As a color work directed by Ingmar Bergman, The Storyline is simple.
Agnes, one of the three sisters, was seriously ill and was about to die, so the eldest sister Karin and the younger sister Maria rushed back to take care of her. But a movie of less than an hour and thirty minutes shows the delicate emotions of the characters after being torn apart.
Red chairs, red carpets, red walls, this is the red house in Shouting and Whispering.
The onslaught of scarlet stimulates the senses, and under this bright red collision, director Bergman pulls you into the extreme emotional world he has created.
There is pain, there is repression; there is care, and there is indifference. Millions of human natures are staged in this quiet red house. There were people whispering and shouting inside, but in the end they all dispersed and returned to peace.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > Karin</h1>
Karin is the eldest of three sisters.
She always wore a black dress and appeared restrained and calm. After Agnes died of illness, she methodically handled her sister's inheritance without shedding a tear for her deceased loved ones.
She and her husband engaged in diplomatic careers, and the two were not close, and there was even almost no communication. She resisted any tenderness, and when her sister Maria tried to touch her, she dodged, evaded, and even spoke harshly.
It seems that Karin is a cold person, she rejects any gentle emotions, and refrains from interacting with those around her.
Because only in this way can Karin not be tortured. She confessed that she had thought about committing suicide because she felt like she was living in hell.
This torture stemmed from the contradictory circumstances in which she lived.
As a child, the younger sister Maria monopolized her mother's favor, while As the eldest daughter, Karin never felt "loved". This has led to karin, who has always had an inferiority complex in her dealings with people. She felt like she had "no one to comfort, no one to love, no one to help me".
When the maid Anna dressed Karin, Karin ordered Anna not to look at herself. In Karin's perception, she was ugly, and she was afraid to expose her ugliness in front of Anna. Karin once hurt herself in front of her husband, but only got a scornful smile from her husband. Karin's self-harming behavior is both a despair of her situation and a cry for help.
Karin is always in a contradiction between longing to be loved and afraid of love.
Because of her low self-esteem, Karin fears that taking the initiative to give love will hurt, so she locks herself in a cold shell. But at the same time, she also hopes that someone can save her, and someone will love her. That's why Karin accepts Maria.
When Maria tried to get close to Karin, Karin refused. But as Mary continued to unleash kindness, Karin's wariness slowly cleared, and she began to be willing to believe Mary. Given that Karin knows her sister Maria well, her attitude towards Maria is initially defensive. Under Maria's constant attempts to eliminate the alienation, Karin grew angry. Karin's anger was directed not at Mary but at herself. She had a strong desire to be loved, and her anger meant wavering. Eventually Karin collapsed. When Maria touches Karin like a mother, boundaries disappear and Karin can no longer stay estranged from Maria.
Karin is stingy in giving love, how can she get love?
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > Mary</h1>
Mary is the youngest of the three sisters, the most beautiful and the one who receives the most love.
Unlike the empty rooms of Karin and Agnes, Mary's room is filled with many exquisite dolls, which can be seen that Mary was most favored by her mother when she was a child. The close relationship with her mother also attracted the envy of Agnes and the jealousy of Karin.
Mary is like a doll in her room, exquisite and beautiful, as if she is the embodiment of the good things in the world. She took good care of Agnes and was patient. Even with Karin's indifference, she strives to express her kindness. Mary looks at people with a smile and shows her tenderness all the time.
Mary received a lot of love by her appearance, but she squandered it. She disguises herself as a beautiful look and captures the love of those around her.
In Mary's dreams, she wanders between her husband and lover. The husband hated Mary's infidelity but could do nothing about her. After learning of Mary's infidelity, the husband shot himself. Mary bumped into this moment and was indifferent to her husband's plea for help. While caring for Agnes, Maria attempts to seduce Agnes's personal doctor. The doctor broke Mary's superficiality, saying that she was no longer old, and wrinkles gradually climbed up her face, but she was still caught up in it.
Underneath her beautiful exterior is selfishness and shallowness. She gets the love of others to prove her charm, and when she gets it, she forgets it.
Mary gets love, captures love, but loves only herself.
Of the three sisters, Mary received the most love, but she was the one who lacked the most respect for love.
When Agnes asked Mary to hug herself, Maria walked over to Agnes, but was afraid to turn around and run away. Her false concern for Agnes is only to further reveal herself. She captures Karin's love, also only to prove that she is still full of charm.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > Agnes and Anna</h1>
Compared to Karin's coldness and Maria's hypocrisy, Agnes is sincere and kind.
In Agnes's world, everything is beautiful. Therefore, when Agnes was alive, the film took white as the main tone, representing kindness, innocence and honesty. Even though Agnes was so eager for her mother's love, she never expressed her dissatisfaction in the face of Mary's favoritism.
Agnes is the only one of the three sisters to give her love unreservedly. Because of this, she was always lonely.
Agnes loves Karin and loves Mary. But Karin and Maria did not respond to Agnes's love. As Agnes shouted for a hug, Karin and Maria left, fortunately accompanied by her maid Anna. When Agnes called for help, only Anna walked toward agnes. In the film, Anna's posture of embracing Agnes is similar to that of "The Virgin", metaphorically that of these people, only Anna has always been loyal.
Agnes and Anna, who have sincere feelings, are at odds with a world full of hypocrisy.
Agnes has been plagued by illness. Even in her sleep, she was crying, and when she opened her eyes, she was still dull with tear marks. Tormented by the pain of the disease, she howled and prayed, and then suddenly stopped and died suddenly.
After Agnes' death, the crowd wanted to dismiss Anna. For the past twelve years, Anna had been alone in her care of the sick Agnes. But this kind of companionship could not touch Karin and Maria. They offered to pay Anna, and even thought that finding Hera a new job was a flood of kindness. After the funeral, a group of people left. Karin and Maria parted ways, which also meant that Agnes's wish was disappointed. In the end, Anna was the only one left in the Red House to remember Agnes.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > written at the end</h1>
The whole movie is quiet, and there is not a single line of dialogue in the first nine minutes. Most of the time they are quiet, and occasionally they talk only in a whisper.
But it is in this silence that you seem to hear their cries, their cries.
"Who's talking?"
It's a line that appears twice in the movie, but no one answers.
Because they do not feel loved, they feel pain in tranquility, and this pain is caused by alienation, loneliness, and shallowness. In the Red House, Agnes hopes to get the full love of her mother, but her mother has long since died. She was never married and surrounded by loneliness. Karin felt like she was living in a lie, eager to communicate, but unkind. Mary was deeply loved by her mother, but she was cold and selfish.
Lingering pain, repression with nowhere to hide, is the main emotional tone of the movie. As beautiful as Agnes, she has also been suffering from spiritual loneliness and physical pain. It is precisely because most of the plot of the film is wrapped in red repression, when the end comes, we fall into Agnes's memories, and the picture changes from the usual depression to a vibrant green, we feel some comfort.
The three sisters walked in the green-covered garden in white dresses, which was a rare intimate moment for them. They sat on the old swing they had played on as children, like three good sisters, and Anna was slowly pushing the swing next to them. Bright sunlight sprinkles down, adding a pale golden color to the green.
In this utopia, Agnes felt a happiness that she had not felt for a long time. When the sisters accompanied Agnes, Agnes was no longer alone, her pain disappeared, and she thanked life for it. Bergman finally gave hope to a world where love was missing.