[INTRODUCTION]
This was an analysis made for a subject in 2010. This time the movie I chose was Sommaren Med Monika or in english Summer with Monika from Ingmar Bergman. The work contains screenshots taken from the movie. I apologize for any English mistakes.
[SYNOPSES]
Sommaren Med Monika is based on Per Anders Fogelström's book and starts with Harry, a 19 year old young man who works on a glass fabric called Forsberg. Harry goes to a bar where a young woman (who is introduced to us a few moments before) asks him for a match to light a cigarette. Monika, a 17 year old rebel who works in a vegetable store and apparently already knew Harry from seeing him around, initiates a conversation with him. She starts saying that Spring has finally arrived making it a good day for work and she also refers how good it would be if she could go away and travel around the World. Harry gets excited with the conversation and the two of them seem to get along, ending up with Monika asking Harry if he had seen Song of Love, a romance which the young woman would love to see. This makes Harry ask her if she wanted to go to see the movie with him. The date goes well and they end up in a small park where they kiss and confess being in love for each other.
Sometime later they meet and Harry asks Monika for dinner in his house, once his father would be at the Nautical Club's dinner. She accepts and confesses that Harry is not like other men, he's like the men in romantic movies. During this dinner Monika is introduced to Harry's father when he gets home early due to health problems.
One day, Monika's father gets home drunk and hits her making her leave the house and ask Harry for a shelter. He manages to bring her to his father's boat and they spend the night together. In the next day, Harry is fired and leaves with Monika to a small island to spend the Summer. The couple makes plans for the Future: they could run away from their lives and problems; have a good house; Harry would study to become an Engineer; Monika would stay at home caring for their children; they could buy expensive clothes; have a happy family like they never had.
After spending some time together Monika gives Harry the news that she's pregnant. Harry wants to go back home when she would have decent food and better conditions but she refuses. After a small discussion they end up staying in the island continuing with their little adventure, happier than ever.
Unfortunately, the dream Future they thought they were gonna have becomes a very realist nightmare. Food starts to run low, Monika starts arguing with Harry and the couple ends up having no other choice but to steal food from a nearby property. Both manage to escape at the last moment but for Monika having Harry by her side isn't enough anymore. Awakening to the cruel reality they return to the city. Harry asks his aunt to help get them marry and buy an house.
The young man is hired by a firm while studying at home. Some time after that June is born and starts being left behind by her mother. Monika ignores the baby's cry and when Harry asks her for help she ignores him completely. She even says that she would go insane if she had to take care of her daughter during day and night. Furthermore Monika realizes that the luxury life she desires so much is far far away. They don't have almost any money and the few left is for house expenses. Monika starts to argue about how they don't have money to go to Cinema or buy her decent clothes to go out of the house.
The firm where Harry works offers him a temporary work outside the city and that makes him stay away from home for a while. June stays at her aunt's care leaving Monika alone at home. As Harry and his aunt go away Monika meets with a man. The situation gets worst when Harry returns. As soon as he enters the house he sees Monika with a man. They don't see Harry and he leaves the apartment. Later Monika's lover also leaves the apartment and tries to hide when he sees Harry.
The couple argues violently and breaks up. We never get to know what happens to Monika. Harry sells the few he has and together with his daughter, abandoned by her own mother, moves to his father's house.
The movie ends with Harry in the street where all starts, looking at his reflection (in the same door mirror where we first see Monika) and his daughter's. Initially with a happy expression seeing his daughter's face, he gets sadder and sadder as he sees his own reflection and it's meaning: his reality and the end of a dream from which are only left June and a Summer with Monika.
[MOVIE DIVISION]
I decided to divide the movie in three important moments coinciding with the places where Sommaren med Monika takes place.
The first part, in the city, introduces the narrative and the main characters (Harry and Monika) giving us some information about them: how is their social life, the environment they have in the workplace and at their homes. Finally it shows us how the couple met and the romance starts. This first chapter ends when Monika's father hits her making her go to Harry.
The second part, essentially outside the city, starts when Harry takes Monika to his father's boat and ends when she announces her pregnancy. This part corresponds to the movie's development. Harry goes to the boat with his girlfriend and is later fired making them leave in a journey. This is the center of the narrative. When the couple lives many adventures in a free World, a World without problems, work nor family. Just the two of them. Their love and their plans for the future mature completely. Unfortunately, we arrive to a central part of the story when Monika tells Harry shes pregnant.
The third part, when we return to the city, is the final part. Even though a child should join a couple, it's from the moment June is born that their happiness starts to end and the story changes its path. The life that looked perfect before starts to fall down as food and comfort begin to disappear. Monika feels that a lot of stuff is missing and Harry is not enough to fill the gaps anymore. After they rob a farm to get food the couple returns to the city and quickly the love that seemed infinite ends when Monika (who totally ignores her daughter June, not showing the minimal affection towards her) cheats on Harry with another man. Harry divorces her and she disappears, abandoning Harry and June.
[POINTS OF VIEW]
I'll now analyse some points of view found in the movie, starting with the Visual meanings. Sommaren Med Monika was shotted with objective shots, giving the spectator the possibility to see the character's reactions (something impossible if the movie used subjective shots).
The camera tries to be a person, simulating the idea that the audience is watching the movie from inside. We can see this because the camera is rarely stopped, something done only in dramatic and important moments. Besides that it follows the characters like a human eye.
