#42: Persona

Persona (Bergman, 1967)

Bergman is one of my favorite directors, and Persona is my favorite Bergman film. The story focuses on two women. One, Elisabet Volger, is a stage actress who has recently inexplicably shut down and stopped talking and been sent to a mental institution. The other, Alma, is a nurse at that institution. The director of the mental institution presents Elisabet with a theory that she doesn't feel emotions for anyone and spends her life faking the emotions, and she stopped talking so she could stop lying. Her solution is to send Elisabet with Alma to her summer home to relax.

Alma at first is completely open with Elisabet, and identifies with her, almost forming a crush. Then, she reads a letter Elisabet wrote to the hospital director in which she says she is manipulating Alma into using her for a character study. At this point she blows up, and starts to see her as cold and manipulative. At the same time she secretly wonders if she's as cold and manipulative as Elisabet.

My interpretation of the film the first time I saw it was completely different from my interpretation the second time. The first time, I thought Elisabet was the cold, manipulative psychopath and Alma was losing her sense of identity because she was worried she couldn't show love for the child she was pregnant with. The second time, I had a different interpretation. Elisabeth didn't shut down because she was cold and manipulative. She shut down because she had trouble dealing with the violence in the world. When the director gave her the story of the cold, manipulative actress, she adopted it as her persona and starting playing that part, so she could use it as a coping mechanism. When Alma caught her playing that part to the director, she decided to project her own coldness, that she does not like to admit, onto Elisabet. Through her actions we see Alma is the real sociopath. She saw a shard of broken glass on the ground, and Elisabet walking around barefoot, and said nothing so she would cut her foot. She threatened to throw boiling water on Elisabet to get her to talk and break her persona. Alma is the cold, manipulative one, who knows she'll now have to play the part with her child, and receive emotion she can't return.

The movie is heavily open to interpretation but not in a way that seems vague. It uses dreams and tacit emotion in a way that's distinctly Bergman. In a way that invites you to examine and form your own ideas rather than just spelling everything out. It raises the themes of the difference between our inner psychology and the personae we choose to show to others. It's an all around beautiful film.

Rating: ***** / 5

82/101

Next: Voyage In Italy, Rear Window, Amarcord