As we mentioned last week, BAM’s retrospective of ’70s icon Elliott Gould finished up this week (entitled “Elliott Gould: Star For An Uptight Age“) and last night we went to go see “The Touch,” the first ever English language film directed by the great Swedish director Ingmar Bergman (the second and last one was the Hollywood attempt, “The Serpent’s Egg,” which many erroneously report as his only English film; he passed away last year at the age of 89;).
“The Touch” (1971) is notable for many reasons, the aforementioned first language film fact being the first of many reasons. First off, last night’s screening was a rare treat; the film is barely ever shown and is not available on DVD. The scratchy print was from Gould’s personal collection that he personally lent to the Brooklyn film theater and – in the beginning at least – the film was incredibly un-Bergman-esque (Gould was also the first non-Scandinavian actor to ever work with Bergman).
Practically a comedy at the outset, the story about a seemingly happy Swedish housewife who begins an adulterous affair with an American friend and acquaintance of her husband, was replete with uncharacteristic Bergman moves; moving handheld camera, whip pans, montage sequences to Swedish pop music, jarring cuts. It made us think, “What have you done with Ingmar Bergman and who have you put in his place?” Wes Anderson would have really appreciated that first 20-30 minutes (the film soon becomes a bleak, tragic and sorrowful love story and we breathed a sigh of relief, ha).
The film is obviously close to Gould’s heart and he talked proudly about his experience working with Bergman recently in a radio interview with WNYC. “My theater career was very undeveloped and actually Ingmar Bergman had [written] about me [saying] I was ‘tragic.’ Not for the work that we did together, but for not doing classical work in relation to my natural gifts. And he published this in an article [called], ‘Shakespeare, Ibsen, Strindberg and O’Neil,’ and I was quite flattered.”
But contradictorily, “The Touch” is also notable because it’s a film that Bergman hated and was incredibly embarrassed by.
“I feel ashamed of or detest [only] a few of my films for various reasons. ‘This Can’t Happen Here’ was the first one; I completed it accompanied by violent inner opposition. The other is ‘The Touch.’ Both mark the very bottom for me,” Bergman once said.
Bergman was tortured about the idea from the very concept and never felt comfortable with the project. In a diary entry he wrote, “I’ve finished the screenplay, although not without a fair amount of inner resistance. I baptized it ‘The Touch.’ As good a name as any other. Now I’m going to take time off until August 3, when we begin the preparations in earnest. I feel depressed and ill at ease. I’d be happy to drop this film.”
Perhaps it was because it was part comedy, part tragedy (or at least comic once Gould got his hands on it), or perhaps it was because of the mix of languages – apparently there were two version of the same film made though one no longer apparently exists. “The intention was to shoot ‘The Touch’ in both English and Swedish. In an original version that doesn’t seem to exist anymore, English was spoken by those who were English-speaking and Swedish by those who were Swedes. I believe that it possibly was slightly less unbearable than the totally English-language version, which was made at the request of the Americans,” Bergman once wrote.
Needless to say, Bergman anguished over the film.”The story I bungled so badly was based on something extremely personal to me: the secret life of someone who loves becomes gradually the only real life and the real life becomes an illusion.”
The film also co-stars the great Bibi Andersson and the inimitable Max Von Sydow (two of Bergman’s persistent repertory players) and Bergman further beat himself up for convincing/manipulating Andersson to take the part even thought she instinctively knew it didn’t suit her. “I felt I needed a loyal friend in this foreign production. Besides, Bibi has a good command of English,” Bergman said. “The fact that she became pregnant after having accepted the part threw a terrible monkey wrench into what seemed, on the surface at least, a matter-of-fact, methodical production set. ‘Cries and Whispers’ began to make its way forward during this depressing period.” (The film received a disastrous reception at the Berlin Film Festival that year and was excoriated by Swedish journalists in attendance).
Elliott Gould would like you to note: A Village Voice article written by the normally-on-point J. Hoberman earlier this year stating that at the time of working on “The Touch,” Gould had never seen an Ingmar Bergman film, is incorrect. “That’s not true. I kind of appreciated the [Voice] article. [The writer] had a take about my being Jewish and how unlikely it was for me to breakthrough in film. No, I had seen several of his films.”
Gould had his reservations too though. When he got to page 22 in the script – a scene of violent sex – he got a headache and felt doubts. “I immediately got a migraine. I didn’t think I could expose myself mentally and emotionally… but I couldn’t just dismiss him.” Gould had Bergman call him and their conversation convinced Gould he should take the part. “Little did I know how far I was willing to go,” he said with a chuckle.
It’s an odd duck film, with weird and seemingly mis-matched tones, but it is a rarity and there’s never a dull moment – not something you can say about all of Bergman’s, sometimes glacially paced, films. It’s also quite moving and emotionally brutal too. “The Touch” was also one of Bergman’s first films in color and has an amazing auburn glow courtesy of Academy Award-winning cinematographer Sven Nykvist, who would win his first Oscar the following year with Bergman’s “Cries & Whispers.” If you have the means, we recommend (it is so choice). If you live in New York and missed the Elliott Gould retrospective, kick yourself now.