Wild Strawberries

Ingmar Bergman wrote the screenplay in spring 1957 at the Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm, through two months there with stomach trouble and exhaustion. The hospital is Isak Borg’s workplace in the film. Bergman told Sjöström’s casting two ways in two books: in one the idea came to him once the script was done, in the other producer Carl Anders Dymling proposed it and he hesitated. Bibi Andersson, who plays Sara, takes two parts at once, the cousin in memory and the hitchhiker on the road. Victor Sjöström in the lead had directed in the silent era; The Phantom Carriage, 1921, is his, and Hollywood knew him as Victor Seastrom. It won the Golden Bear at the 8th Berlin International Film Festival and shared the FIPRESCI prize with Ice Cold in Alex. At the Golden Globes it was one of five foreign films honoured that year. The 12th BAFTAs nominated it for best film from any source and Sjöström for foreign actor, losing both. The 32nd Academy Awards nominated its writing, and Bergman wrote back returning the nomination certificate. A good fit if you want the move into the past built from one actress carrying two parts rather than a flashback device. Not for a viewer who wants the journey to arrive somewhere; the weight is Borg reckoning with himself.