Skammen: In War, Only War Wins … and Death Will Have Its Dominion
By SusanUnPC on January 3, 2009 at 10:44 PM in Current Affairs
For the civilians caught up in war. For the Israeli civilians. For the Palestinian civilians. For all civilians in all wars past and present …
…
Come in, then, poverty, and come in, death:
this year too many lie cold, or die in cold
for any small room’s warmth to keep you out.
You sit in empty chairs, gleam in unseeing eyes;
having no home now, you cast your shadow
over the atlas, and rest in the restlessness
of our long nights as we lie. …the wind has tales to tell of sea and city,
a plague on many houses, fear knocking on the doors;
how venom trickles from the open mouth of death,
and trees are white with rage of alien battles.
Who can be happy while the wind recounts
its long sagas of sorrow? ….
And, now, a film review that I wrote in 1969 about Ingmar Bergman’s new film, Skammen, the Swedish word for shame, about a civilian couple enduring a war in a country unidentified because, after all, war is and does what war is and does, anywhere. Some say that this film was Bergman’s response to the war in Vietnam. But I fear that would limit the meaning of this film, which is about all war, throughout the ages, and its impact on civilians.
Skammen * Shame (Special Edition)
Starring Max Von Sydow and Liv Ullman
IMDb.com page || Amazon’s page & reviews
I’m interrupting my own review to add this salient commentary from LifeIsCarbon.com’s “Ingmar Bergman Tribute” on Skammen (Shame): “An under-seen masterpiece selected by author Jonathan Lethem for this tribute, Shame is Bergman’s take on war and its destructive force. Liv Ullman and Max Von Sydow play a married couple who find a civil war erupting brutally in their town. Contrasting the face of blood and death with the pain and torment of the couple’s disintegrating relationship, Bergman crafts a final vision of apocalypse as disturbing as anything ever put on screen.”
AND NOW MY FILM REVIEW for a Stanford University publication, written by me nearly 40 years ago on an April night, very late at night as was my wont when I wrote such reviews:
Most of the time whatever is real to me is only what I have experienced personally. For months, I heard SDS speakers talk about biochemical warfare, counterinsurgency, war research grants, and so on. Words, words, said I. I’ve never even seen the effects of tear gas, let alone nerve gas. But, in the drama of last week’s sit-in — and it was the drama that drew me to the sit-in — a little of what the speakers said began to hit me.
By the same token — by dramatizing the horror of war — Ingmar Bergman’s film Shame hit me hard and drew me into feeling something that I had never seen and heretofore found difficult to conceptualize, let alone feel.
Guerilla theater works on the same psychology that was employed so effectively on such as me last week. Yet, as the San Francisco Mime Troop proved disappointingly at Tuesday’s noon rally, unless the drama is first and foremost an artistic endeavor, it fails as a means to political and social realizations.
Bergman is an artist, and Shame is one of his most artfully composed, penetrating films.
Berman depicts one of the most destructive aspects of war — any war (the film’s characters, unidentified by nationality or politics, could have been Vietnamese as well as Swedes) — and that is what happens to civilians, ignorant of politics, ignorant even of the fact that the war has started until the bombs begin to fall, whose homes are destroyed and whose lives are subject to the whims of military aggressors.
Eva Rosenberg (she and her husband, Jan, are former professional violinists now running a farm and greenhouse) says, after the first attack, that she feels like she’s in a dream — somebody else’s dream — and she wonders “what happens when that other person wakes up and is ashamed.”
Her dream, though, is her nightmarish reality. Jan turns into a monster-child of war when he is induced, by a group of soldiers, to kill a partisan political leader who had befriended the Rosenbergs, given them hard-to-get supplies and presents, and just before he was accosted, given Eva his life savings. 
Having found out just before the soldiers arrive that Eva has had an affair with the man, Jan pockets the savings and refuses to give it over to the soldiers in exchange for the politician’s life. (As my cousin, an infantry commander in the Vietnam war told me, one’s main contact with the peasants is monetary. “You give a peasant $50, which is almost two months’ wages to him, to tell you where a mine is hidden on the road. But what is the guy going to do? He’s going to go out and plant some more mines.”)