Nevertheless, there are times where we can see some interesting choices of shots. The first one right at the beginning of the movie when Monika appears in front of the door mirror, using the mirror to show us what is happening at the other side of the street.
The second one happens when the couple is in the bench after their first date. During the all scene we can only see Monika, facing the camera, and Harry's face is never shown. This gives a great importance to Monika but it also doesn't show us Harry's facial reactions during the conversation.
At the 76th minute, which we can see in the frame below, Bergman shots a scene in an intense way. Monika is protesting about her life, having nor money, nor the luxury she desired. Meanwhile, Harry tries to remain calm, even though we can see how angry he is, while telling her the good side of their life. The characters feelings are reinforced because Monika is far from Harry, becoming smaller than him, inferior to him, while Harry takes most of the space.
In terms of the Narrative point of view, Summer with Monika, uses something like a third person view to tell us its story. It's like someone outside the movie is telling us the events, which makes us able to support or criticize the characters knowing that our opinion isn't totally manipulated by any point of view but ours. We know exactly what happens in this story, nothing is hidden from us. There's nothing that only the character knows and there's nothing we know that the character doesn't. Both of us (characters and audience) are living the moment at the same time, receiving the same information.
In a Ideological way the movie talks about a couple of themes. First of all we have generation conflicts which can be seen when Harry is bullied in his workplace. Being the youngest he is scolded a lot and he's frequently a victim of physical and psychological violence.
In the middle of the movie we find Ideal Dualism. While Harry searches for a happy family, Monika only wants luxury and comfort. Even near the end when their life is pretty much ruined, Monika hates her reality and is only able to see the negative side of the situation, more over, for her that life is like hell on earth without a single motive for happiness. Meanwhile Harry can only worry about his wife and daughter, working as harder as he can so they get a good life. Even if Monika doesn't stop complaining, he forgives her. When all goes down, he stays with his daughter and for a moment we can see a smile on his face when he looks to June (the only thing he has in the World, the only reason to continue living and fighting).
Love between young people is also a theme. The naive love between two teenagers (an immature 19 years old Harry and Monika with 17 years old), dreaming of a perfect future without problems, not understanding that their real future won't be pink, specially after Monika's early pregnancy.
Nonetheless, the most interesting theme is the most explored one, Family Relationships. Both Monika's and Harry's families make them feel like something was missing and later on their own family suffers from the same. Harry's mother died when he was just a kid and his education was on his fathers shoulders, a sick father depressed by his wife's death making him barely talk to his son. On the other side, Monika has a big family, with three brothers, a mother and an alcoholic father who could be both fun and violent. In the end of the movie, Harry and Monika find themselves inside their own family after June is born. And once again, a sad family story is told. This time, Monika (June's mother) completely neglects her child, abandoning her after the divorce and leaving her to Harry's care.
[MAIN SCENE DECOMPOSITION]
In my perspective the main scene in Summer with Monika happens with Monika and can be seen below.
Monika finally wakes up for her reality and tries to express her thoughts and feelings to the audience. Monika is about to commit adultery when she looks to the camera and to the spectator.
The protagonist dreamed with a luxury life however the reality is that she lives like a "pig" (without any money or conditions), having a child she hates and a husband who can't carry out his promises of a good life. Everything she dreamed of didn't fulfill. The rebellious, fun and happy girl became a bitter and unhappy woman.
Through her facial expression we can see that she is unhappy with her own actions, possibly even feels disgusted by them, but that's the only possible way out she sees.
This is the moment when Monika decides to give up on Harry and her life, her dreams. If there was any chance of an happy ending this scene and Monika's expression give us the sure that there's no way back. All the happiness felt during the Summer became sadness and deception. Her look can even be questionable... What would the audience do in her place? It makes people wonder and reflect (this scene is really long and slow), reviewing all she lived, feeling sorry for her and at the same time makes us criticize her. She doens't care, she gave up. The story could almost end here.
[CONCLUSIONS]
Now that I finalized by analysis I'll talk a little about what I concluded. The first point is the title choice. Sommaren med Monika means Summer with Monika, being like a resume. The story of a boy who falls in love with a girl from which only remains a daughter and the memories of the Summer with Monika, making them feel more like a dream and not Real Past.
Other conclusion I found was the divergences between City/Countryside as an allegory to Prison/Freedom. While the Countryside is a place of freedom where people can be free and live without problems, the City is an impressive place where difficulties, obligations and unhappiness live.
Like in Alfred Hitchcock's The Wrong Man, we have something at the beginning of the movie which takes us to it's ending. Some minutes after the start of Sommaren med Monika we see a man carrying some furniture in a wheelbarrow. As we watch the movie we realize that that sequence could be an allegory to Harry since he ends up having to sell all his belongings (including June's stuffed animals) which are carried by the same man in the same wheelbarrow.
To finish my work I'll talk about an interesting technique used by Bergman, which simulated the "exiting" from reality and the entrance to the characters personal world through the background darkening and the highlight gave to the character. This can be seen when Monika is about to betray Harry with another man and when Harry remembers about his Summer with Monika. Darkening the background makes the audience feel like she left reality as when we start thinking about our own life and the surroundings seem to disappear, everything turns black.
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