Directed by: Ingmar Bergman
Written by: Ula Isaakson
Set during Sweden’s medieval era, The Virgin Spring tells the tale of Tore, a prosperous farmer who has always done right by God and has raised his family to do the same, however the family is unaware that the adopted and pregnant daughter Ingeri secretly worships Odin the Norse God.
One morning, Tore asks his youngest daughter Karin to deliver prayer candles to the church. Mareta, Tore’s wife, asks Ingeri to accompany her foster sister. After the two set out on their journey, they come across a mill by a stream where they become separated after Ingeri chooses to converse with a one-eyed hermit. Karin chooses to continue down the road while Ingeri remains behind only to sense danger while inside the mill and runs in terror.
Karin meets three sheep herders, brothers, and accepts their company when she sits down for lunch. The two oldest turn on her; they rape and murder her, then steal her belongings. Unbeknownst to anyone else, Ingeri witnesses the entire ordeal.
Before Ingeri can return home, the three brothers coincidentally arrive at Tore’s farm seeking shelter for the evening. Tore welcomes them, but when one of them offers to sell Mareta one of Karin’s dresses, the man who chose to follow God’s will now seeks a father’s vengeance.
The cast is superb with Max Von Sydow as the emotional Tore and Birgitta Valberg as the stern but motherly Mareta. Gunnel Lindblom plays Ingeri, spending most of the film splattered with mud across her face, which matches her character’s disposition and is only multiplied by Lindblom’s constant scowling. Birgitta Pettersson does a smashing job as the ill-fated Karin as she is spry and lively as Karin is young and naïve.
For a film with such a disturbing plot it is beautifully rendered on film. Ingmar Bergman was at the top of his game while making this movie. The cinematography is as poetic as the themes behind the story – themes of religion, nihilism, and innocence. The script was written by Ula Isaakson, adapted from a 13th century Swedish ballad Tores dotter I Wange, while much of the imagery and subtext of the film was also inspired by an ancient Latin tale, The Three Living and the Three Dead. The Virgin Spring would later on inspire horror veteran Wes Craven to create his movie The Last House on the Left (1972).
The Virgin Spring is a work of art with a cast that honors the director’s intentions, and together they made a gorgeous film about the evils that corrupt and maim what is good in this world as they explore one of the most difficult subjects – what makes us human – and what happens to make a person good, to make a person evil, and what happens when that unpleasant moral shade of gray
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