537 The Magician

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Matt
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Re: 537 The Magician

#51 Post by Matt » Thu Sep 23, 2010 10:39 pm

You're probably joking, but I actually like that movie.

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domino harvey
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Re: 537 The Magician

#52 Post by domino harvey » Fri Sep 24, 2010 6:46 pm

Well, I like it better than Summer With Monika, that's for sure

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Jean-Luc Garbo
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Re: 537 The Magician

#53 Post by Jean-Luc Garbo » Tue Jan 11, 2011 1:36 pm

Matt wrote:The Magician was shot by Gunnar Fischer who was also, you know, not bad.
Finally watched this night and Fischer's work really stuck out for me. I love Bergman's actors, but this period of work with Fischer is always incredibly inspiring for me. I went through the entire set - minus the booklet - and found the DVD to be superb. This may even end up on my list for the year. The interview with Assayas is quite good. I also found it of interest as most of the time Bergman discusses the influence that Strindberg had on him. His appreciation for the French poetic realists was news to me, but now obvious in retrospect. I'm really looking forward to watching this film again. Also, it was quite stunning to see Joseph Erlandson looking so young. It was a shock as I'd only known him in later Bergman films as well as Tarkovsky and Kaufman.

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fiddlesticks
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Re: 537 The Magician

#54 Post by fiddlesticks » Tue Jan 11, 2011 7:39 pm

I think you must mean Erland Josephson.

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HistoryProf
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Re: 537 The Magician

#55 Post by HistoryProf » Wed Jun 01, 2011 12:39 am

can anyone offer an opinion as to why this is such a masterpiece? I have loved every Bergman film i've seen - about half i'd guess - and for some reason the Magician left me underwhelmed. It looks amazing, grandmother is suitably creepy, and the setting is great, but it just didn't click and I can't figure out why. I was so positively certain this was going to be a revelation that I guess I was a bit let down by my own eagerness. Yet coming here for feedback I found only repeated "AWESOME!!!" posts with nothing really about the film beyond declarations of its greatness. So for all of you who love it, convince me to watch it again!

I should say that I started it at about 2am so I was pretty tired by the end...but it seemed like the right time to watch Ingmar go all gothic. In all honesty, my one clear thought on what I didn't care for was having Max Von Sydow stay mute for 3/4 of the film. He's his giant imposing self, but as harrowing as he can look, I wished he would have given voice to that character earlier...you knew it was coming, so it wasn't revelatory at all. But I suppose as that's part of the tale that it is not a fair criticism...i dunno...i was just plain frustrated by my failure to fall in love with this one on first viewing.

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knives
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Re: 537 The Magician

#56 Post by knives » Wed Jun 01, 2011 12:56 am

It honestly sounds like you went at it with the wrong state of mind. While there are gothic elements to the film I see it as more a member of the early farces like Smiles of a Summer Night. Maybe the best point of comparison to the tone I'm reaching for is Corman's The Raven where this big gothic look and battle for more important things is used to play up a farce. An other point of example might be Woody Allen's Love and Death where it's the first very serious tackling of all of these existential element that would be at the forefront of his career, but melded onto a style that better resembles what he had been doing up until that point.
Last edited by knives on Wed Jun 01, 2011 1:35 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Murdoch
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Re: 537 The Magician

#57 Post by Murdoch » Wed Jun 01, 2011 1:23 am

I only first saw it with this release so someone who has seen it multiple times as opposed to my single viewing can better describe the film's strengths, however here goes:

What I like best about the film is how Bergman sets up Albert Vogler as this mystical being, and then exposes him as a charlatan. The film's climactic point with the resurrected Vogler confronting the doctor pushes the viewer from one extreme to another, where we believe that the skeptic's comeuppance is at hand, only to be shown that these supernatural abilities of Vogler were mere parlor tricks. The transformation of Sydow in the final scene is great, he suddenly drops his muteness and menacing stare now that the act is over and becomes this pathetic, inarticulate beggar. The religious allegory is obvious, and I like how Bergman approaches his reveal, allowing the viewer to fall prey to belief for the majority of the film only to strip it away in the final minutes.

