The Criterion Collection announces a new line of films.
Early Bergman works see the light, thanks to Eclipse | Chicago Tribune : This year promises to be no less exciting for Criterion with the introduction of something new this week -- its Eclipse line.and I'd heard the following anecdote before, and it still cracks me up. Imagine the disappointment viewers must have felt, thinking they were going to see a “blue” movie, and ending up in a Bergman film! How many people left after 23 minutes? There is a little nudity in Summer with Monika, but from what I remember, there wasn't much titillation involved.“We've never launched a second line before,” says Criterion president Peter Becker. “We've always had a very clear mission as a company: to present films as their makers would want them seen, and expand the awareness and enjoyment of film culture. With Eclipse, we decided these were films people needed to know, and we wanted to create the cinematheque experience for the home viewer.”
With the release of “Early Bergman” ($69.95), Eclipse hopes to shed light on movies overshadowed by the major works of the directors who made them. So while most foreign film buffs know Ingmar Bergman for “The Seventh Seal” and “Wild Strawberries,” the five features here, spanning 1944-49, will be unknown to all but the most devoted and scholarly (“Torment,” “Crisis,” “Port of Call,” “Thirst” and “To Joy”). Still, the volume bears Bergman's artistic stamp: psychological intrigue, hardscrabble environments, captivating visuals.
“We wanted you to experience the early Bergman films the way you would at a film forum anywhere across the country,” Becker says. “Unless you have a cinematheque in your town, you probably wouldn't see these titles for 10 years at a time. These films are hard to find.”
![Summer With Monica (Sommaren med Monika) [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.0 Import - Great Britain ]](http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/B000F2SDCK.01._SCMZZZZZZZ_.jpg)
There's also the matter of setting history straight. Prior to 1957's “The Seventh Seal,” American audiences didn't know what to make of the Swedish director -- in part because American film promoters gave them the wrong idea. “Bergman's films were treated as skin flicks,” Becker says. “'Summer With Monika' [1953] was marketed in the U.S. as 'Monika, the Story of a Bad Girl' with a butt shot on the poster.” (That same year, “Sunset of a Clown” became “The Naked Night” here.)
It's been years since I've seen any of these films, and three of the ones on Eclipse I've never seen.
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