Ingmar Bergman: Four Masterworks from Criterion in December

Seriously, I don't need to start with a paragraph explaining who Ingmar Bergman is an why he's such an important figure in film history, do I? I thought not. Hence the widespread sense of creative loss at his passing earlier this year, with in a week of fellow film visionary Michelangelo Antonioni. In a release that celebrates his talent, Criterion have announced a four-film DVD set for December entitled Ingmar Bergman: Four Masterworks, which contains four of Bergman's most celebrated works.

The Seventh Seal (1957)
After a decade of battling in the Crusades, a knight challenges Death to a fateful game of chess. More than forty years after its initial release, Ingmar Bergman's stunning allegory of man's apocalyptic search for meaning remains a textbook on the art of filmmaking and an essential building block in any collection. Not just Bergman's most internationally famous film, but one of the most iconic in movie history. Special features on this edition are:

• Pristine new transfer;
• Audio commentary by noted film historian Peter Cowie;
• An annotated, illustrated Bergman filmography, featuring excerpts from Wild Strawberries and The Magician with commentary;
• Improved English subtitles;
• Optional English-dubbed soundtrack;
• Original theatrical trailer with optional English subtitles;
• Restoration demonstration.

Smiles of a Summer Night (1955)
After fifteen films of mostly local acclaim, the 1956 prize-winning comedy Smiles of a Summer Night at last ushered in an international audience for director Ingmar Bergman. Set in turn-of-the-century Sweden, four women and four men attempt to juggle the laws of attraction amidst their daily bourgeois life. When a weekend in the country brings them all face to face, the women ally to force the men's hands in their matters of the heart, exposing their pretentions and insecurities along the way. Chock full of flirtatious propositions and sharp-witted wisdom delivered by such legends of the Swedish screen as Gunnar Björnstrand, Eva Dahlbeck, Harriet Andersson, and Ulla Jacobsson, Smiles of a Summer Night is one of film history's great tragicomedies, a bittersweet view of the transience of human carnality. Special features are:

• New high-definition digital transfer, with restored image and sound;
• Video introduction to the film by director Ingmar Bergman;
• New video conversation with historian Peter Cowie and writer Jörn Donner (producer, Fanny and Alexander);
• Swedish theatrical trailer;
• New and improved English subtitle translation;
• Optimal image quality: RSDL dual-layer edition;
• Printed booklet including a new illustrated essay by renowned theater and film critic John Simon and an essay by film critic Pauline Kael.

The Virgin Spring (1960)
Winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring is a harrowing tale of faith, revenge, and savagery in medieval Sweden. Starring frequent Bergman collaborator and screen icon Max von Sydow, the film is both beautiful and cruel in its depiction of a world teetering between paganism and Christianity, and of one father's need to avenge the death of a child. Somewhat surprisingly, it was the inspiration for Wes Craven's notorious and controversial debut feature, The Last House on the Left. Special features on this edition are:

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer;
• Audio commentary by Ingmar Bergman scholar Birgitta Steene;
• New video interviews with actresses Gunnel Lindblom and Birgitta Pettersson;
• Introduction by filmmaker Ang Lee;
• An audio recording of a 1975 American Film Institute seminar by Bergman;
• Optional English-dubbed soundtrack;
• New and improved English subtitle translation;
• A 28-page booklet featuring essays by film scholar Peter Cowie and screenwriter Ulla Isaksson, the medieval ballad on which the film is based, and a letter from Bergman on the film's controversial rape scene.

Wild Strawberries (1957)
The film that catapulted Bergman to the forefront of world cinema is the director's richest, most humane movie. Traveling to receive an honorary degree, Professor Isak Borg (masterfully played by the veteran Swedish director Victor Sjöström), is forced to face his past, come to terms with his faults, and accept the inevitability of his approaching death. Through flashbacks and fantasies, dreams and nightmares, Wild Strawberries captures a startling voyage of self-discovery and renewed belief in mankind. Extra features:

• New digital transfer;
• Commentary by film scholar Peter Cowie;
• Ingmar Bergman on Life and Work, a 90-minute documentary by filmmaker and author Jörn Donner;
• Stills gallery, featuring rare behind-the-scenes photos;
• New and improved English subtitle translation.

Ingmar Bergman: Four Masterworks will be released by Criterion on 4th December 2007 at the SRP of $79.96.