Lured to the city, an innocent country girl falls miserably in love with her sleazy mother’s gigolo until revelations of the city’s violence revive her faith in quieter virtues. Wildly melodramatic in parts, the significantly orchestrated soundtrack and theatrical analogies mark Bergman’s first film as director with his unmistakably personal style. Crisis is very much an apprentice work and finds the young Bergman busily experimenting not merely with thematic material but also with deep-focus photography, the use of ceilings to lend a feeling of claustrophobia to certain scenes, and music to underline mood. The conversations between mother and daughter are the first of the countless exchanges between female rivals in Bergman. Accusations are flung out venomously as the characters stare past the camera, looking not at their opponent but into some unseen void of anguish and discontent.
1945.
English subtitles.
Black and white.
93 mins.