Bruno Peltier
During the first press conference he has given in his own country for six years, the Swedish film and theatre director Ingmar Bergman seemed relaxed.
He had quit his island retreat in the Baltic to announce that he is working on a screenplay. It is clearly a project close to his heart.
Bergman, who will be 80 in July, has not embarked on the project alone. He has called on the help of two women. They walked arm in arm with him into the sunny courtyard of the Swedish state television channel, which will produce the film.
He was flanked on his right by the Norwegian Liv Ullmann, one of his favourite actresses, to whom he was married in the Sixties. She will direct the two-hour film.
On his left was the star of the movie, Lena Endre. Although little known outside Sweden, she has appeared in several Bergman films.
A balding and rather pale Bergman started the ball rolling: Dear friends, for a long period in my career I toyed with the idea of making a film consisting of a single close- up, that of an actor or actress speaking straight to the audience for two hours.
The film never happened. Then, two years ago, Bergman began to dwell on what he described as his fantastic co-operation with Endre on a play by Botho Strauss.
I said to myself that if Lena told the story, while at the same time acting in several scenes, the result could be fascinating. Im fascinated by the way her face lives. If Lena hadnt been interested in the project, I wouldnt have gone ahead with it.
What story Bergman wants to tell through the intermediary of his muse remains a mystery. All he would say was that Marianne (Endres character) would describe, in close-up, an emotional drama.
Its almost a thriller, Ullmann said about the film, whose working title is Trolsa (Faithless). It is about loneliness and a disturbing silence between people who dont understand each other. These are typical Bergman themes.