have been produced specifically for one certain movie.

Almost all commentators have for two generations bestowed unmixed praise on this movie. I do not deny its technical merits. But it is impossible to arrive at a fair evaluation, without taking into account the secret propagandistic aim. The film was intended as a weapon in a protracted and still unfinished war within psychology and psychiatry. One of the fighting sides consists of psychodynamic therapists, or for short, psychotherapist. Their procedures are to a greater or lesser extent based on psychoanalysis. The other side consists of the behaviour therapists, whose approach is based on learning theory. During 40 years I have encountered no more than two persons who have pointed out the flaws of ‘A Clockwork Orange'. One was the late Professor Hans-Jürgen Eysenck at London University. I myself am the other one. I discussed the movie in my doctoral thesis in 1984, and once more in ‘The Non-Authentic Nature of Freud's Observations' (2 vol., 1993). The latter is acknowledged as one of the most important writings within the trend of modern Freud criticism, which started in the 1990s. If we want to grasp the real nature of the movie, we cannot avoid a careful scrutiny of the context in which the movie is embedded. We must direct our attention toward many facts which at the first glance seem to have no relation to the movie. I ask the reader to be patient; in due course I shall justify my `digression'. - - - Psychoanalysis was created by Sigmund Freud around 1895. Freud boasted that psychoanalytic treatment will not merely cure some, but each and every neurotic patients. In addition, it will provide a life-time guarantee against relapse. (Anyone doubting that Freud said such foolish lies may take a look at Gesammelte Werke, vol. XI, pp. 467-469.) One of his further (and equally mendacious) claims is that he and his followers have gathered a wealth of highly surprising clinical observations, which provide foolproof evidence of the theory. For almost a century Freud's followers repeated these claims. Not until the last ten years have they been forced to admit the truth, viz. that treatment has no therapeutic effect; that all non-trivial observations were faked; and that many of Freud's alleged patients did not even exist. - - - It may be debated whether behaviour therapy started in 1924 or 1904. But there is scientific proof that the treatment is highly efficacious. And while the normal duration of psychotherapy is measured in years, the duration of behaviour therapy is measured in weeks. Psychotherapists rightly perceived it as a dangerous rival. For many decades they succeeded in keeping it away from psychic clinics. However, thanks to Professor Eysenck the existence of behaviour therapy could no longer be concealed after 1960. The result was an immense reduction of patients seeking psychotherapy. The members of this profession suffered great economic problems. Their first counter attack was to start a world-wide campaign against behaviour therapy. There are specific reasons why it was easy to start such a campaign. It had always been the goal of psychotherapists to convert their patient into a true believer of psychoanalysis. And they had usually succeeded with this goal, even if the patients had not been cured. Many former patients held influential key positions: university teachers, reporters, writers of fiction, movie directors. Newspapers disseminated the lie that behaviour therapists treat bed-wetting children with electric shocks. Quite a few of my own university teachers asserted that behaviour therapists aim at transforming their patients into automatons without emotions. ‘A CLOCKWORK ORANGE' IS PART OF THIS HIGHLY UNETHICAL CAMPAIGN. THE AIM IS TO DISSUADE SICK PEOPLE FROM TURNING TO THE HIGHLY EFFECTIVE BEHAVIOUR THERAPY FOR HELP. INSTEAD, THEY SHOULD GO TO PSYCHOTHERAPISTS, THEREBY SAVING THEM FROM ECONOMIC HARDSHIP. - - - Now look at Kubrick's movie, but not with eyes wide shut. A key theme is that the government has decided to apply behaviour therapy to criminals. What motive is attributed to the government? Is the aim to reduce the rate of relapse among convicts and, hence, to reduce the number of future victims of crimes? Oh no! Is humanitarian concern involved as regards a young boy who is serving a 14-year prison sentence? Oh no! If we may believe Mr. Kubrick, the government consists of scoundrels who needs the prisons for detaining their political opponents. Therefore it is imperative to empty the prisons rapidly of ordinary criminals. For this purpose behaviour therapy comes as a godsend gift. - The evil-minded parody of the outcome of the treatment depicted in the movie, is not even possible in homo sapiens. The boy invariably starts with strong aggressive feelings and with preparation for a violent action. Only as a second step is he overwhelmed by nausea. - There are many other things Kubrick and his writer would prefer the spectator not to notice. First, the troubles the boy experienced after release from the prison, are not in the least a result of the treatment. These troubles would not have occurred, if mass media had not given widespread publicity to his case and, without any respect of anonymity, informed the whole country that from now on it is safe to perform aggressive acts against this boy. Second, prior to the conviction the boy used to beat up peoples just for fun, with minor consequences for himself until a woman was killed ‘for fun'. After he was released, each of his former victims was satisfied with performing one single act of retaliation. It would not take many days before he was through with all the retaliatory acts. And afterwards he had no reason to fear further violence. Third, who would sincerely claim that keeping the boy in prison for 14 years would be a more humane treatment? - Two final questions to the reader: Do you think that the description of the war within psychology is a superfluous digression? Do you think that users, reviewers and experts should not bother about the Kubrick's evil-minded aim, when they evaluate the movie?

