Saraband

As a result, Saraband is a great masterpiece, and a true and fitting culmination to a major career.....The film's living characters are riddled with insecurities, pain and regret....Shooting on digital video, the great director uses many of his customary techniques:....He finds people in their most intimate moments, brings them face-to-face with their fear and watches the result..... ... Full Review

Saraband," which unfolds in 10 short chapters, opens with a prologue in which Marianne, sitting at a desk strewn with old photographs, addresses the camera and introduces the story of her impulsive visit to Johan, whom she hasn't seen in 30 years. Ingmar Bergman has said that "Saraband," his bleak made-for-television epilogue to "Scenes From a Marriage," will be his final statement on film. ... Full Review

If we take him at his word, "Saraband" is a stunning and complex final bow from a stunning and complex artist. 'Saraband' explores failed love, need to connect ... Full Review

In a parched summer of reality TV, it seems hard to imagine television that could match finely worked dialogue and powerhouse performances with the voyeuristic impulse to watch the ups and downs of someone else's marriage. Overwhelming the film is a powerful sense of loss. ... Full Review

When the University of Baltimore opened its Student Center a few years ago, the Performing Arts Theater on an upper floor proved to be a little gem of a venue. ... Full Article

Mark Morris has enjoyed a 15-year collaboration with San Francisco Ballet, and by and large, audiences have enjoyed the results. From "Maelstrom," his first work set on the company, in 1994, to last season's "Joyride," we have benefited from nearly... ... Full Article

To negotiate the Melbourne International Film Festival - 19 days, five main venues, more than 400 films - is a challenge, and to see it all a sheer impossibility. ... Full Article

In 1973, director Ingmar Bergman made Scenes from a Marriage , a series for Swedish television that plumbed the relationship of Marianne, a lawyer, and Johan, a professor, following their ups and downs in love, adulteries and, ultimately, divorce. ... Full Article

Bergman belongs to a class of filmmakers who are hailed as brilliant even by people who have never actually seen their movies. Fellini is in that class, too, and so are the French New Wave directors like Truffaut and Godard,... ... Full Article

In Saraband, Marianne and Johan (the couple in Scenes from a Marriage) meet again after thirty years without contact, when Marianne suddenly feels a need to see her ex-husband again. ... Full Article