Fanny and Alexander (1982): A Must See Movie

I have to say this upfront: Fanny and Alexander is one of the finest films I have seen in a long, long while, and, in fact, one of my favorite films ever. If you have never seen it, or, like me, have not done so in a long time, I encourage you to check it out.

Fanny and Alexander is about a family, largely seen through the eyes of a young boy. The "action" of the story takes place over a few consequential years in the early years of the 20th century. As such, it is a story of change and loss, of familial love and relationships, of a child’s growing understanding of the complexities of the adult world, and of the follies of adults who should know better. It is also a nostalgic look back at a different time, and a fictionalized recollection of and reflection on the director’s youth.

Yes, it is by Ingmar Bergman, but don't reject my suggestion based on recollections of the stark, black and white, art-film meditations for which Bergman originally became famous back in the 1950s – films such as The Seventh Seal (1957), with its iconic image of a medieval knight playing chess with the grim reaper, against a backdrop of desolation (empty sea, grim landscape, plague devastated society, etc.). That film and many of Bergman's other early films were great in their way, and worth watching for sure; but 60 years on, they can be a tough slog – as much an intellectual exercise as a cinematic experience.

Bergman's later movies are different. Films like Persona (1966) and Cries and Whispers  (1972) are less philosophical, more intimate, more psychological, more modern. And, not insignificantly, beginning in the late 1960s, with The Passion of Anna (1969), they are in color. Fanny and Alexander may be Bergman’s richest, most approachable work, and in this film, the impact of color is immeasurable. It is like an extra, vivid character in the movie.

We know from the title of the picture that the two children, Fanny and Alexander, will be central to  the story. Indeed, the movie begins with 10-year-old Alexander Ekdahl, dreamily playing with a dollhouse theater.Then, seeking companionship, he walks through his home, room by room, calling out for his sister Fanny, for his mother, his grandmother, his nanny - but finds himself quite alone.  We are simultaneously introduced to the perspective of this young boy and, by means of this little, interior travelogue, to the sumptuous environment in which he and his family lives. The furnishings, the layout, the artwork, the crystal chandeliers all suggest wealth and comfort. Yet, while resplendent, the place also feels warm, comfortable, and nurturing.

Rich burgundy reds, deep dark greens, lustrous golds and other warm, lush colors and textures abound - in the draperies, carpets, furnishings, artwork, bedding, you name it. When Alexander peers through an ice-frosted window down to the snowy street below, everything is cold, white, wintry – everything, that is, except for the vividly festive display of bright red, yellow, orange and purple blossoms hawked by flower sellers across the way. Winter or no, there’s life here.

From this lovely opening sequence, it’s apparent that the photography on this motion picture, by long-time Bergman cinematographer, Sven Nykvist, will be exquisite. There are extended vistas down long corridors or through multiple interconnected rooms, in which everything is in sharp focus from the most distant painting three rooms distant, to the most immediate chandelier – stunning and remarkably beautiful perspectives. In the middle section of the movie, when the locus and environment changes dramatically, Nykvist does wonders with a mostly monochromatic palette of stark white, black and gray – a very different tone, but just as exquisite.

Alexander’s realization that he is alone in the house is liberating and a little scary at the same time. His penchant for make-believe takes hold. He imagines a statue is gesturing to him, and he gleefully leaps into his grandmother’s bed, burying himself in the warm security of her comforter, but later he catches a fleeting glimpse of the grim reaper and his scythe.  Or did he imagine that? Pretty soon maids appear and start bustling about. It turns out he wasn’t truly alone in that great house.

There’s a sudden energy: it's Christmas Eve, and preparations are afoot. The extended family – all of whom seem to live in the same elegant building  - will soon be arriving for the night’s festivities. The feast is being prepared, the table must be set, the candles lit, the tree decorated, scores of things. Supervising this elaborate production is Helena Ekdahl, the matriarch, Alexander’s grandma.  And so there’s this lovely extended tracking scene of Helena (Gunn Wållgren), as she goes from room to room, instructing the staff, straightening a candle here, picking up a stray item there, checking that everything is in readiness. Finally she sets herself down for a needed glass of cognac and, a bit surprisingly, some private tears. Wållgren, one of the greatest Swedish actresses of the 20^th century, is truly superb throughout; her Helena is the solid, gentle core of this family, to whom everyone turns for advice or solace.

One of the very cool things about the opening of Fannie and Alexander is how we are introduced to the Ekdahls, their friends, colleagues and servants without being told or really knowing who the primary adult characters will be. There’s Oscar (Allan Edwahl), an actor and the director of a small theater; Oscar’s much younger wife Emilie (Ewa Fröling), the theater’s leading lady; Gustav Adolf (Jarl Kulle), Oscar’s brother, a restaurateur, flamboyant bon vivant, and seducer of servant girls;  Alma (Mona Malm), Gustaf’s level headed, accepting wife; Carl (Börje Ahlstedt) the weak-willed black sheep brother; and Lydia (Christina Schollin), his doting, long-suffering wife; among others.  There’s also Isak Jacobi (Erland Josephson), a long-time friend of the family, former lover of Helena, pawnshop owner, money lender, and, not incidentally, a Jew.  And Maj (Pernilla August), the children’s loving and doting nanny, as well as a target of Gustav’s lascivious interest. All of these folks have back-stories and rich personalities.  All come to the Christmas party, a splendid, festive, mostly joyous revel, in which the servants dine with the masters, the booze flows freely, and all marvelously dance through the house singing traditional holiday songs.  Here, we begin to get to know each personality by turns. We eventually realize that Oscar and Emilie, are Alexander and Fanny’s parents, and that they, and especially Emilie, will be a focal character of the story.