Eva alone is not warped by the effects of the war. Earlier in the film, after the first air attack, she spots a parachuter caught in a tree in the woods. She runs out to help him. Jan cries out, “You don’t even know if he’s an enemy or not.” She goes anyway, while Jan runs back to the house to get a rifle.
The personal relationship between Eva and Jan is but a smaller allegory of their relationship to the war. Just as they don’t have communication with the outside world — their radio and telephone periodically don’t work and their car continually breaks down — so they fail to communicate with each other. Jan is the child who runs upstairs and cries when he spots Eva with the politician. Only Eva’s bullying keeps him going. During one brief, pleasant scene, she talks of making themselves practice the violin one-half hour every day. She talks of having a child, after seven years of fruitless marriage, and hints that Jan may be sterile (in more ways than one, it seemed to me — Max Von Sydow initially makes Jan into one of the most castrated, hung-up male characters since Prufrock).
The film is superb as an allegorical story. Yet, it is so tense in the plot outline that some helpful explanations or rationales for Jan and Eva’s behaviors are forsaken for the pace. It is possible, though, such details would probably have detracted from the film’s impact, which lies in constantly pitting the disintegration of Jan’s personality and his and Eva’s relationship against the disintegration of their country and home. The impact is also strong because Bergman wisely doesn’t rely on dialogue to make his points, but rather than on the extraordinarily fine photography and audial effects. (The almost incessant sound of bombing is unbearable.)
I hear an army charging upon the land,…
They cry unto the night their battle-name:
I moan in sleep when I hear afar their whirling laughter,
They cleave the gloom of dreams a blinding flame,
Clanging, clanging upon the heart as upon an anvil.– James Joyce, “I Hear An Army Charging Upon The Land”
And now, videos from CNN today, January 3, 1969 2008:
‘Situation very dangerous’ 5:26
CNN’s Ralitsa Vassileva speaks with Adnan Abu Hasna of the U.N. relief and works agency about Gaza:
Israeli perspective 11:04
CNN’s Christiane Amanpour speaks with Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev about the situation in Gaza:
Gazans seek refuge 7:20
CNN’s Ralitsa Vassileva speaks with Hatem Shurrab, an Islamic aid worker in Gaza City, about the fighting:
Gaza hospital in chaos 1:00
Medics and doctors at a hospital in Gaza frantically try to treat victims of an Israeli airstrike on a mosque:
Israeli forces enter Gaza 1:23
Fighting between Israel and Hamas escalates as Israeli troops enter Hamas-ruled Gaza:
[...]
They cleave the gloom of dreams a blinding flame,
Clanging, clanging upon the heart as upon an anvil.– James Joyce, “I Hear An Army Charging Upon The Land”
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Susan-Thank you for posting both the Levertov poem and the Joyce quote. Both present such moving images and remind us of all those on both sides that are caught up in this tragedy. I have not seen this Bergman film, but the reference seems timely.
It came to mind simply because of the utter insanity of what is going on for both the Israeli and Palestinian people, and also because civilians can get caught up in the most cruel and horrific situations that demand choices of them that some cannot make. As the movie review points out, Jan is incapable of bravery, and is so self-consumed with his own doubts and insecurities that he is willing to abet the murder of a man who has been nothing but KIND to this couple. true enough, his wife’s affair makes it easier for him, but he still makes the morally repugnant decision.
It was a film that haunted me.
And it was an era full of violence. Assassinations of JFK, MLK, RFK, and more. Massive numbers of casualties on both sides of the Vietnam War. Students being murdered on their own college campuses in the U.S. Civil rights advocates being beaten mercilessly for simply wanting the right to vote and to sit where they wish on a bus.
Did you happen to catch the video that Larry posted below? Very disturbing, if the father’s story is true — and it appears as likely as not that it was true.
I know the Israelis are sick of being terrorized by Hamas rockets, and I don’t blame them for wishing to react.
But “proportionality” is missing from the Israeli reaction.
