Prague, Dec 5 (CTK) – Film screenings as well as exhibitions will be held in the Czech Republic next year within the Bergman 100 project marking the 100th birth anniversary of the legendary Swedish film-maker Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007), the organisers told reporters on Tuesday.
The events will be prepared by the Swedish Embassy in Prague, film clubs and distributors, festivals as well as film and theatre faculties.
An exhibition of posters for Bergman’s films is held in the Aero cinema in Prague these days and it will run through the end of January.
In February, the fourth Scandi festival of Nordic films will take place in Prague and other regions, including also a section of five films by Bergman.
The garden of the Swedish embassy, which offers one of the most beautiful views of Prague, will be opened to the public during three summer evenings to screen a selection of Bergman’s films in an improvised outdoor cinema. Swedish Ambassador Viktoria Li will prepare the event.
The programme of the 44th Summer Film School (LFS) festival to be held in Uherske Hradiste, south Moravia, at the end of July and the beginning of August will also focus on Bergman. It will present 14 of his full length feature films and three documentaries.
A section of the Be2Can event, offering a selection of the festival-awarded films, will highlight Bergman’s relations to major European film festivals in the autumn.
The Bergman Theatre Week will be staged in Prague’s Kolowrat Theatre in cooperation with the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (DAMU) in October.
The Scandinavian House NGO, promoting the culture of Nordic countries, also plans events within the Bergman celebrations from June to October, such as the screening of a documentary by Swedish journalist of Czech origin Hynek Palas and discussions with translators and film critics in Prague and Brno. More information is available on www.bergman100.cz.
Bergman, who shot almost 50 films and wrote scripts for most of them, won a number of awards, including seven Palme d’Or highest prizes at the Cannes Film Festival and an honorary Oscar. Nine of his films were nominated for the Oscar Academy Award, while three won it for the best foreign film, The Virgin Spring (Jungfrukallan, 1960), Through a Glass Darkly (Sasom i en spegel, 1961) and Fanny and Alexander (Fanny och Alexander, 1983).
Apart from film-making, Bergman worked as a theatre director and wrote books. He died in his house on Faro island, where he lived from the end of the 1960s, on July 30, 2007. His personal archive, which he donated to the Swedish Film Institute, is part of the UNESCO world heritage.