The film also balances Bergman's sexual humor well with the central story, I actually found it be one of the funnier Bergmans I've seen with the scenes between Andersson and the assistant.

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Re: 537 The Magician

#58 Post by Jack Phillips » Wed Jun 01, 2011 2:59 pm

Murdoch wrote: What I like best about the film is how Bergman sets up Albert Vogler as this mystical being, and then exposes him as a charlatan. The film's climactic point with the resurrected Vogler confronting the doctor pushes the viewer from one extreme to another, where we believe that the skeptic's comeuppance is at hand, only to be shown that these supernatural abilities of Vogler were mere parlor tricks. The transformation of Sydow in the final scene is great, he suddenly drops his muteness and menacing stare now that the act is over and becomes this pathetic, inarticulate beggar. The religious allegory is obvious, and I like how Bergman approaches his reveal, allowing the viewer to fall prey to belief for the majority of the film only to strip it away in the final minutes.
What about the miracle at the very end? Your analysis seems sound to me, as far as it goes, but I think you're forgetting Bergman's final move. It's the ending miracle that transforms the film into a very clever variation on Dreyer's Ordet.

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Murdoch
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Re: 537 The Magician

#59 Post by Murdoch » Wed Jun 01, 2011 3:34 pm

If you're referring to the king asking Vogler to perform for him then I just took it as how blind belief in Vogler's abilities continues in the rest of the country. The viewer is now privy to his fraudulence, but those in the world of the film outside of the doctor et al. still hold a belief in Vogler. I think the film brilliantly takes the viewer through the act of losing one's religion, we begin with the belief in Vogler, and then when we lose it everything in the film takes on a different connotation, especially Vogler himself.

I don't see the ending as a miracle in the sense that it's an act of God like the resurrection in Ordet clearly was, I think it's more Bergman showing that belief continues even when there's nothing to believe in.

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Re: 537 The Magician

#60 Post by Jack Phillips » Thu Jun 02, 2011 8:24 am

Murdoch wrote:If you're referring to the king asking Vogler to perform for him then I just took it as how blind belief in Vogler's abilities continues in the rest of the country. The viewer is now privy to his fraudulence, but those in the world of the film outside of the doctor et al. still hold a belief in Vogler. I think the film brilliantly takes the viewer through the act of losing one's religion, we begin with the belief in Vogler, and then when we lose it everything in the film takes on a different connotation, especially Vogler himself.

I don't see the ending as a miracle in the sense that it's an act of God like the resurrection in Ordet clearly was, I think it's more Bergman showing that belief continues even when there's nothing to believe in.
Look at the scene again. The moment before the messengers arrive with the King's command it is pouring down rain. Then they come and suddenly everything is in sunlight. In fact, the ground isn't even wet. The miraculous change in weather conditions highlights the startling and unlikely announcement that the King is ressurecting Vogler's career. A fanfare plays as the entourage--which is ridiculously huge--departs. After everyone drives out of frame, the fanfare plays again, an annunciation of sorts.

Theater was Bergman's true religion. He could take a production apart and show us all the tricks and then put everything back together and have the play proceed and viewers would still be "fooled." Theater is a system of false beards and mirrors that nonetheless produces truth. Every successful performance, against all the odds, creates an audience of believers.

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MitchPerrywinkle
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Re: 537 The Magician

#61 Post by MitchPerrywinkle » Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:54 pm

I guess I have a more simple view of the ending; I always saw the film as a tribute to entertainment, and of it's role in a cynical society. I loved the climax where the doctor, though visibly frightened by Vogler, insists that his obvious display of fear was nothing more than some sort of physical reaction. There will always be those who will never give themselves fully to something like this, but the point is that we need to suspend our disbelief and accept that we can't explain everything. That's why Bergman contrasts the entire darkly comedic plot with those serious scenes of that dying man. He is the only one really facing the abyss, and it's scary and mysterious and unknowable.