On November 30th 1718 the Swedish king Karl XII died. He is primarily known because of his incessant wars aimed at increasing the territory of the Swedish nation, although the actual result of these wars was an enormous reduction of the territory. Nevertheless, Karl XII is highly admired by hyper-national and neo-nazi groups, and every year they perform a demonstration on that date. There may also be democratic counter demonstrations, and it may be a tough job for the police to keep both groups apart. - The action of 'West Side Story' (of course without the music) is transplanted to Stockholm and its suburb Alby in which numerous immigrants live. But the new film is definitely not a plagiarism. - The boy (Adam) belongs to a nazi group, whose racial attitude is foremost directed against immigrants with 'wrong' colour of hair or skin. The girl (Julia) belongs to a family of political fugitives from Peru. - The briefest characterisation would be that 'West Side Story' and '30:e November' have exactly the opposite merits and shortcomings. No negative surplus meaning is intended when I say that every detail of West Side Story is through and through stylised. The fights are choreographic, and the representatives of the authority are theatre policemen. When Tony sings 'Maria', the background incessantly changes, and it does so in a way which can only be realised in a film studio. Etc. - By contrast, every detail of '30:e November' is so realistic that one may feel discomfort. Racist policemen beat up immigrants for no reason. A nazi throws a bomb on the democrats, which fortunately does not explode. Sometimes the action proceeds by a reporter asking questions to the spokesman of the police. Sometimes the TV news reporter repeatedly interrupts his account as further events or more serious consequences of some specific event become known. The director often presents the kinds of scenes which would indeed have occurred, if the main events had been real. - Against this background Adam and Julia meet, and their feelings evolve. Often the photo is unusually poetic when they are alone and away from the turmoil. The director has a great capacity for perceiving highly poetic qualities in simple things, such as a girl walking through a grove. - But both of them will be murdered. The movie takes no step toward reconciliation. - I do not expect other people to share my evaluation. Nevertheless, if given the choice, I would rather see '30:e November' than 'West Side Story'.

