FACTBOX: Films of Ingmar Bergman
(Reuters) - Swedish director Ingmar Bergman died on Monday. Bergman, who had just turned 89, was famous for films which gave Sweden a reputation for melancholy.
Bergman made his debut in film in 1944 as a screenwriter to the Alf Sjberg film "Frenzy". Bergman's first film, the 1946 "Crisis", was panned by the critics and was a box office fiasco.
His first international success was "Smiles of the Summer Night" made in 1955.
Here is a short listing of some of his major films:
* "The Seventh Seal" (1956) - won prizes at the Cannes Film Festival. It explored the individual's relationship with God and the idea of Death. In the story, set in the 14th century, a knight challenges Death to a game of chess.
* "Wild Strawberries" (1957) - was considered a landmark film in Bergman's career. It dealt with the subject of man's isolation, and like in several films, Bergman used a journey as a plot structure.
* "The Virgin Spring" (1960) and "Through a Glass Darkly" (1961) both of which won Bergman Oscars.
* "Persona" (1966) - about an actress who has cut herself off from the world.
* "Cries and Whispers" (1973) - about a dying woman tended by her two sisters and a servant.
* "Scenes from a Marriage" (1973) - was originally made as six TV episodes, but Bergman later edited it into a full-length film.
* "Autumn Sonata" (1978) - Bergman has said he saw the mother-daughter drama as the beginning of the end of his film career. It was the only film he made with the late Ingrid Bergman, a fellow Swede but no relation.
* As a film director his greatest international success was the autobiographical "Fanny and Alexander" (1982), which received the Oscar for best foreign film. The film takes place in 1910 and tells the story of a well-off family coming together for Christmas.
* "Saraband", (2003) - was a television film starring Liv Ullmann and Erland Josephson. Bergman said it would be his last picture.
** NOTE: Dates are from www.ingmarbergman.se
Sources: Reuters/here
