Television, 1997

In the Presence of a Clown

Uncle Carl encounters death in the guise of a female clown.

'[A]mong the soon 80-year-old director's most powerful works.'

Nils Schwartz in Expressen

About the film

At the centre of In the Presence of a Clown we find a recurring Bergman character: uncle Carl Åkerblom, engineer and Schubert fan. Börje Ahlstedt returns to the role for the fourth time following Fanny and Alexander, The Best Intentions and Sunday's Children.

The year is 1925 and the 54-year-old inventor Carl Åkerblom, has been locked-up at the psychiatric ward of Akademiska Hospital in Uppsala for the attempted murder of his fiancée, Pauline Thibault (Marie Richardson). Carl is intrigued by the idea of replacing silent movies with talking pictures. Together with another patient, Professor Osvald Vogler (Erland Josephson), he gets together a performance to show the magic of this idea. A group of people attend the performance, including Carl's stepmother. During the performance emotional confrontations come to the surface among the people there.

Though orginally made for television, In the Presence of a Clown was screened in the 'Un certain regard' at the Cannes film festival.

Sources

The Ingmar Bergman Archives.

Distribution titles

Dabei: Ein Clown (Germany)
En présence d'un clown (France)
I klovnens nærvær (Norway)
In the Presence of a Clown (England)
Vanità e affanni (Italy)

Production details

Production country: Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Italy, Finland, Germany
Production company: Sveriges Television AB, Danmarks Radio, Norsk Rikskringkasting, Radiotelevisione Italiana, Yleisradio Ab TV1, Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen

Original work: Larmar och gör sig till (Play)

TV-screening: 1997-11-01, SVT1, Sverige, 120 minuter