Also, Max von Sydow, who I'm certain is one of the finest actors of the 20th Century, gives a brilliant performance here. I love the example you made, Murdoch, of Vogler dropping character, yet von Sydow never misses a beat.

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HistoryProf
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Re: 537 The Magician

#62 Post by HistoryProf » Thu Jun 02, 2011 11:17 pm

some excellent stuff here folks...thanks so much. lots to think about and i'll have to rewatch this soon. I think Knives' supposition is correct and that I went in expecting something gothic and serious and completely misread the tone of the film. I like Murdoch's proposal of an organized religion allegory, and will definitely have that in mind on next viewing.

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Murdoch
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Re: 537 The Magician

#63 Post by Murdoch » Fri Jun 03, 2011 1:26 pm

Jack Phillips wrote:
Murdoch wrote:If you're referring to the king asking Vogler to perform for him then I just took it as how blind belief in Vogler's abilities continues in the rest of the country. The viewer is now privy to his fraudulence, but those in the world of the film outside of the doctor et al. still hold a belief in Vogler. I think the film brilliantly takes the viewer through the act of losing one's religion, we begin with the belief in Vogler, and then when we lose it everything in the film takes on a different connotation, especially Vogler himself.

I don't see the ending as a miracle in the sense that it's an act of God like the resurrection in Ordet clearly was, I think it's more Bergman showing that belief continues even when there's nothing to believe in.
Look at the scene again. The moment before the messengers arrive with the King's command it is pouring down rain. Then they come and suddenly everything is in sunlight. In fact, the ground isn't even wet. The miraculous change in weather conditions highlights the startling and unlikely announcement that the King is ressurecting Vogler's career. A fanfare plays as the entourage--which is ridiculously huge--departs. After everyone drives out of frame, the fanfare plays again, an annunciation of sorts.

Theater was Bergman's true religion. He could take a production apart and show us all the tricks and then put everything back together and have the play proceed and viewers would still be "fooled." Theater is a system of false beards and mirrors that nonetheless produces truth. Every successful performance, against all the odds, creates an audience of believers.
This reading certainly seems more in line with Bergman's theatrical roots, and the film does work well as an ode to the illusion and power of performance. Like I said my reading was based on one viewing - although I did return to the last scene for the sake of the discussion - so my view of the film will likely change as I watch it more, I was fresh off viewing Seventh Seal before this so that impacted how I went into Magician. But I do believe that Magician works as an interesting companion piece to Seventh Seal in its examination of belief, it may not be overtly focused on religion but the way in which the viewer is led to believe that Vogler possesses supernatural abilities only to have that view disproved is to me as much a commentary on the artifice of performance as it is on the artifice of belief, where the viewer is strung along with Vogler only to have him shown in his true colors and our belief in him as this otherworldly sorcerer exposed as a fallacy. This reading is inseparable from the film as a piece of theatre, but I think Bergman is using these theatrical parallels to examine belief not from a strictly religious perspective, but from the perspective of the audience.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: 537 The Magician

#64 Post by Roger Ryan » Fri Jun 10, 2011 9:27 am

Having just watched this for the first time last night, I agree with the thought that Bergman approaches this material from the perspective of an entertainer who must constantly try to win over a hostile audience. THE MAGICIAN has the aura of a fable (quite similar to THE SEVENTH SEAL I suppose) and is quite direct in framing the story as a religious allegory. However, the aspect that really makes the film work for me is the way Bergman reveals the psychology of the audience; they simultaneously want to believe in the illusion and destroy it at the same time. This particular psychology has always been attached to the art of magic as magicians know that an audience will delight in a trick, then demand to know how it was accomplished, even grow angry or threatening if the illusion is very convincing. Bergman demonstrates how this trait can be found in all belief. The audience in THE MAGICIAN are desperate to divine the truth from illusion; Vogler and co. are weary of entering the debate, but it's the only way for them to earn enough to survive. What Vogler and co. represent to the house of Egerman is the opportunity to act on their desires normally kept in check by decorum and tradition (for example, the constable's wife feels free to say what she truly thinks about her husband under the guise of being hypnotized). Their belief in the potential of Vogler's magic is what allows them to act out, but they aren't reacting to the real Vogler, only to what they perceive him to be. I found it quite sad when Vogler, his make-up removed, approaches Egerman's wife reminding her that the night before she considered him a soul mate as the wife pulls away in fear. As the enigmatic and silent "magician", Vogler is alluring, an instigator who can inspire and persuade; the real Vogler has much less power. Von Sydow performs this role beautifully. You can see the combination of relief and disappointment in his eyes at the film's end; the king has given him a reprieve, but Vogler knows that what is being asked for is not the truth but the illusion.

