Smultronstället (Wild Strawberries) (1957)
Average Rating: 8.8/10
Reviews Counted: 33
Fresh: 31 | Rotten: 2
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: N/A
Critic Reviews: 3
Fresh: 2 | Rotten: 1
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Average Rating: 4.3/5
User Ratings: 21,283
Movie Info
After exploring his disillusionment with religion in his previous films, Ingmar Bergman adopted a humanistic approach for this classic study in isolationism. Legendary Scandinavian director Victor Sjöström stars as Isak Borg, an aging medical professor who reassesses his life while journeying to his former university to receive an honorary degree. Borg travels with his estranged daughter-in-law Marianne (Ingrid Thulin) and revisits many of the landmarks of his past, conjuring up memories of his
Dec 26, 1957 Wide
Feb 12, 2002
Janus Films
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Cast
-
Victor Sjöström
Professor Isak Borg -
Bibi Andersson
Sara -
Ingrid Thulin
Marianne Borg -
Gunnar Bjornstrand
Evald Borg -
Folke Sundquist
Anders -
Naima Wifstrand
Isak's Mother -
Björn Bjelvenstam
Viktor -
Gunnel Broström
Mrs. Berit Almann -
??ke Fridell
Gertud's Lover -
Gertrud Fridh
Isak's Wife -
Maud Hansson
Angelica -
Julian Kindahl
Agda the housekeeper -
Gunnel Lindblom
Charlotta -
Yngve Nordwall
Uncle Aron -
Gio Petre
Sigbritt -
Sif Ruud
Aunt -
Gunnar Sjöberg
Alman -
Per Sjöstrand
Sigfrid -
Max von Sydow
Ã?kerman, Åkerman, ??ke... -
Goran Lundstrom
Benjamin
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All Critics (34) | Top Critics (4) | Fresh (31) | Rotten (2) | DVD (19)
An archetypal Ingmar Bergman film, and one of his best.
One of Bergman's warmest, and therefore finest films.
Mr. Bergman, being a poet with the camera, gets some grand, open, sensitive images, but he has not conveyed full clarity in this film.
Swedish master Ingmar Bergman delivered one of his greatest ruminations on love and life in this 1957 drama.
Several actors who were to form the director's virtual stock company are here, but it is Sjöström who is heart and soul of the film.
One of Ingmar Bergman's many masterpieces, this universal meditation on the meaning of life is extremely well-acted by Victor Sjostrom (also known as director) as ther aging professor.
It's most memorable due to the heartfelt sterling performance by the seventy-something Victor Seastrom.
a masterpiece
Landmark Bergman
My favorite Ingmar Bergman film, without question.
A film of rare beauty and pain
Brilliant.
Sjostrom, in his final film, delivers one of the finest performances in any Bergman film -- a major accomplishment considering the virtuosity that Bergman's actors consistently display.
[Worth watching] if only to see issues that are nowadays considered verboeten tossed around as freely as a football.
Victor Sjostrom's magnificent performance carries an emotional authority that gives Bergman's great movie a warmth and an accessibility that it might not otherwise have had.
The relentless symbolism, and some rather heavy-handed dream sequences are off-putting at times, but Wild Strawberries has enough sorrow, warmth and profundity to make for sophisticated and rewarding viewing.
This is one of the truly outstanding works of post-war European cinema.
Poetic and richly elegant -- and sometimes playful (but don't tell anyone, because lots of people think of Bergman as stupefyingly serious).
...a touching look at old age and how memories from the past can affect us as mature beings.
Each step along the trip yields new faces, new situations, and dilemmas -- all leading back to the film's ideas about love, life, death, accomplishment, and incompetence.
Audience Reviews for Smultronstället (Wild Strawberries)
The film is the odyssey of a rather cold, cerebral and elderly highly respected professor Isak Borg (Victor Sjostrom) as he goes on the road with his sensitive and prickly daughter in law to receive an out of town honor. Along the way, they visit Borg's even older and even colder 90 something mother.
Don't give up. The film initially seems to meander aimlessly. Numerous apparently unrelated events unfold, including a submersion into Borg's past memories, picking up a trio of young and naive hitchhikers, the rather prickly exchanges with the mother, an encounter with a bitter and unpleasant middle aged couple that have had a car crash, and various dark revelations by Marianne the daughter in law about her teetering marriage to Borg's difficult son, who has inherited his father's cold and isolating tendencies.
By the end, the film presents a unified whole of a man coming to terms with his life and taking down the high walls from others with which he has isolated himself. He forgives himself for his choices and his treatment of others, and is able to not only reconcile but express love for his pregnant daughter in law, the sensual and expressive Marianne, played by iconic Swedish beauty Ingrid Thulin. Look also for Bergman's favorite screen performer Max Von Sydow in a cameo performance as a small town gas station owner who reminds Borg of the good he has done in his life. He shows some range as he is convincing as a simple goodhearted working man, a contrast from his usual high minded, tortured intellectual characters.
The crisp and gorgeous black and white photography of Bergman's early collaborator Gunnar Fischer presents the story not in gritty documentary style, but in picturesque, highly contrasting stylized compositions. This is appropriate to the memories and elegiac retrospective of Borg's life. Rarely cited as a Bergman favorite due to it's rambling nature, quiet introspection and the subtlety of its revelations, it may be his best film. It's certainly his gentlest.
Super Reviewer
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Foreign Titles
- Wild Strawberries (Smultronstället) (DE)
- Wild Strawberries (UK)


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