1961 Flashback: Best International Film

by Cláudio Alves

Did you know that Juan Carlos Ojano hosts one of the best film podcasts around? The One-Inch Barrier started last year, examining the Best International Film race, going backward in time. As its penultima season is drawing to an end, I was honored enough to return for my third stint as a guest.

The subject, this time, was Ingmar Bergman's Through a Glass Darkly, which won the Oscar in 1961, beating Denmark's Harry and the Butler, Japan's Immortal Love, Mexico's The Important Man, and Spain's Plácido. Though the Swedish flick about God's silence and Harriet Andersson's general awesomeness isn't an especially joyous piece, this was a fun, thoroughly entertaining conversation. Topics ranged from faith to class warfare, from ironic movie titles to Toshiro Mifune's hotness. There was even time to throw shade at some 2021 Oscar contenders, though I refuse to name the mediocrity in question. Take a listen:

What do you think of this Oscar lineup? Are you similarly drawn to the bleak conclusions of Through a Glass Darkly, or do you have another favorite from '61?

1957: Harriet Andersson in "Smiles of a Summer Night"

Before the next Smackdown, Nick Taylor will be visiting some "alternates" to the Supporting Actress Ballot.

Existence, am I right? Being alive? Inhabiting a physical form and experiencing things until we inevitably pass from this mortal coil? Few filmmakers have captured the ache of true, unbearable unhappiness with oneself, with love, with God, with time, with humanity itself like Ingmar Bergman did.

Yes, he did more than just contemplative, psychologically precise, wholly accessible dramas, like the fantastical, expansive, occasionally harrowing depiction of childhood in Fanny and Alexander. Still, who would expect the auteur behind Through a Glass Darkly and Cries and Whispers (truly one of the most upsetting films to watch under self-isolated quarantine) to make a bedroom farce as light and entertaining as Smiles of a Summer Night? The sheer fact of Smiles is almost as surprising as the narrative, which artfully succeeds at being funny and sexy while wrapping itself around ideas of human behavior that fit neatly into Bergman’s filmography...

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