“I think I’m invisible sometimes.” — Ingrid Thulin

It’s her birthday today.

I’m really proud of the video-essay I wrote on her for Criterion: The Eerie Intensity of Ingrid Thulin

One of Ingmar Bergman’s repertory company of actors. As heavy-hitting as Liv Ullmann, Bibi Andersson, Harriet Andersson. She wasn’t fully fluent in English and therefore she didn’t move into international stardom the way Liv Ullmann was able to do. But let’s not get it twisted. She worked with the great European directors: Bergman, Luchino Visconti, Alain Resnais … Of course her legacy is her work with Bergman. Her work in Bergman’s films is as good as it gets. She trained as a ballerina before switching to acting. She appeared in a number of films and television series in the 1950s, before catching Bergman’s eye. He cast her as the daughter-in-law in Wild Strawberries, where she makes an enormous impression, her chilly blonde beauty hiding a dark ambiguous soul.

After Wild Strawberries, she appeared in two more Bergman films, Brink of Life and The Magician, in two wildly different roles, giving just a glimpse of her dazzling diversity. Unlike other movie stars, she did not have a personality like a “fingerprint” of personality. Whatever Thulin’s personality, it was completely irrelevant to her in her work. She was truly uncanny. Like, who WAS she? It’s literally impossible to know.

In the early 60s, she appeared in Ingmar Bergman films, back to back, Winter Light and The Silence. They are two of his most ruthlessly uningratiating films. In Winter Light, Thuline play a mousy tormented woman, in love with a pastor. In The Silence, she plays an alcoholic dying woman holed up in a hotel room in an unnamed city. These two roles, played so close together, have to be one of the most astonishing displays of acting virtuosity in any career. The films are so difficult to take, they are so unremittingly bleak, their reach will always be smaller than something more accessible, like Wild Strawberries, or even Persona. Thulin is a Priestess of Bleak. Her anguish is so total in Winter Light she’s difficult to look at at times. In The Silence, she drinks, smokes, masturbates, gasps for oxygen to come into her diseased lungs, goes raging against the dying of the light, fears death, courts death … it’s a mind-blowing performance.

She went to places in her work other actors don’t go. Not because they are afraid (although this may be true), but because they literally can’t conceive the depths it is even possible to go. Thulin is frightening that way. She saw farther and traveled farther.

Her hands are maybe the most expressive hands of any actor. They’re agonized, restless. Claw-like, desperate. They look like they’d keep clutching and wringing and twisting themselves up, even after death. She was an actress of supreme control/intelligence – and yet her work does not feel studied, or pre-planned. Her hands have a life/mind of their own.

She appeared in more films directed by Bergman: The Hour of the Wolf, the television movie The Rite, and the great Cries and Whispers, where she is truly terrifying. There’s one damn near unwatchable scene. If you’ve seen the film, you’ll know the scene I mean. Instantly. It’s hard to picture another actress who would even consent to play such a scene, and/or do it the way she did it.

It’s hard to find interviews with her. You have to dig deep. I came across this clip of an interview she gave in 1969, where she spoke about working with Vischonti, Bergman, Alain Resnais – their different styles and approaches. She’s riveting. If you don’t speak French, just turn on closed captioning.

Again, here’s my video-essay on Ingrid Thulin.

 
 
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5 Responses to “I think I’m invisible sometimes.” — Ingrid Thulin

  1. Melissa Sutherland says:

    Sheila, just watched your film on Ingrid Thulin. Wonderful work. The writing captured her so well, and the narration co-existed with the pictures, adding and not taking away, which so often can be the case. A terrific piece of work.

  2. Chris Durnell says:

    Really enjoyed the essay, and despite my pretensions at being a cinephile I have not seen most Bergman movies and this actress was unknown to me. At some point I will have to rectify that, but I am so behind on my movies it’ll be sometime before I binge on his work. I didn’t know you were doing videos for Criterion. Your voice sounds less accented than it was on the McQueen discussion on Stitcher! Looking forward to seeing more.

    • sheila says:

      Chris – hi! I didn’t realize I had an accent – I probably do – a mix of New York and Rhode Island. Tough-girl accents, lol

      Yes, the first thing I did for Criterion, back in 2014 I think – was a video-essay on the work of Gena Rowlands. Only an excerpt is online – it was included in the special features on the DVD release of Cassavetes’ Love Streams. I love doing them – have only done a couple – that one, and then the ones about Bergman’s actresses.

      Ingrid Thulin is a towering scary talent – her films with him (besides Wild Strawberries) are so relentless and brutal – they just don’t have the same “play” as other ones, although Bergman fans of course are familiar with them. First Reformed is basically an unofficial remake of Winter Light. They are tough tough watches but her talent is so worth it.

      I did a big post on Bergman for his birthday and did a little guide-book to his films – suggestions for where to start (not that you asked for it – but just in case you’re interested). I find it a very intimidating body of work!

      Thanks for watching and commenting!

  3. Maddy says:

    I love how you call her the “A Priestess of Bleak.” Ingrid has long been one of my favourites. She made it all look effortless, yet ventured into such deep emotional realms that few other actors have ever reached.

    It’s always a delight to watch her work. Her letter monologue in Winter Light is riveting.

    • sheila says:

      // entured into such deep emotional realms that few other actors have ever reached. //

      she really did. Winter Light … I’ve only seen it maybe 2 times in my entire life because I can’t put myself through it again. But it’s burned into my brain. Her hands, her anguish.

      She really was interested in all the right things – depth of character and fearlessness in digging deep – Actresses as beautiful as she was aren’t often asked to play such roles. Hitchcock would have had a field day with her.

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