World film-makers pay tribute to the master, Ingmar Bergman

SWEDEN: Tributes poured in for Ingmar Bergman, one of the most influential film directors of the 20th century, who died at his home on the Swedish island of Faaroe. He was 89.

His daughter Eva Bergman told the TT news agency her father had passed away “peacefully” on Monday but did not give the cause of death.

Max Von Sydow, who appeared in 11 Bergman films, spoke of his “infinite gratitude” not only for the professional opportunities but also “the immense privilege to have been his friend.”

As an actor, he said, “no one counted as much for me as Ingmar Bergman.”

Director Michael Apted, head of the Directors Guild of America, said in a statement: “Bergman was the epitome of a director’s director — creating beautiful, complex and smart films that imprinted permanently into the psyche.”

He had inspired filmmakers all over the world to create their own movies with similar passion, Apted added. The DGA gave Bergman its highest honor, the Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990.

Filmmaker Woody Allen earlier paid tribute to Bergman, one of his biggest influences, by bidding him farewell with a final joke.

“I was very saddened by the death of Ingmar Bergman. He was a friend and certainly the greatest film artist of my lifetime,” Allen said in a statement.

“He told me that he was afraid that he would die on a very, very sunny day and I can only hope it was overcast and he got the weather he wanted,” he said.

Gilles Jacob, president of the Cannes film festival, said “modern cinema has lost one of its last pioneers, a pioneer of genius.”

Bergman was personally nominated for nine Oscars in his role as director and writer, including in 1960 for “Wild Strawberries,” and in 1980 for “Fanny and Alexander.”

Bille August, Danish director who won the Palme D’or for best film at Cannes in 1992 with “The Best Intentions”, the script for which was written by Bergman about his own parents says:

“It was a real shock to me because he was the last big director left. The three big ones for me were Kurosawa, Fellini and Bergman. The two others had already passed and now Ingmar has also left us. He leaves a big vacuum behind.

“He was wonderful to work with. We worked together on the script (for ‘The Best Intentions’) so I had the opportunity to sit with him every day for three months. We developed a friendship that meant so much to me. I would call him if I had a big crisis or I had to make a life choice.

“He was such an incredible, unusually bright person. He was the only one I really trusted and felt like I could share my doubts with.”

Andrzej Wajda, Oscar-winning Polish Director, quoted by the Polish news agency PAP says:

“Bergman was always an independent person, not distracted by other kinds of activities outside of cinema and theatre. He created great art, and for us — movie directors — he gave hope, a belief, that if we wanted to say something about ourselves, the world would notice that.

“He made a great impression on me with his absolute isolation. It seems the man who makes movies ... has to be at the disposal of so many people. “That is why what he created is immortal. This will remain, this will be an everlasting, great achievement.”

Istvan Szabo, Oscar-winning Hungarian director, who worked with Bergman as an associate after Bergman founded the European Film Academy. Quoted by the national news agency MTI, says:

“Ingmar Bergman is one of the greatest directors in the history of film-making. He did a lot for film art, and within that for European film art, not only by his films, but also with his personal commitment and strength ...

“The Bergman films are to viewers like the novels of a great novelist, the poems of a great poet or the works of a great drama writer ... He valued contact with the audience very much and the story which can be told to them, while he did not attribute a great value to stories which can only be understood by snobs and highly qualified aesthetes.”

Stockholm, Tuesday, AFP, Reuters