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Re: 537 The Magician

#65 Post by Black Hat » Fri Feb 28, 2014 9:38 am

Watched The Magician for the first time this week and was very surprised by how rich the film is. Almost every line from every character is a form of misdirection. The words pointing you in one direction but its meaning leading you into another one entirely. Of the seven or eight Bergman films I've seen I think this is the film that is his most personal artistically. This, whether you love him or hate him, is the film you watch if you want to understand where he was coming from.

I've watched it twice this week, having gone through all the supplements and looked a few other things up there's one thing about the film that hasn't registered with me yet.
SpoilerShow
Which would be Antonsson. How/why was he struggling so bad? Was he in on the trick? Also the grandmother alluded to his end and at times she appeared to be who people thought she was (a witch).

An interesting contrast was Vogler calling himself a magician while everyone else called him a fraud, while everybody called her a witch even though she was always introduced as a grandmother.

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Slaphappy
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Re: 537 The Magician

#66 Post by Slaphappy » Wed Apr 08, 2020 8:35 am

Black Hat wrote:
Fri Feb 28, 2014 9:38 am
Watched The Magician for the first time this week and was very surprised by how rich the film is. Almost every line from every character is a form of misdirection. The words pointing you in one direction but its meaning leading you into another one entirely. Of the seven or eight Bergman films I've seen I think this is the film that is his most personal artistically. This, whether you love him or hate him, is the film you watch if you want to understand where he was coming from.

I've watched it twice this week, having gone through all the supplements and looked a few other things up there's one thing about the film that hasn't registered with me yet.
SpoilerShow
Which would be Antonsson. How/why was he struggling so bad? Was he in on the trick? Also the grandmother alluded to his end and at times she appeared to be who people thought she was (a witch).

An interesting contrast was Vogler calling himself a magician while everyone else called him a fraud, while everybody called her a witch even though she was always introduced as a grandmother.
I watched The Magician also twice within a week. I’m pretty convinced, that the Volger bloodline did have some sort of gift. It is the simplest explanation as this is a playful gothic tale and from my point of view to deny this one would a need to go full-Vergerus with rationalisation. Granny Vogler did predict stableman’s death and Albert Vogler did trick Vergerus so, that he did a full autopsy on the stubby corpse of Johan Spegler thinking that it was the tall and lean magician. These are the facts.

The plot is a variation of Christ before Pilate -scenario. The magician’s troupe is called upon an inspection to decide wether they are harmless enough to let go on with their tour. Tubal makes it very clear, that absolutely nothing unexplainable should happen. So Albert Vogler restrains himself
SpoilerShow
and even after Vergerus tries to make advances on his wife and Vogler decides to make his stand, he uses his animal magnetism, or what ever it is he does, so cunningly and faintly, that Vergerus and others can rationalise it away.

