Episode 173 – Ingmar Bergman’s Summer Interlude

Scott, David, Trevor, and Arik discuss the artistic seeds, sensuality, playfulness, performances, autobiography, and tragedy in Bergman's 1951 film.

This time on the podcast, Scott is joined by David Blakeslee, Trevor Berrett, and Arik Devens to discuss Ingmar Bergman’s Summer Interlude.

About the film:

Touching on many of the themes that would define the rest of his legendary career—isolation, performance, the inescapability of the past—Ingmar Bergman’s tenth film was a gentle drift toward true mastery. In one of the director’s great early female roles, Maj-Britt Nilsson beguiles as an accomplished ballet dancer haunted by her tragic youthful affair with a shy, handsome student (Birger Malmsten). Her memories of the sunny, rocky shores of Stockholm’s outer archipelago mingle with scenes from her gloomy present, most of them set in the dark backstage environs of the theater where she works. A film that the director considered a creative turning point, Summer Interlude (Sommarlek) is a reverie about life and death that unites Bergman’s love of theater and cinema.

Subscribe to the podcast via RSS or in iTunes

Buy The Film On Amazon:

Watch the trailer:

Episode Links:

Summer Interlude (1951) – The Criterion Collection
Summer Interlude: Love and Death in the Swedish Summer – From the Current – The Criterion Collection
Illicit Interlude – From the Current – The Criterion Collection
Summer Interlude (1936) – IMDb
Summer Interlude – Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia
Summer Interlude | Ingmar Bergman
TASCHEN Books: The Ingmar Bergman Archives
The George Sanders Show: Episode 64: Summer Interlude and Songs from the Second Floor
Ingmar Bergman: An Artist’s Journey

Episode Credits:

Scott Nye (Twitter / Battleship Pretension)
David Blakeslee (Twitter / Criterion Reflections)
Trevor Berrett (Twitter / The Mookse and the Gripes)
Arik Devens (Twitter / Cinema Gadfly)

Music from this episode is by Chad & Jeremy and Sam Cooke.