Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		4.0

Scenes from a Marriage Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman March 7, 2020

A lot of casual armchair historians tend to think of Roots: The Complete Original Series as the first miniseries, but while Roots probably inarguably put the concept and the term firmly on the public consciousness map, real trivia fans know that even in the United States, where Roots became an unabashed sensation, there had been at least a couple of other broadcasts that qualified as miniseries, including QB VII and Rich Man, Poor Man: The Complete Collection (note that the links point to DVDs, both of which seem to be out of print and in the case of Rich Man, Poor Man , insanely expensive). But as with a number of other things, while Americans may feel like “they’ve” invented something, the miniseries had already made a global appearance at least a year or two before even the three aforementioned United States miniseries. Scenes from a Marriage first debuted in the miniseries format on Swedish television in 1973, becoming iconic director Ingmar Bergman's first "long form" television offering. The miniseries was successful enough to warrant an edited version being released as a theatrical exhibition in 1974. The Criterion Collection has aggregated both versions on this Blu-ray release, and while the unedited version obviously provides more content, each is in its own way a visceral portrait of a marriage seemingly careening inevitably toward dissolution.

Speaking of a marriage seemingly careening inevitably toward dissolution, while probably only a dedicated marketing guru could have branded it as a “real” miniseries, there was a rather interesting “two fer” on ABC’s old Movie of the Week series of so-called “world premieres”, Divorce His and Divorce Hers which kind of fascinatingly aired on American television in 1973 just a few weeks before Scenes from a Marriage premiered on Swedish television. Divorce His and Divorce Hers featured a star couple who had a bit of a real life history with both marriage and divorce, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, in a two part tale that sought to tell the breakup of a marriage from two different viewpoints. (In a somewhat similar way, the Jason Robert Brown musical The Last Five Years explores this same almost Rashomon-esque variance of perspectives of two people involved in a relationship.) Bergman’s opus makes use of his own history with marriage and divorce, or at least the common law equivalent, including of course featuring his erstwhile “wife” Liv Ullmann (the two never officially married, though they share a child).

Ullmann portrays Marianne, a kind of uptight lawyer who ironically specializes in divorce. Marianne is married to Johan (Erland Josephson), a university professor. The two are definitely affluent and seemingly happily married with children. In both the miniseries and theatrical versions, the illusion of happiness is inexorably deflated by a series of revelations about both dalliances with others but an obviously linked lack of joy in their own relationship. Bergman tends to concentrate on minutiae a lot of time, something that's probably emphasized subliminally by Sven Nykvist's frequently use of (at times extreme) close-ups. There is therefore a kind of claustrophobic ambience running through this piece that may ultimately make the longer miniseries version a bit more of a slog than the at least relatively briefer theatrical version for some viewers.

As is typically the case with a Bergman film of this intimacy, the performances are uniformly naturalistic and believable. The ebbs and flows of the marriage in question are depicted with a rare authenticity, even if some sidebar relationships can be a bit more cliché prone. Shot on what was for Bergman a pretty miniscule budget, Scenes from a Marriage perhaps inevitably has an "up close and personal" feeling that concentrates on character rather than directorial flourishes or even a traditional mise en scène. As such, it may qualify in a way as an outlier in Bergman's legendary oeuvre, but it has the same raw emotionalism that typifies the best of Bergman's work.

Scenes from a Marriage Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Scenes from a Marriage is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of The Criterion Collection with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.33:1. This is another release where in lieu of a traditional insert booklet, Criterion provides more of an accordion style foldout, and that foldout insert has the following pretty minimal information on the transfer:

Scenes from a Marriage is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.33:1. On widescreen televisions, black bars will appear on the left and right of the image to maintain the proper screen format. This high definition digital transfer was created on a Spirit DataCine from the original 16mm negative A/B cut.

The soundtrack was remastered at 24-bit from the original 35 mm magnetic print, and audio restoration tools were used to reduce clicks, pops, hiss and crackle.

Screenshots 1, 2, 4 and 6 through 10 are from the television miniseries found on Disc One of this set. Screenshots 3, 5 and 11 through 18 are from the U.S. Theatrical Version found on Disc Two of this set. I've tried to both reproduce screenshots for some scenes and offer a variety of others across the presentation so that those interested can do some comparing between the two, but the bottom line is I wasn't able to discern much if any difference between the two presentations. I suggest that those interested look, for example, at screenshot 2 (from the miniseries) compared to screenshot 13 (from the theatrical version), screenshot 4 (from the miniseries) compared to screenshot 18 (from the theatrical version), or screenshot 1 (from the miniseries) compared to screenshot 11 (from the theatrical version) to see what I consider at least near identical presentational values in terms of detail, palette and grain resolution. As should probably be expected from the source format, grain can be rather gritty looking at times, and fine detail can tend to recede a bit in midrange and wide shots (there are relatively few really "wide" shots), but overall this is a nicely organic and well detailed looking presentation. Some of the darkest material definitely looks a good deal coarser than the bulk of the presentation, and there are a few passing issues with crush and lack of shadow detail. I note that our Forum for this film has some comments on what some members consider to be lackluster compression on the Theatrical Version of this film that's included in Ingmar Bergman's Cinema, where it shares disc space with Saraband, but I haven't seen that version and so cannot authoritatively state any opinion. I will say that nothing jumped out at me as looking considerably worse on the Theatrical Version of this release when compared to the miniseries version on Disc One.

Scenes from a Marriage Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Scenes from a Marriage offers a workmanlike LPCM Mono track for both of its versions. There's frankly not much ambition to the sound design here, as the bulk of the film is comprised of dialogue scenes either between Marianne and Johan, or other supporting characters. There are a few passing outdoor moments or other snippets where ambient environmental sounds can intrude, but this is really for all intents and purposes one of Bergman's more relentless "talk fests", which is not meant as a disparagement, simply a description. All dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout both presentations, and whatever restoration gauntlet the tracks underwent removed any signs of distortion, dropouts or other damage.

Scenes from a Marriage Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Ingmar Bergman (1080i; 15:13) is a 1986 interview with the icon where he discusses the background and filming of Scenes from a Marriage. In Swedish with English subtitles.


• Liv Ullmann and Erland Josephson (1080i; 24:45) is a really interesting set of 2003 interviews done by Criterion with Ullmann in New York and Josephson in Stockholm. Both of them discuss their characters and the production. Ullmann speaks in English and Josephson in Swedish with English subtitles.


• On the Versions (1080i; 15:03) features Peter Cowie analyzing the differences between the television miniseries and the feature film, including some of the editing decisions Bergman made.

Note: As can probably be gleaned from screenshots 19 and 20, Disc One has the Television Version and no supplements. Disc Two has the U.S. Theatrical Version and the supplements listed above.

Scenes from a Marriage Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Scenes from a Marriage is one of Ingmar Bergman's most personal and intimate films, for a variety of reasons including some discussed above. It's a kind of gruelling experience at times, especially for those who are married and know how difficult it can be at times. With an understanding of the smaller millimeter source format, technical merits here are solid, and while Criterion hasn't provided a glut of supplements, what's included is quite interesting. Recommended.