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The Magician (Ingmar Bergman, 1958)

#67 Post by Mr Sausage » Mon Sep 19, 2022 2:15 pm

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Re: The Magician (Ingmar Bergman, 1958)

#68 Post by Sloper » Sat Sep 24, 2022 6:48 am

I love the first half hour and the climactic scene in the attic, but whether or not I enjoy this film as a whole seems to depend on what mood I’m in. Sometimes those early scenes cast such a powerful spell that I feel deeply affected by the conflict between Vogler and the bureaucrats, and this creates a low flame of existential suspense throughout the second act. But sometimes I find it a bit flat and irritating: Bergman’s comedy almost never makes me laugh, and his tendency to veer into optimism at the end of a film often feels trite – and smug, in this case, because it’s a self-satisfied coda to the ‘artist vs. critic’ narrative at the heart of the film. Maybe this kind of thing makes me defensive because I’m over-invested in the value of critical analysis; and to be fair, I don’t think the film is completely black-and-white in portraying this conflict.

It is seemingly built around a series of binary questions: is magic real or fake, is there a spiritual realm or just a lot of material surfaces, is there such a thing as truth or is everything a lie? With each question, not only do we not get a clear answer, but it is also not clear which of the two possible answers would be more disturbing.

When Vogler stares into the (apparently) dying Spegel’s eyes, does he see into the mystery of death, or does he just see a blank, impenetrable surface? When he terrorises Vergérus in the attic, do we feel detached from this horror because we know it’s all tricks, or does that make it more frightening because we’re not sure what Vogler is capable of, and what he might do to Vergérus if Manda doesn’t stop him?

Max von Sydow’s performance is crucial to this ambiguity. He plays Vogler as someone who has decided not to speak because he has too much to express, and this mysterious ‘too much’ can only issue in a series of bizarrely intense facial expressions, head movements, and hand gestures. When Vergérus examines Vogler’s face and declares there is no reason for his look of fierce hatred, then examines Vogler’s throat and declares there is no reason for him to be mute, Vogler reacts as though he is being tortured. There is something about Vergérus’s failure (or refusal) to engage seriously with the expressive performance in front of him that fills the performer with real anguish.

When Vogler finally does speak, he voices his hatred for ‘them’, and it’s as if there is something so dark and bitter and angry inside him that it can’t be vocalised. Manda, who had been embracing and caressing him a moment earlier, recoils from this dark energy when her husband speaks, as though she’s afraid of what it might do to her.

Vogler seems to give free rein to that inner darkness in the locked attic, and the film has worked hard to make us unsure of how high the stakes are in this moment. The ominous drum-beat throughout this sequence is repeated from the opening credits, so it feels like a climax, a fulfilment of what the film promised us at the outset. But the nature of that promise isn’t clear: is Vogler on the run from the law because he is truly dangerous, or because he is simply too good at inducing a sense of danger in his audience? Was the eeriness of the carriage ride through the woods, and of the encounter with the dying man, a premonition of more monstrous, more deadly manifestations to come, or just an evocative piece of mood-setting, intended to create a momentary sense of fear that doesn’t amount to very much (there are no demons in the woods, Spegel doesn’t really die, etc.)?

And again, these binary options keep blurring into each other. When Vogler is fully un-masked after the attic sequence, he seems like a vulnerable, stuttering little man; but we also understand why Egerman’s wife is frightened of him, and we sense that Vergérus’s don’t-touch-me gesture is prompted by something more than contempt. Even if he’s telling the truth when he says that Vogler only made him feel a ‘momentary fear of death, nothing more, nothing else’, that isn’t nothing – his fear when confronted with death, or with the inexplicable, is intense and profound.

Vergérus tells Manda that he feels an ‘inexplicable sympathy [oförklarlig sympati]’ for her and Vogler, then seconds later explains that they represent the thing he despises above all, ‘the inexplicable [det oförklarliga]’. This parallel isn’t accidentally introduced by the English subtitles, and it really cuts to the heart of the film’s ambiguity. Somehow, I think Vergérus is telling the truth when he says that he likes Vogler; and somehow this sympathy is rooted in the same thing that makes Vogler his enemy; and this all makes perfect sense despite being totally inexplicable.

Gunnar Fischer’s cinematography emphasises contrasts between light and shadow, and draws attention to the artificiality of these effects without depriving them of their evocative power. In some of the Nykvist-shot black-and-white films, especially Winter Light and Persona, it feels like we can see everything with clarity and lucidity, all laid out in shades of grey, but the effect is also to blur distinctions between things – as if when you really look at the surfaces of the world, they all start to seem like one overwhelming surface, one shifting, incomprehensible plane of matter and energy.

