Flick Review < Summer Interlude | Ingmar Bergman, 1951

“A strange mood developed, almost like a melody. A new room was opened in our minds.”

“You only see your life clearly once, when all protective walls have crumbled.

You stand there, naked and cold, seeing yourself just the way you are. Once only.”

Director: Ingmar Bergman

Writers: Ingmar Bergman, Herbert Grevenius

Cinematography: Gunnar Fischer

Stars: Maj-Britt Nilsson, Birger Malmsten, Alf Kjellin

“Summer Interlude has a long history. Its origin, I see now, lies in a rather touching love affair that I had one summer when my family resided on Ornö Island. I was sixteen years old and, as usual, was stuck with extra studies during my summer vacation and could only occasionally participate in activities with people my own age. Besides, I did not dress as they did; I was skinny, had acne, and stammered whenever I broke my silence and looked up reading from Nietzsche.”

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[… ]On the far end of this so-called Paradise Island, toward the bay, there lived a girl who was also alone. A timid love grew between us, as often happens when two young lonely people seek each other out. […] Our love died when autumn came, but it served as the basis for a short story that I wrote the summer after my exams.

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