This title is I think better than the bland title Bergman gave it, loosely translated as ' Dreams of Women ' and the even blander title of ' Dreams. ' It is a personal favourite out of all of Bergman's films for me, and although it deals with less grandiose and for me sometimes more pretentious subject matter, this is rooted in a special ' reality ' that only Bergman could achieve. Basically it is two stories; a fashion designer played by Eva Dahlbeck is the core of the first, and Harriet Andersson who is a fashion model working for Dahlbeck the second. Driven by a desire to see a worthless ex-lover Dahlbeck plans a trip to the place where he lives, taking Andersson with her. Their acting is superb, and so is mostly the rest of the cast except for an horrifically stereotyped gay man working in the fashion house. Once arrived both women take different paths, both finding men who are heading to their own Autumn in life, and inflicting suffering as well as to endure their own. Dahlbeck too has to face up to her Autumn years, while Andersson in her Spring of life endures her own personal pains. Unlike the men the women are stronger and face the future with more dignity. No more spoilers except to say that Bergman shows us exceptional scenes; a fairground that is a place of nightmare and collapse, and one where a woman believes she has brought into the world a child with a wolf's head, and is assigned to an asylum. I must also mention a scene on a train where Dahlbeck is temped by suicide. Summing up it is a film of great perception and one that should be more well known than it is.
Review of Dreams