But in a film like The Magician, it’s more like we’re seeing a series of careful compositions made out of constructed light and shadow, designed to induce certain effects. When Sanna is listening to Granny’s lullaby, we see her framed in one shaft of light, then descending into another as she falls asleep. It’s glaringly artificial, and a lullaby is glaringly manipulative, and yet it’s a hypnotically effective, dream-like sequence. There are lots of moments like this, when the film shows in microcosm how a performance affects an audience, how a work of art produces effects, how a film manipulates us through lighting and editing (e.g. the scene where Spegel bursts in with the axe, which is breathtakingly scary even though nothing really happens), and how real the effect is even when the performance is in some sense ‘a lie’.

We see faces lit up or hidden in shadow, closed-off or openly expressing emotions, made-up, projected, reflected, or nakedly exposed. These images of faces are often edited together to suggest relations that are more complex than the surface dialogue and interactions between characters. What does Vergérus’s troubled look mean when he first sees Vogler? When Vogler widens his eyes at Vergérus and the latter responds, ‘I want to remove your eyes’, has Vogler prompted that desire or is the desire a rejection of Vogler’s attempted hypnotism? Does Egerman’s wife really see something in Vogler, or is she just projecting something from within herself (when they’re alone together her face is bathed in artificial light, looking away from him as he sits in the shadows, while her husband stands both illuminated and hidden by the magic-lantern projection), and is that why she’s so frightened by his un-adorned face at the end?

Even though I’m not fond of the more humorous scenes, I do love Bibi Andersson’s performance for the way it suggests – just subtly enough, and just obviously enough – that she is aware of being lied to, and that she is having fun playing along with the lies. When she’s in the laundry bin with Simson and the lightning flash hits, she delays her frightened reaction for a split-second to let us know it’s a performance, but not so long that it feels like she’s winking and mugging at us; and the same goes for the terrified face she pulls when the next lightning flash comes and she drags Simson down into the sheets. It’s acting that looks like acting but still ‘works’, and there’s something very impressive about that. No wonder that Sara ends up joining Vogler’s troupe.

I also just wanted to note a clever mirror-shot: when Vogler is playing dead and being replaced with Spegel (whose name means ‘mirror’), we see the scene reflected in a triptych mirror, with Vogler’s veiled ‘corpse’ doubled in the left-hand and central mirrors, and a dressing-screen with a mask hanging from it in the right-hand mirror. Bengt Ekerot (as Spegel) is made-up with facial hair that looks sparse and mangy, presumably as an effect of his obscure illness, but that looks even more like fake hair on an actor’s face, perhaps left behind after tearing off a prop-beard. That’s a nice touch that helps to explain why Spegel can be mistaken for an un-masked Vogler.

It’s so boring that this film is known as The Magician in English, a bit like re-titling The Seventh Seal as The Knight. The Face is a much more suggestive title, and ‘magician’ feels reductive. Google translate tells me that ‘trollkarl’ is the usual Swedish term for ‘magician’ (as in a ‘wizard’), but when Vergérus contrasts ‘the idealistic Doctor Vogler’ with ‘the magician engaging in hocus-pocus’, the word he uses for ‘magician’ sounds like ‘trollerikonstnär’ – I can’t find the exact Swedish phrasing online but I guess he’s saying that Vogler engages in the ‘magic arts’ or ‘dark arts’. Anyway, I don't actually know Swedish and perhaps I’m barking up the wrong tree, but I wonder if the original text allows for associations between magic and artistry that get lost in translation.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: The Magician (Ingmar Bergman, 1958)

#69 Post by Roger Ryan » Mon Sep 26, 2022 10:31 am

Another great analysis from "Sloper" which I certainly can't compete with.