When I saw this film for the first time, I deemed it to be markedly superior to the blue and red movies. What I admired was primarily the emotions displayed, the way of displaying them, the interaction of emotions of different persons, and the interaction of different emotions felt by the same person. Today I might agree with this view, though only if each scene is evaluated in isolation. The logic of the film as a whole is hobbling, and it is not easy to believe that Kieslowski was aware of it. A Polish male and a French female hairdresser (Karol and Dominique) participate in an international competition in Budapest. They fall in love and start a sexual relation. After some time Karol becomes impotent. Nevertheless, they marry, though the marriage will never be 'consummated'. At the initiative of Dominique they eventually divorce. Karol is thrown out, and does not even have a place to sleep. Now, in his pocket he finds the key of Dominique's shop, so he can sleep indoors one more night. When Dominique arrives on the next morning, they make another sexual try. And if Karol had succeeded, a reciprocal love relation would have continued. However, when Karol fails, it is not enough for Dominique to get her key back. She wants mean revenge: she lights the curtains and reports to the police that Karol has done it. Hence, Karol cannot even return to Poland in a legal way. So far, all logical problems can be solved without any extraordinary effort. The same is true of the next pair of events: how Karol manages to go to his brother in Poland, and why he becomes the partner and personal friend of the owner of a greater building firm. But the logic goes astray when Karol takes his revenge on Dominique. He draws up a will and makes Dominique the sole heir of all his possessions. He buys a Russian corpse. His brother and his friend identify the corpse as Karol. The corpse is duly buried, and Dominique comes to Poland to participate in the funeral. (Perhaps someone had informed her about the will.) When she returns to the hotel, she finds Karol in the bed, and this time he is not impotent. - On the next morning the police arrives to the hotel: Dominique is suspected of having murdered Karol. Her assurance that he is not dead at all, and that she has slept with him on the night after the funeral, does not improve her case. She is convicted (and may well have got a life sentence). While she is in prison, Karol sometimes leaves small bags to the guard, who passes them on to Dominique. She at her cell window, and Karol on the prison yard, are waving their hands with unalloyed positive feelings for each other. - Some of the problems of this sequence of events can be solved. Karol might live his subsequent life in secret. And the prison guard may believe that he is, say, Dominique's cousin. Prisoners have so few sources of pleasure that they are often prepared to forgive those who sent them in prison by perjury, in order to obtain a little human communication (I have first rate experience of this since I have worked in legal courts for 15 years). However, how could Karol be sure that he would have an erection at the hotel? If he had not succeeded on this single occasion, the entire plan for revenge would have failed. - Does Kieslowski mean that Karol can function adequately if either no emotions, or sadistic emotions are involved, while positive emotions prevent smooth functioning? If this is what he means, it is ill placed to give the spectator the task of "deducing" it. And the same pattern cannot be applied to Dominique. Despite her obvious sadism in one key scene, her unmixed positive feelings in the prison would be poor evidence of a masochistic attitude.

One fundamental and innovative feature of this movie may be difficult to detect by present-day users. Even in 1964 many professional experts overlooked it. 'LES PARAPLUIS' STARTED AN ENTIRELY NEW GENRE, viz. THE FILM MUSICAL. Without any exception, the music of every previous musical was created with the aim of functioning appropriately in the theatre. By contrast, in 'Les parapluis' the team of the director (Jacques Demy) and the composer (Michel Legrand) for the first time decided to produce a work in which the sound should be 100% film music. No one had previously attempted such a task. - This innovation may seem less conspicuous today, because theatre musicals and cinema musicals have reciprocally learned from each other. But note! Even though some musical techniques and phenomena may function well in both the theatre and the cinema, this is by no means true of all techniques and phenomena. - Today it is no revolutionary view that 'West Side Story' and 'Les parapluis' belong to the ten best musicals ever made for the screen. But Swedish reviewers in the 1960s had limited musical competence. Leonard Bernstein's contribution to the former movie was called 'a heap of banal hits', and the latter movie was depreciated as 'a sugary Hollywood melodrama'. - It is definitely not my intention to belittle the non-musical merits of the movie. Even if all music had been deleted, I would still consider it a great movie. Nevertheless, I asked myself whether the music of any other film is of a comparable quality, while being at the same time congenial with the action and situations. I think there is one and only one rival, viz. 'Phaedra' by Jules Dassin, with music by Mikis Theodorakis. However, in 'Les parapluis' all music reaches the highest quality, from the first to the last note. In 'Phaedra' the same thing is true of at most two tunes, among them the love theme. - The DVD version is 31 seconds shorter than the cinema and the video versions: the penultimate 31 seconds have been cut away to ensure that the picture and the music should finish at exactly the same time. It would be vainly to complain about such re-editing. However, the technique with a rotating playback-and-record-head has existed since forty years. If this technique had been applied, the cut would not have been annoying to musicians. But most regrettably, the cut is performed with ordinary scissors. - Users who do not love music, or not this kind of music, would more often than not be disappointed by this movie (although not necessarily so). - The action is very simple. Guy and Geneviève love each other. He is a motor mechanic, and she works in her mother's umbrella shop. When he is enlisted and sent to the North African colonies, she is pregnant. Continual war activity makes it difficult for him to write many letters. Geneviève's mother is worried about her pregnancy. Her pressure eventually makes Geneviève marry a jeweller, whose love may well be as sincere as Guy's. But we are not told whether Geneviève feels more than gratitude because he saves her from becoming an unmarried mother. - When Guy returns from the war and Geneviève has left the town, he becomes very depressed. But he eventually marries the nurse who had for years taken care of his godmother. All the time she had secretly been in love with Guy. - After some years Guy and Geneviève accidentally meet again, but nothing much happen at this meeting. - What so many people admire is the moods and the atmosphere of each scene; not least the transparency and depth of the emotions of the persons. Some people even feel as if they themselves experienced the events and situations on the screen.

