IN MEMORIAM:
INGMAR BERGMAN, 1918-2007
And then there were none… The New York Times said that this trio of great film directors, “dominated the world of serious film making in the second half of the 20th century.” The first, Federico Fellini, passed in 1993. The second, Akira Kurosawa, died in 1998. Now, the great Ingmar Bergman has gone, too, of undisclosed causes at the age of 89. Bergman, a nine-time Oscar bridesmaid (with one Thalberg Award in 1971), is best known to fans of serious filmmaking as the creator of such evergreens as The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries (see photo) and the epic drama Fanny and Alexander. He held actors in very high regard, having worked on the stage until as recently as 2002. Woody Allen summed up Bergman’s greatness once when he called the Swedish-born legend, “probably the greatest film artist, all things considered, since the invention of the motion picture camera.” –Robert Newton