It's extraordinary to imagine now but Ingrid Bergman was once seen as a danger to American womanhood. When the Swedish film star revealed her affair with Roberto Rossellini, the director, in 1946, the House Un-American Activities Committee denounced her and there was pressure from various self-righteous politicians to ban her work.
Bergman’s decision to risk such vituperation seems strange given her intense need for privacy, and Ingrid Bergman – In Her Own Words often hinted at this contradiction. As an insight into a much-gazed-upon figure in danger of being forgotten, this documentary – featuring home movies, diary entries and interviews with those who knew her – was terrific. I’ve often wondered about the Swedish psyche which, I have been told, treats melancholy as a sort of default setting. Certainly Bergman’s diary entries suggested a woman, loved by millions, who never quite learned to love herself.
She worried about her legacy, felt uneasy about her success at a time when so many actors were out of work and questioned her feelings for her many lovers, who included Gregory Peck and Robert Capa. At other times, Bergman’s thoughts were more succinct, though no less telling. Recalling a meeting with David O Selznick, the Hollywood producer, she wrote: “He sat, looked, praised my English, then left.”
The unhappiness went back to her childhood, and a diary entry from when she was 13 showed an intense desperation. “God. My God. Help Dad. Make me calm. God. I beg you. Make Dad well. Don’t abandon us.”
In fact, Bergman would famously abandon her own children in pursuit of both a career and personal happiness. Their feelings at the time were not articulated here, but there was a suggestion that they saw her as a fabulous friend rather than a mother.
imagine...
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