Is that you...Borg?
Click here to see Borg's dream-sequence!
SYNOPSIS OF ISAK'S FAMOUS COFFIN SCENE (merged with Bergman's film techniques)
In Isak’s dream-sequence, his nightmare is filled with visual imagery representing an ongoing set of symbols which will be significant for analysis. As Isak is on his morning walk, he looks at certain objects, such as a clock overhead which has no hands. However, it seems as though it is still able to tick because we, as viewers, hear it as if we were there. We hear the ticking and Bergman makes it so pronounced that we feel our hearts are beating along with it. Halpern says the ticking means that “time is running out” (128). We will later find out that this is true as it foreshadows his death.
The camera then switches from a man carrying a briefcase from far away, then to Isak, and then to the man once again, but this time he is closer. Bergman switches the camera angles forward and backwards, making the objects far and then as a close-up. This effect is one assumed to be intentionally absurd to show that we are not dealing with reality. We are dealing with another state of consciousness – dreaming – where time and space is looser than waking life. Isak approaches the man and turns him around. Bergman gives us a close-up on the man’s face, which is scrunched and forceful. It is not meant to be intense like in Hitchcock’s film when Marnie sees the color red, but we are supposed to be compelled to scrunch just like the man in Isak’s dream because of our own fear and confusion – both which Isak seems to feel. With Isak, the ticking and beating are the main sensory techniques used so audiences could again come close to diagnosing the patient by becoming immersed in their emotions.
We are interrupted with the sound of church bells and a carriage crosses near Isak. Bergman’s camera angles make the audience think that time is malleable, with the carriage seeming to turn the corner moving away from us and then as it comes from the right, it then comes towards us planting itself right in front of Isak. The wheel of the carriage disengages, rolls towards Isak, and then falls apart. The carriage is also ready to fall apart, but a coffin comes rolling out, falling to the floor and opening. A man’s hand comes out of the coffin and we keep with Bergman’s camera angles, switching from the man’s hand and the image of Isak. When Isak comes closer to the coffin, the hand comes alive and touches Isak. Then the body, struggling to come out, slides out of the coffin and we see Isak. The camera angles enable us to distinguish between the dream world and waking world of both Isaks in response to the sudden fear of a trauma he experienced in childhood. The Isak in the coffin persists in coming closer and closer to Isak the dreamer, and both images of Isak’s face dissolve into each other – a clever technique implemented by Bergman to terrify us in thinking that both are the same person.
Read more:
An Introduction to Dreams on Film
Who are HITCH and BERG?
What is MARNIE about?
What is WILD STRAWBERRIES about?
So who is influencing HITCHBERG?
RED RED RED!
Is that you...Borg?
Think Psychoanalysis, Think Freud
Dream-work and Wild Strawberries
Concluding Thoughts, Works Cited, Suggested Reading, Image Credits, and About Me