I will say that I believe Bergman's film is about an audience's willingness to give in to the "suspension of disbelief". As generally accepted by Bergman scholars,The Magician was inspired by the harsh critical response to some of the director's stage productions from a few years earlier, but more than just an attack on dismissive critics, I think the film explores how drama/fantasy/entertainment can be both freeing and a trap.

Bergman choosing to use a magician and his medicine show cohorts as the focus of the story as opposed to a drama troupe in an incisive one: magicians can evoke a more disagreeable response from audience members than an actor would. This is due to some audience members' discomfort at being "tricked"; they don't want to be outsmarted and would rather discover how an illusion is accomplished than give in to the wonderment (or "inexplicable" nature) of the illusion. In the film, Vergérus is already predisposed to not suspending his disbelief given he has a wager riding on the outcome. This suspension of disbelief is held as a valuable, almost sacred treasure by the performers and I see the early scene in the woods as showing the troupe sharing a willingness to believe in the fantastic ("demons in the woods") instead of acknowledging the chicanery of it all. To not suspend their own disbelief would be to weaken the value of what they have to offer.

Apart from Vergérus, Egerman, and Starbeck, most of those at the manor are more than willing to suspend their disbelief. Neither Sofia nor Sara are taken in at all by the ruse, but they both recognize how freeing the play acting can be, allowing them to indulge in behavior that might have been held more in check in different circumstances. Later we see Starbeck's wife allow herself to openly criticize her husband using the pretense that she has been hypnotized and has no recollection of what she has expressed. The wife knows it's play acting, but uses the ruse as an excuse to say what she has probably longed to say out loud. Ultimately, Sara has found the magic of this kind of pretense to be so enticing that she begs to join the troupe.

The most tragic figure in The Magician has to be the stableman. He sees the performance as a genuine threat and his suspension of disbelief proves destructive. Believing he has actually killed Vogler, and being susceptible to Granny's earlier suggestion of a figure hanging in the pantry, the stableman kills himself in that location to fulfill the prophesy. The fact that Granny accepts this action with such nonchalance evokes a laugh, but it underlines the idea that, true or false, the play is the thing.

Vogler appears to be the most conflicted about the pretense he upholds. When I mentioned earlier about how the film shows that the belief in the power of a performance can be both freeing and a trap, Vogler represents the potential trap. His power lies in being impenetrable, allowing others to project onto him their own desires or fears. It is not safe for him to drop the charade and this conflict over who the magician is and who the man is manifests itself in the awkward facial contortions and hand movements. This is still a performance, but one not done with ease; it seems half-hearted, desperate, and it's, frankly, not particularly convincing. Only when the mask drops (when he's with Manda and, later, when he's begging for money) do we see the "naked" Vogler. The illusion is destroyed and Otillia reacts with revulsion as her own fantasy was dependent on Vogler maintaining his mask.

Perhaps to emphasize his idea of the power of a shared willingness to suspend disbelief, Bergman rejects realism entirely in this film. The heightened theatrical performances never let us forget we're watching something contrived. Is this done as a challenge to the film's audience? A demand that we work to suspend our own disbelief for this story about doing the same? As "Sloper" mentioned, while this film has many comic moments, the comedy isn't particularly convincing and I don't think that is really Bergman's aim. He's showing us how theater and film can manipulate an audience and he uses many of the accepted tropes to draw attention to that. I think it's very telling that he ends The Magician with a surprise turn of fortune accompanied by an enthusiastic march on the soundtrack only to drop out all sound, as the carriages disappear from view, apart from the sound of the lantern swinging back and forth. That is the essence of realism missing from the rest of the film; it's the unadorned swinging lantern, marking time like the numerous clocks that have appeared earlier. It's a reminder that life can be deathly dull without the exuberance of the inexplicable. He holds on this swinging lantern for several seconds and then brings the march back for one quick final flourish to end the film.

