Written by: Ingmar Bergman
Starring: Harriet Andersson, Gunnar Björnstrand, Max von Sydow, Lars Passgård
Rating: [4/5]
Understanding the plight of others does not require a level of understanding of what ails them but rather empathy to assist in any way that you can. Not everyone needs to be fixed and some just cannot piece that together because of the way they are programmed. In Through a Glass Darkly, we receive a story taking place in a span of 24 hours that displays plenty about its characters in a way that seeks to make you ponder to great effect.
At a remote island for vacation, Karin, who suffers from schizophrenia spends time with her husband Martin (Max Von Sydow), father David (Gunnar Björnstrand), and brother Minus (Lars Passgård). While on this vacation Karin and Minus discuss the grievances they have towards their father for various reasons while Martin discovers just what he’s dealing with here.
Watching Through a Glass Darkly certainly does not come as a joyful experience seeing as what it seeks to discuss falls deep into religious and mental health issues along with individuals only making things worse. Nearly meditative in approach, this feature follows how David has impacted his two children in ways even he does not fully comprehend and how in the end he has little control of everything. We see this mainly through Karin as she battles with a mental illness that has no cure, but impacts her mightily. We see the impact in different scenes when she wishes to speak to God but begins to hear things that only add to the psychological harm of what she deals with. Martin learns of David’s lack of compassion for what ails his daughter, which only further explains the icy relationship at the center of it all. It certainly does not help with the feeling a vacation should have.
Martin has to reckon with his own actions both of the past and present and the impact it has had on his children. Certainly to a much milder degree with Minus, but everything, in the end, comes back to Karin. From treating his daughter as something to solve rather than someone to care for as she battles with her schizophrenia it takes him to a dark place and one this feature examines in such a thorough manner. While we do not get a view of how this all transpired in the past, we get the idea, especially when it all builds upon what we see later in the film.
As with many of Ingmar Bergman’s more serious works, the pondering about the presence of God makes its way into the narrative and it certainly becomes a centerpiece of this feature through Karin. Her particular experience with religion in conjunction with her mental illness makes the scenes where she has her breakdowns all the more heartbreaking to watch. Everything occurring with her allows for so much analysis, especially breaking down everything she says and how it relates to her character. She becomes the focal point of the movie and Harriet Andersson plays her beautifully well. A longtime collaborator of Ingmar Bergman, Andersson has never given a bad performance under his direction. Actually, she has never not given a tremendous performance in one of his features and this one sees her dive into a challenging role to pull off and she does it spectacularly well in the way she displays the humanity and pain of this character. Truly stunning work, especially as we reach the climax and conclusion of the narrative, she knocks it out of the park.
Kicking off the unofficial trilogy deeply entrenched in religion, Through a Glass Darkly begins this journey about the absence of God and those in search of it. Bergman, with this film, makes us sit through these uncomfortable moments with these family members and the particular affliction Karina must battle. He lets these moments play out and holds out attention to it in a way that makes it hard to look away. He imbues this deep sadness to the story because the more we learn about Karina and how she has gotten to this place in life, the more we can see the overall impact of the nature of her illness and the lack of nurturing from her father ultimately leads her to this place where she feels she cannot hear or find God but rather something much more sinister. Truly chilling in those moments, and certainly what Bergman sought to elicit.
Certainly not an easy film to sit and watch, Through a Glass Darkly goes to some dark places and delves into some harsh truths that have been kept under the surface for far too long. Not only do we get yet another strong effort by the legendary Swedish filmmaker but it comes hand-in-hand with one of his greatest collaborators in Harriet Andersson who simply captivates with everything she does as Karina rivals mostly anything else she has done in her illustrious career.
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