If the actors had talked French, 'Wild Birds' might have been compared to cinéma-noir movies such as 'Quai des brumes', 'Le jour se lève', 'L'épave', 'Justice est faite', 'Gibier de potence'. And users liking or disliking such films may be expected to like or dislike this one too. Many persons in the just mentioned French movies could aptly be called 'wild birds'. - In cinéma-noir movies there may be one or two murders or suicides. But even the murders might be more tragic than repulsive. Another more central but less explicit theme is the impossibility of love in this world. - 'Wild Birds' shares all these features, despite the fact that it is based on a Swedish novel, whose writer could never have suspected that it would be filmed, nor what kind of a movie would result. - Some experts think it is a Romeo & Juliette story. I have finally decided to disagree. Basically I would say that two worlds meet for a brief experience of happiness ended by a violent tragedy. - In one world the unhappy prostitute (Ulla) finds a drunken young man (Nisse), who had previously failed in various occupations. She takes him home. They will never have sex. Rather, her feelings are like those for a younger brother (and indeed, her younger brother is dead). The next day Nisse moves into the small apartment next to hers. The previous tenant was a piano teacher. A complex tragedy (shown in the movie) explains why the apartment had just become vacant. - Ulla has no literal pimp. Instead the leader of a gang visits her now and then and receives its tribute. But the main occupation of the gang is middle-sized stealth, not least from the stores in the harbour. Ulla becomes very distressed when Nisse joins this gang. - The central person from the other world is a young girl (Lena), who is living together with her younger sister in a large villa. Her father is the captain and her fiancé the first mate on the same boat. Probably, the mother of the sisters is deceased. - Lena feels confined, almost imprisoned, by the life she is expected to live: bearing children, bringing them up, probably becoming a housewife, and many other things she can hardly put into words. - When her piano teacher has failed to show up for several weeks, she goes to his apartment, where Nisse lives now. Together they ask Ulla what became of the piano teacher, and she tells one half of the tragedy. None of the persons on the screen will ever learn the other half, although the audience will. - It is not just that Nisse and Lena fall in love. She is revived by this relationship, and fundamentally changes her view of life. Suddenly she no longer perceives it as a dreadful fate to bear children etc. - if doing so together with Nisse. But their love is doomed. - Readers should not expect a more exciting development or a more surprising end, than what is customary in French cinéma-noir movies. Nevertheless, I will not deprive them of the possibility of viewing this film with fresh eyes. - Nisse's part is played by Per Oscarsson. For half a century no Swedish actor could match him in depicting neurotic personalities. - I anticipate an objection: if this movie is so excellent, why is it not significantly more renown? Now, first, the film was much appreciated in many South American countries. Second, Hollywood has more than once offered jobs to the director (Alf Sjöberg). But he entertained the private moral that it is the duty of an artist to stay in the place where he found himself, and to do the best of the situation. And he has indeed done his best. Newton said that as a scientist he was standing on the shoulders of giants. As a director Ingmar Bergman certainly stood on the shoulders of another giant, viz. Alf Sjöberg.