Why Ingmar Bergman said Federico Fellini was “everything I’m not”
The beginning of Persona by Ingmar Bergman depicts a bizarre and unsettling set of images – a crucifixion, a child’s hands, a spider, clips from old silent films, and a young boy waking up on a table in a morgue. The director forces us to linger in this abstract and graphic atmosphere where no explanation is provided – we’re simply left to piece the puzzle together ourselves.
Persona is one of Bergman’s best-known works, reflecting his affection for the experimental. He brings attention to the artificiality of cinema through the inclusion of celluloid strips, which at one point appear to burst into flames. As the two women’s identities begin to merge, the film becomes more and more complex, relying on repeated scenes and stylised camera shots, such as their faces aligning with one another, to bridge the gap between form and content.
With The Seventh Seal, another classic Bergman movie, he revelled in fantasy to explore death, blending philosophical questions with imagery detached from our everyday. Yet, he also made movies which were much more indebted to realism, like Autumn Sonata, a melodrama that largely unravels through intense conversations. There is hardly anything avant-garde about it, but it’s equally as brilliant as his more experimental works, proving Bergman to be a multi-faceted filmmaker.
Still, that didn’t stop Bergman from admiring other filmmakers, whom he sometimes wished he was more like. Talking to Playboy, he once expressed his love for Federico Fellini, the Italian master with roots in Italian Neorealism, before blending in more fantastical and dream-like elements as his career progressed. Bergman explained, “Fellini is wonderful. He is everything I’m not. I should like to be him.”
Describing the filmmaker as “so baroque,” he added, “His work is so generous, so warm, so easy, so unneurotic.” Fellini often dealt with characters facing deep troubles, yet he balanced this sense of devastation and uncertainty with gorgeously fantastical imagery. When we think of Fellini, we think of the circus, unique characters, seduction and dreams. He blended comedy into his work, creating a cast of memorable characters who brought extra lucidity to his films.
Bergman continued, “I liked La Dolce Vita very much, particularly the scene with the father. That was good. And the end, with the giant fish.” The film, released in 1960, starred Anika Ekberg, Marcello Mastroianni and Anouk Aimée and follows one man’s search for happiness and romance, mixing comedy and drama to create a gorgeous masterpiece.
Fellini was much better equipped when it came to utilising comedy within his films compared to Bergman, which, as a result, allowed his work to emanate a certain warmth. Bergman certainly has some comedic moments lurking in his filmography, but he once admitted to the Guardian, “I don’t watch my own films very often. I become so jittery and ready to cry … and miserable. I think it’s awful.”
It seems as though Bergman just understood Fellini’s method of creating films, even though they were wildly different filmmakers. Discussing the brilliance of the 8 ½ director, Bergman once said: “He is enormously intuitive. He is intuitive; he is creative; he is an enormous force. He is burning inside with such heat. Collapsing. Do you understand what I mean? The heat from his creative mind, it melts him. He suffers from it; he suffers physically from it.”