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Sloper
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Re: The Magician (Ingmar Bergman, 1958)

#70 Post by Sloper » Sat Oct 01, 2022 7:40 am

Roger Ryan wrote:Bergman choosing to use a magician and his medicine show cohorts as the focus of the story as opposed to a drama troupe in an incisive one: magicians can evoke a more disagreeable response from audience members than an actor would. This is due to some audience members' discomfort at being "tricked"; they don't want to be outsmarted and would rather discover how an illusion is accomplished than give in to the wonderment (or "inexplicable" nature) of the illusion.
Great point, RR. It makes me want to re-watch Sawdust and Tinsel, which feels like a companion-piece to this film, and in which the circus-folk are contrasted with the respectable acting company. In that case, I think Bergman is looking at another aspect of the artist’s identity, the part that involves constant humiliation. It’s not only that the artist has to be a clown, they also have to live in squalor, and travel all the time, and thereby abandon any claim to membership of a community or stable family, or to the respect of their peers or audiences. There, too, the spectators want conflicting things: they want to look down on these pitiful clowns, but they also want to see their own foolishness mirrored back at them, and this makes the circus-folk both vulnerable and dangerous.

What you say about magic underlines how powerfully The Magician twists this idea, because although Vogler’s troupe are kind of pitiful in many of the same ways as the circus-folk, their act depends on their not humiliating themselves, and not being humiliated. They practise a type of magic that has to be played straight, because as you say the audience’s suspension of disbelief is key to the success of the act.
Roger Ryan wrote:This suspension of disbelief is held as a valuable, almost sacred treasure by the performers and I see the early scene in the woods as showing the troupe sharing a willingness to believe in the fantastic ("demons in the woods") instead of acknowledging the chicanery of it all. To not suspend their own disbelief would be to weaken the value of what they have to offer.
And of course they really do discover something in the woods: when Vogler goes out to investigate the noises, he finds Spegel, a mirror of (and window into) Vogler’s own mortality, and later Vergérus’s as well. So it’s not just that they know magic isn’t real but pretend that it is – they are aware of something ‘real’ beyond the trickery. It’s a bit like how Sara knows the love potion isn’t real, but she and Simson really do end up having sex. When Starbeck ruins the levitation trick, he is refusing to ‘give in to the wonderment’, and he is missing the point: of course Manda isn’t really levitating, but the fact that this illusion can be created, and the feelings this can elicit from an audience, are significant. As you say, that’s partly about being liberated from the usual repressions and restrictions of life, but it’s also about accessing fears and impulses we’re uncomfortable with and would rather not publicise.
Roger Ryan wrote:[Vogler’s] power lies in being impenetrable, allowing others to project onto him their own desires or fears. It is not safe for him to drop the charade and this conflict over who the magician is and who the man is manifests itself in the awkward facial contortions and hand movements. This is still a performance, but one not done with ease; it seems half-hearted, desperate, and it's, frankly, not particularly convincing. Only when the mask drops (when he's with Manda and, later, when he's begging for money) do we see the "naked" Vogler. The illusion is destroyed and Otillia reacts with revulsion as her own fantasy was dependent on Vogler maintaining his mask.
That’s interesting – I hadn’t seen him in quite those terms, as an unconvincing performer, but I think your reading makes sense. The film (like many other Bergman films) spends a lot of time playing with the question of whether there is such a thing as a real person as opposed to a mask, or such a thing as truth as opposed to falsehood. I think it’s sort of an open question whether the begging Vogler at the end is any more ‘naked’ or real than the masked Vogler. There’s something disturbing about his sly half-smile to Vergérus when he’s called away to perform for the king, and it makes me wonder whether he’s putting the mask back on, or whether this is a glimpse of his real (and genuinely dangerous) self. The heavily made-up magician with his strange, exaggerated gestures might be the most ‘real’ version of this person, even if (or precisely because) it seems like an unconvincing performance.

I like your comment about the swinging lantern as well. It’s a moment of emptiness and bleakness that shows another aspect of ‘truth’; maybe it’s when the stage seems most vacant, when a performer is at their emptiest and least invested in their own act, and when the audience is least convinced by it, that the experience comes closest to capturing some kind of existential truth.

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