And, down the road, all of this will come back to haunt ALL of us who have befriended Israel.
I think the Egyptian president is right to refuse to open his border until the Israelis stop the aggression. At least he has a way of exerting leverage over the Israelis.
We Americans seem like nothing more than their hapless pawns, making the same immoral decisions that Jan did in that film.
Do What We Did In Vietnam!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oa2fJVWhiIA
Here is another poet I discovered tonight. He teaches at the University of Tennessee, and he wrote a collection of poems that are intended to speak to the crises in the Middle East.
Here’s an excerpt from one — like James Joyce, he speaks about what happens to one’s heart:
…
And it’s a wise child who can understand
that the mothers and fathers on the trains
see only the receding pastorals,
the lamplit villages of other angels,
and that his suffering is only one pinpoint
on a lithic hoarding of departures
each passenger reads like an advertisement of heaven.
The wise child goes crazy. How could he not?
How could he not be heartbroken to learn
that even compassion is compassionless, that it uses
the real or imagined pain of others and himself
for wings, for memory, for a marriage proposal,
for the cruel angelism that adores victims
and makes a fifth, airier element out of pain?
We recede. We recede. A virus finds
that place deepest behind the heart where it
unweaves itself into a pattern of false starts
like knots of villages and the one house
lightening at the crest of a green street
as its doors close to us. Dearest,
that is another crime of pluralism.
Hope, jagged with beginnings, scatters
our one real life among a dozen houses,
little illnesses of longing whose low
fevers contract the heart. You have but one heart.
And I have one. At the crest of a green street
we give them away. The night thanks us.
The fences shiver with cats, and the flowers close.
Here is the page about him:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=5662
– His book is called “The Gaza of Winter.”
These lines made me want to read more of Revell’s work. And I will. Thanks!
Jenin on the West Bank — I remember the gross destruction of the town — civilians killed — children murdered (head shot of a 3 year old child — close enough so that the Israeli soldier KNEW he was murdering a child) — for what reason? Israel created more enemies — civilians were made to suffer — homes and businesses were destroyed.
Before Jenin I really never stopped to ask — why the destruction of so many civilian targets — what does this have to do with Israel’s self defense?
That was when Sharon was in charge and Arafat was the enemy. Sharon is gone now and so is Arafat. But not much has changed — the location is different — now Gaza is the target. The tanks are rolling and people are dying — mostly Palestinians again.
There’s also another election in Israel and the candidates (male & female) need to act macho and show the voters that they can certainly “defend” Israel.
But as my Jewish friends living in Israel pointed out — the leaders are actually making the world more dangerous for Jews all over — and their friends.
The Germans invaded England after pounding the British into submission . . . . oh wait — the Blitz STRENGTHENED the resolve of the British and Germany never invaded and occupied England.
Liv Ullman is one of my favorite actors — this is one of her films I’ve not seen. Thanks for “reprinting” your long ago article. Not much has changed in 40 years — people are still dying in wars.
Off and on all day, we have watched one pundit after another give their justification for this invasion, usually beginning with, “Israel has a right to defend itself” to the point it has become predictable. In the student union where I went to school, during the same time period of the film you reviewed, there was a juke box with Bad Moon Rising. The record was scratched and when it came to the words, “Bad Moon” it repeated over and over again until someone kicked it. Then someone else would play the song again and so on. It has been like that today except it didn’t stop.
Your movie review and the poems you posted bring the taste of the pain and suffering to life. I have been thinking tonight of how it must feel in Gaza. Is it cold? Are the lights off? Where do you go with your family when you can hear the bombs?
People are saying Hamas hides behind women and children, but this morning I heard they were asking civilians to go to the Egyptian border for safety. Then I read the Egyptians have refused to open their borders until Israel accepts a cease fire which they have no plans to do and have said this will be slow. It will take time. How much time?
Susan, thank you.
The most critical computer and communication networks used by the U.S. government and military are secured by encryption software written by an Israeli “code breaker” tied to an Israeli state-run scientific institution.
