Eden Undone

If you combined the stories of “Little Red Riding Hood” and Last House on the Left (1972), then transposed the byproduct to medieval Sweden, you’d have Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring (1960). Indeed, the Wes Craven film was consciously modeled on Bergman’s effort, lightly nudging the tale away from idealization by associating the action with the emerging and dangerous freedom of the late 60s and early 70s. Bergman takes the opposite tack, bending toward melodrama. He sets his movie in an idyllic past, makes the family loving beyond expectation even now (let alone in the Middle Ages!). His female lead, Karin (Birgitta Pettersson), is a mere child, joyous, naïve, and (in some inoffensive ways) entitled. She’s the picture of innocence, sent to deliver candles to a church; she is no liberated teen. By idealizing the components of its narrative, The Virgin Spring fully exploits the emotional potential latent in the story, condensing its themes into a single shot of Karin’s father, Töre (Max von Sydow).

That shot has stuck with me for years, branded onto my brain, a reminder of the moving image’s power. But before we can get there, you may have noticed I’ve remained murky in my description of the plot (hence the opening, uh, recipe). While the movie is old, I fear spoiling its key beats for anyone who hasn’t seen it. The major themes and the significance of the shot can be explained without all that added context. Perhaps, if you do watch it, dear reader, your encounter with the story itself will take a moment already of tremendous significance and emotional power and supercharge it, brand (forgive me), in this way, your brains too.

The Virgin Spring, like much of Bergman’s oeuvre, deals with guilt. Most, though not all, of the players regret an action and consider the consequences of things they have done, be it in passion or with cold calculation. In this world, good and evil, justice and injustice, morality and immorality are simultaneously stark and blurred. We meet Karin’s family and admire her doting parents, sensing that anything is amiss only from their dark-haired, pregnant servant, Ingeri (Gunnel Lindblom). Karin and the serving girl head off to bring candles to a church and find little but depravity and violence along the way. Ingeri’s nervousness and devotion to Odin keep the otherwise bucolic environment misted with fear. Reminders appear—a one-eyed man, three herdsmen—until a certain scene rips away any sense of security, a scene that feels overlong because of how painful it is to watch. The viewer, on this journey with the girls, is exhausted. We watch as guilt poisons the most innocent, while the violent and malicious go on with life unimpeded. Night falls.

And so, we come to the shot. Töre has learned the identities of his last-minute houseguests and reacts accordingly—up to a point. Filled with righteous rage, he goes too far. It’s the middle of the night. His face is dirty from the scuffle, marking his wearied body, strained unendingly for the last day. In a medium shot, we look from a little below his chin level. His face, just off center, stares in disbelief and regret at his sullied hands. To Töre’s right, visible over his shoulder, stands Märeta (Birgitta Valberg), his wife, who looks on in shock and horror. She looms behind him, bearing witness to his righteous unrighteousness. All the guilt hinted at and made manifest throughout the film is concentrated in this moment. This is the shot.

The frame implicates the viewer too. We watch his vengeance with glee, even though it’s scored with thumps, grunts, and screams. The scene earlier with Karin, the one that felt interminable, has primed us for catharsis—we also want revenge. Yet here we are, watching Märeta watch Töre. We see the disbelief on her face: does she feel guilty for telling her husband the guests’ identities? Have we, like this sad father, let the darkness of this world carry us from righteousness to regret? We were there and cheered it, after all.

That’s hardly a full review of The Virgin Spring, mysterious as I have been about plot details. Perhaps I’ve decided to be too opaque. Perhaps these “surprises” aren’t worth it. Then again, I delight in reducing the film to that one shot, the moment at which, for me, the work goes from good to great. It testifies to the power of cinema, the concision of its language, and the depth of its emotional resonance. Details can help. At bottom, however, the image perdures, speaking through and beyond any one context.