CINEMA: Stanley Peskin
THE OX, which has as its background the severe drought=20 suffered by Sweden in the 1860s, is described as a true=20 story told by director Sven Nykvist. The narrative is=20 presented with the utmost clarity, but not without=20 subtlety. Although the director is self-effacing in the=20 presentation of his ostensibly simple homiletic, we are=20 always aware of a steady, controlled presence.
In the opening sequence, a lengthy travelling shot=20 which accentuates frames within frames establishes not=20 only the oppressed condition of Helge Roos (Stellan=20 Skarsgard), his wife Elfrida (Ewa Froling) and child=20 Anna, but shows the ox of the title through a frosted=20 window pane.=20
It was William Blake who said that “One law for the=20 lion and ox is oppression”. Nykvist’s film is not=20 Blakean, but at the very outset it identifies Roos and=20 ox together as oppressed. Roos kills the animal which=20 does not belong to him so that he might feed his=20 family. The crying of the newborn child, heard most=20 often on the soundtrack, is unbearable and emphasises=20 the threat of starvation.
The film could not be more aptly titled: the ox is the=20 dynamic of everything that happens in the film. The=20 series of tracking shots which include the ox’s blood=20 are horrifying and yet Helge’s violation of the seventh=20 commandment (“Thou shalt not steal”) is completely=20 understandable in his impoverished circumstances.=20
Roos wants, despite his wife’s horror, to believe that=20 “What’s done is done”, but unlike Macbeth before him,=20 he cannot rid himself of either terrifying nightmares=20 or overwhelming feelings of guilt. Both actors register=20 the pain that almost destroys them, as well as the=20 thwarting of sexual desire which the husband’s action=20 has entailed.
The rural and pious community is a closely knit one,=20 and the members of the parish overseen by the pastor=20 (Max van Sydow) are fast dwindling. If the pastor is=20 puzzled by the nature of the world in which he lives,=20 and if Elfrida is convinced that they “have sinned=20 before God”, Nykvist, unlike Bergman before him, does=20 not commit himself to the belief that we live in a=20 silent world, nor does he aver a belief in God’s=20 presence. The strength of his film lies in his refusal=20 to make judgments about erring humanity and in his=20 recognition of the need to forgive oneself as well as=20
Nykvist’s use of colour is limited to a severe palette=20 of plues, browns, and greys which reinforce the feeling=20 of spatial entrapment and frustration both in Roos’=20 house and later in the prison sequence. In the closing=20 sections, there are some lyrical shots of spring and=20 summer settings as the film moves towards an harmonious=20 close. Throughout the film, eloquent use is made of=20 Grieg’s more elegiac music, particularly Solveig’s=20 lament from Peer Gynt.