The National Security Agency (NSA), the U.S. intelligence agency with the mandate to protect government and military computer networks and provide secure communications for all branches of the U.S. government uses security software written by an Israeli code breaker whose home office is located at the Weizmann Institute in Israel.
Bush loathed the fact that Clinton was in the White House and sought to bring him down. Remember the vast Right Wing Conspiracy claim by Hillary. She knew what she was talking about. Bush Senior aligned himself with his Israeli drug-running partners to bring down the Democratic Party once and for all – with Israel as the promised beneficiary.
The “VAST RIGHT WING CONSPIRACY” of which Hillary spoke was a deal done between Bush 41 and Israel.
The problems with Israel are forever endless and are historical.
“T H E
A R C H I T E C T”
O F
T E R R O R
I S
K A R L
R O V E
He works both sides of the isle for a price. His specialty is voter fraud and creation of terror.
And mimes still suck.
Actually, the US strengthened the British position.
BTW: How did that being bombed thing go for the Germans in Berlin? Strengthened their resolve did it?
Thanks SusanUnPc, I will put that film on the list. I love the cinema photography of these era.
also for the poems…
I look for sanity somewhere.
I found none.
But I did find expressions of the insanity that told me my heart is not wrong.
But my heart is, as James Joyce makes clear, forever bloodied and bruised by these conflicts — even though I am thousands of miles away. (I’ve had other violent conflict of another sort up close and personal, so am woefully only too knowledgeable of its effects.)
Perhaps I’ll dig out my favorite D. H. Lawrence poem. It is about whales copulating.
If only humans were consumed with the pleasure of copulating instead of the mad need for killing.
“If they want eternal war, well and good; we accept the issue, and will dispossess them and put our friends in their place. I know thousands and millions of good people who at simple notice would come to North Alabama and accept the elegant houses and plantations there. If the people of Huntsville think different, let them persist in war three years longer, and then they will not be consulted. Three years ago by a little reflection and patience they could have had a hundred years of peace and prosperity, but they preferred war; very well. Last year they could have saved their slaves, but now it is too late.
All the powers of earth cannot restore to them their slaves, any more than their dead grandfathers. Next year their lands will be taken, for in war we can take them, and rightfully, too, and in another year they may beg in vain for their lives. A people who will persevere in war beyond a certain limit ought to know the consequences. Many, many peoples with less pertinacity have been wiped out of national existence.’”
William Tecumseh Sherman
Thanks for these “expressions of insanity that told me my heart is not wrong”.
The big decision in the ME is whether Israel goes down the path of always finding another offensive justified or down a path of reconciliation. Neither is easy, but if we imagine what the outcomes are as one proceeds down each path.
If Israel can always say, we can’t have peace until _____ Arafat’s dead or the PLO is gone or the suicide bombers stop or the rockets stop or Hizbullah is out of Lebanon and Syria and so on and on. It becomes a way of life with the whole world held hostage to Israel’s position. Israel can only fight its way out of each predicament and is left facing the next battle. They can only win battles but it doesn’t seem to lead to winning the war if winning is defined as peace.
The other direction is one of making prosperity and justice a weapon for peace. I honestly believe that part of the problem is that inhumane conditions only increase the human tendency to cruelty and violence. You cannot stop people from becoming terrorists by depriving them of the opportunity to have a good life.
I understand the Israelis’ claims to have tried peace, but I can’t believe that the Palestinians are incapable of wanting a good life for their families as some now claim.
I’ve watched American presidencies go to die in the ME. You can take you pick, any of them from Carter, who did everything humanely possible to achieve peace (and was sabotaged) to the enablers like the current Bush. We can bribe Egypt for peace and we can hand over more power to Israel, but we can never find a time where enough is enough and our government – and the world – can turn its attention to running its own affairs. It is just exhausting that there is no solution and the world can only continue doing more of the same.
It is all very sad, and your words were just right for me now.
Video taken by mobile phone at a market in Gaza after Israelis bomb civilians there. This is what war looks and sounds like.
YouTube immediately took down this video when it was first posted; it has been put up again:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpMH21Y3vBk