There are only seven people in show biz who can get studios to produce anything and only one is a woman and thats ingrid bergman, so said the debonair CARYGRANT on his second pairing with ingrid in1960.
A N ordinary girl was born in 1925 to a poor photographer in stockholm in sweden, she was orphaned at 3 and then brought up by an aunt till she did her first movie in 1935 with moltafer at the age of 10 as a schoolgirl standing in a chorus line, but it was INTERMEZZO with the same director which brought her to limelight and be noticed by the hollywood mogul david selznick in 1940,
it was selznick who remade it for hollywood to give us a legendary and a beautiful actress with dignity and talent, but a strength to defy the mc carthy era, a dark chapter in the history of america .
she made joan of arc and inn of sixth happiness to become americas darling, her astonishing talent matched her magical beauty but it was CASABLANCA in 1942 which made her a world star, yet she won her first oscar nomination in 1943 with ERNEST HEMINGWAYS adaptation of FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS where as the abused spanish revolutionary she is magical as maria opposite **gary cooper .
but oscars eluded her until 1943 when it was as the slowly poisoned hosewife in george cukors GASLIGHT where she won her FIRST OSCAR, but the best was yet to come, in an extraordinary twist she and LANA TURNER got cast together in DRJEKYLL AND MR.HYDE, but ingrid played the pros*itute while lana against her image was cast as the leading lady setting the box office on fire .
she was cast in three movies by the great alfred hitchcock and all weave a magic spell but its NOTORIOUS with cary grant which is one of the all time greats as she plays the spy sent by cia to argentina with cary grant to supervise her where the meaning of screen chemistry is revealed in the true sense as they emote and kiss and hate each other in this eternal movie but SPELLBOUND with GREGORY PECK as a psychiatric patient is a great psychological drama where she is a doctor and is equally spellbinding as in the UNDER THE CAPRICORN,
the nightmare sequences in spellbound were designed by salvador dali the great surrealist ic painter who designed at least a hundred sketches by post for hitchcock which are in getty museum now and he only agreed to do them when told it was a bergman movie, a genius meets another genius and the results are immortalised on screen forever .
Her second oscar came for playing the legendary ANASTASIA , the amnesic and lost daughter of the last tsar nicholas of russia and she looks every inch like a princess bur acts like a queen of hearts as she was at that time the biggest star in america , but her first marriage to a dentist broke up and she fell in love with the italian filmmaker rossellini as the american media started a witch hunt with the colorado senator calling her an evil influence, she immigrated to italy where she made STROMBOLI with her husband rossellini in the same year as she created her twin daughters, one of whom is isabella rossellini [blue velvet ], then followed 3 other movies in italy before her marriage broke up and she returned to hollywood and was warmly embraced by her fans and the studios
she went back to america to make INDISCREET , again with cary grant, a very sophisticated and discreet comedy, but my favourite from the sixties is YELLOW ROLLS ROYCE, where she drives OMAR SHARIF OUT OF TITOS yugosylavia, as well as SARATOGA TRUNKS, a delightful american periof comedy about the deep south, she also worked on BROADWAY and made a movie for television as well before winning her third oscar in agatha christies MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS, but it is the fellow swede genius filmmaker ingmar bergman s AUTUMN SONATA, her last movie where she sang her swan song as a beautiful ageing mother in a masterpiece on female mystique and human psychology that has never been interpreted in that manner before or ever after .
she had discovered by this time she was dying of breast cancer but she still made her last appearance as golda meir in a tele movie, the israeli leaders biopic which won her an emmy award .
her movies and characters portray her inner strength and purity of character as despite her three failed marriages she claimed,
* ive gone from being a saint to a wh . and then a saint again
only an extraordinary human being can say that about themselves, but she is a very special woman indeed from elsa of casablanca who has her cigarette lit memorably by bogart and for whom sam plays it again and again to the maria in for **whom the bell tolls who is torn away from her dying yankee lover as she alone brought a dignity to american cinema that no one has ever done before or after, whether with cary grant or with omar sharif she dazzled the silver screen like no one can from her black and white classics to her tecnicolor epics .she has a frail beauty but very strong face with extremely expressive eyes which are hypnotic for me as I could watch her endlessly in casablanca and notorious, but her appeal doesnt end here as her wit and intelligence are remarkable as evident from her above quote .
its a classic rag to riches story in real life as portrayed in anastasia of an ordinary swedish girl, a morality as defiant as in notorious yet a courage as noble as in yellow rolls royce, she symbolises all the virtues a mortal like me can desire in a woman but its autumn sonata by ingmar bergman where you are lost for words,
an eternal epitaph for a great actress and woman
they dont make them like her anymore