Stars: Ingrid Thulin, Kari Sylwan, Harriet Andersson, Liv Ullmann, Henning Moritzen, Erland Josephson

Director: Ingmar Bergman

Summary: As two sisters care for their dying sister their past lives are relived. Swedish dialogue with subtitles.

Ingmar Bergman's acclaimed drama, which deals with the fractured relationships between three sisters, is set in a vast turn-of-the-century manor house where unidentified voices are continually whispering and mingle with a dying woman's cries of pain. Karin and Maria (played by Ingrid Thulin and Liv Ullmann, respectively) have come to stay with their sister Agnes (Harriet Andersson), who is suffering from cancer, during the final stretch of her illness. Attending to Agnes is her faithful maid Anna (Kari Sylwan), who, in spite of her apparent social inferiority, is the only one who remains steadfast and dauntless until the very end--the two other women, plagued by guilt, loneliness, and jealousy of one another, are unable to offer assistance or even sympathy in their sister's hour of need. Lauded often for its innovative stylistic elements (such as flashbacks introduced by a fade to red--a color that dominates the picture as a whole--and extreme, expressive close-ups of the actresses' faces), CRIES AND WHISPERS features sumptuous period costume design and stunning photography by longtime Bergman cinematographer Sven Nykvist.

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Ingmar Bergman's Cries and Whispersis a brilliant and at times shockingly traumatic piece of chamber cinema. It also represented a renaissance for Bergman, whose previous few films had flopped commercially. Set in a large house with interiors done out entirely in a disquieting red and against a soundtrack of ticking and barely audible chatter, the film features three of Bergman's female stalwarts. Harriet Andersson plays Agnes--a thirtysomething woman dying of cancer--Ingrid Thulin plays her sister Karin--non-tactile and caught in a marriage with a man she finds physically repulsive--and Liv Ulmann is the almost childishly sensual second sister Maria. Kari Sylwan, meanwhile, stars as the earth-motherly maid Anna, whose cradling of the dying Agnes against her naked bosom is one of the centrepieces of the movie.

Much of what transpires here can be construed as fantasy sequence, including one extraordinary incident in which Thulin cuts her vagina with broken glass and smears the blood over herself, in order to avoid sex with her husband. Agnes' unbearable cries of anguish in her death throes, however, are all too real. Many familiar Bergman themes are explored in Cries And Whispers--mortality, the existence of God (here doubted by a Pastor) and the space between people. However, they are set against a singular, blood-red, dreamlike ambience that is irresistible. This is Bergman at his finest.

On the DVD:the dominant red backdrops of the movie are richly enhanced in this edition. Text-only extras include notes from Bergman's own memoirs. In a lengthy extract here, he reveals that he had considered Mix Farrow for the part of one of the sisters. Philip Strick's additional notes add further context and background--it seems that the film's success in America was due to its distribution by, of all people, Roger Corman. --David Stubbs

Aspect Ratio:	1.66 Wide Screen
Main Language:	Swedish
Region:	Region 0
Special Features:	Star And Director Filmographies, Scene Selection, Philip Strick Film Notes, Extract From Bergmans Book Images My Life In Film, The Bergman Collection Trailer
Subtitles:	English
Year:	1972
Release Date:	February 25, 2002
Runtime:	88 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	T V D 3370
Label:	The Bergman Collection
Keywords:	Swedish, Subtitled, General, Wide, Screen, Whispers, Cries, Drama
Genre:	Drama