As this rereleased 1975 version shows, the opera was the perfect vehicle for Bergman’s combination of symbolism, seriousness and mischief
Ingmar Bergman’s 1975 production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute, originally made for television, is now rereleased as part of the Bergman centenary retrospective at London’s BFI Southbank. It has gaiety and mystery. To consider it between, say, his Smiles of a Summer Night and Fanny and Alexander, is perhaps to see the Mozartian quality of Bergman’s work generally; to savour an influence on his own registers of seriousness and mischief, and his use of symbolism.
Bergman’s production is a cool, frank presentation of the opera, an imagined theatrical performance that begins by looking at members of the audience in turn, but in the course of the action periodically returning to a single young girl’s smiling or thoughtful face – infrequently enough for us to realise that we had forgotten about her, and that another, quieter narrative is running alongside the story: that of this girl’s enjoyment and judgement.
Related: Bergman: why are the great director's women all tragi-sexual goddesses?
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