What I’ve been describing is Act 1 of a five act presentation. And here I must explain that there are actually two different versions of Fanny and Alexander – a very good three hour edition which was initially released in theaters (“the theatrical version”), and a much longer work as Bergman intended it, telecast over several nights on Swedish TV (”the full version”), clocking in at just over five hours, which, despite or because of it’s duration, is actually much better – a masterpiece.

(By current TV series standards, five hours should be no big deal. How many happy hours have you spent watching The Wire, Homeland, or Breaking Bad? Or (shudder) Downton Abbey? 

Fanny and Alexander is a saga, and the full version, includes crucial scenes not included in the theatrical version. It is richer, easier to understand, more fully realized.   As one example, in Act 1 of the full version there’s a warm, fabulous sequence, cut from the theatrical version, in which Oscar comes to the nursery late at night in order to settle down the rambunctious children. He does so by making up a lovely, mesmerizing story about a simple chair there, that he dubs “the most valuable chair in the world”. On one level this is a neat demonstration of the mystery and power of storytelling; at the same time, it’s a crucial scene which allows us to understand the warmth and depth of Oscar’s relationship with his children.

This becomes important when we move to Act 2, in which, during a rehearsal of Hamlet at his theater, Oscar, playing the ghost of Hamlet’s father, is suddenly stricken ill and collapses.  Oscar is brought home to die, but the dying takes some time, during which the family gathers and waits. The children are at first shunted aside and “protected” from the drama, but then they are brought to their moribund Papa’s bedside to say goodbye – a ritual terrifically frightening and emotionally unbearable for Alexander. Before he dies, Oscar describes the strangeness of his experience to Emelie, wryly telling her,“ I could play the ghost now… really well.”  Later, Alexander and Fanny are awakened by the sound of their mother Emelie’s mourning. They creep out of bed and through the house to watch in horror and wonder (as do we) as she wails and screams.

Not long after, the children are awakened in the night by some peculiar music and tiptoe out to the parlor, to find the ghost of Oscar sitting at the piano tinkling out a melancholy fragment of melody. As the Prince of Denmark well understood, there are mysteries.

A year passes.  The Ekdahls’ theater is floundering without Oscar’s leadership. Emilie too, perhaps. She has fallen under the sway of Bishop Edvard Vergérus, who conducted her husband’s funeral, and who has provided spiritual comfort to her ever since. When the Bishop steps in to help Emilie confront Alexander about some fantastic lies he has told in school, he does so with a sinister, intimidating smile, contrived empathy and the Socratic method: “ Why does one lie, my boy?” he asks. It is a wonderfully uncomfortable scene. Alexander obviously is still grieving, but no solace is offered, just a cold, supercilious warning.  This issue resolved, Emilie announces that she and the Bishop are going to get married.  And Fanny and Alexander’s lives takes a dramatic turn.

The Bishop’s household is very different from the Ekdahls’. Whereas the world of the Ekdahl family is opulent, colorful, full of life, humor and love; the Bishop's house is the opposite: stark, sparsely decorated, monochromatic, icy. The Bishop is a humorless, self righteous, imperious autocrat. Emilie was apparently attracted to him for his strength and certainty, believing that she could find in him a guide to a purer life, a life of meaning. What she, and her children find, instead, is a tyrant who demands obedience and submission to him and his version of the Christian life – a brutal and repressive life. She comes to understand that she has made a dreadful mistake and she fears for her children.

That's enough plot. I have already left out a lot. Going forward, there is intrigue, there is resistance, there is drama and resolution. I do not want to spoil it. Describing the details of a story can do that. Even though I haven't mentioned the incredible scenes with the puppets, or the amazing supernatural dream sequence.  Besides, the plot is by no means the main thing, really – rather, it is the soil from which the real fruits of this motion picture grow. Bergman's ambition was not just to tell a story, although he does so beautifully. It was, I believe, to sum up his experiences and his observations about life and art.

Thematically, Bergman covers a lot of territory, expressing and exploring multiple, interlocking and intriguing concerns: the magic of stories and theater; the knotted, intricate web of family relationships; the irrationality and mysteries of life and of death; the creative impulse, sex and love; nurturing love versus possessive love, wonder and imagination contrasted with logic or ideology; tolerance and intolerance; the oppression of ecclesiastic dogma and the Church; the differing experience of adults and children; what it means to be human.

The acting by the entire ensemble is superlative, which is to be expected in a film directed by Master Bergman. Especially notable are Gunn Wallgren as grandmother Helena, Ewa Froling as Emilie, Jarl Kulle as Gustav Adolph, Pernilla August as Maj, and Erland Josephson as Isak Jacobi.  Jan Malmsjo is just awesome as the creepy Bishop.  In fact, one of the great and most memorable scenes in this film - or any film I have seen in recent years, for that matter – is one in which the Bishop calmly, imperiously, relentlessly, agonizingly interrogates poor Alexander about his behavior (and attitude), then canes him. Malmsjo has made several critics’ list of top 10 villains of all time - for good reason.

In short, Fanny and Alexander has a lot to offer – interesting story, great acting, gorgeous cinematography,   sensitive, insightful screenplay and plenty of food for thought. Whether you opt for the theatrical version or the full version (or, like me, both), I heartily recommend this film. My guess is that it will stay with you for a while.

Available streaming on Hulu Plus (both versions), Amazon Instant Video (theatrical version), and on DVD via Netflix (both versions).