Gertrud

(1964) Gertrud (In Danish with English subtitles) DRAMA

Adapted from the play by Hjalmar Söderberg, which the acting is zombie-esque but that is Carl Theodor Dreyer's style, which involves an unhappy housewife, opera singer, Gertud Kanning (Nina Pens Rode) leaving her husband, Gustav Kenning (Bendt Rothe) just when he announces his promotion to become a cabinet minister. She leaves him for someone younger, who is a pianist and struggling composer, Erland (Baard Owe). Viewers get to understand why she has problems with highly successful men as the movie progresses, once she reunites with an old fling. Co-written and directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer that is also his final film.

Even by Dreyer's standards "Gertrud" displays a rigidity rare in cinema. When it first appeared critics hated it, (just as they hated "The Searchers" and "Vertigo"). Now, of course, all three films are considered masterpieces but while "Vertigo" and "The Searchers" were commercial films aimed at a mass audience, "Gertrud" was strictly art-house, the kind of film critics were expected to like. It was also Dreyer's last film and it was archetypal Dreyer but this was also the mid-sixties and movies had moved on. We had had a renaissance in France and Italy and Czechoslovakia and even in the UK while America's 'New Wave' was just about to strike. It was a time for young film-makers and Dreyer was an old man. "Gertrud" looked and felt like it could have been made 30 years earlier. Of course, hindsight is a great thing and today "Gertrud" seems more 'modern' than many of the fashionable 'flash-in-the-pan' movies that hit us in the sixties and which now seem like time-capsules from a by-gone age. "Gertrud's" almost somnambulist pace and Dreyer's insistence on long takes, keeping his actors mostly static while allowing his camera to move, however slowly and deliberately, instead now seems almost revolutionary at a time when movies were chiefly about movement and movement in a pell-mell style. While taken from a 1906 play the theme of the film also seems peculiarly modern for the mid-sixties. It's about a woman's liberation from the constraints that men would seek to put upon her, even if that freedom means the sacrifice of romantic love in favour of higher, more intellectual pursuits. At the beginning of the film Gertrud leaves her stuffed-shirt of a husband because he's not prepared to love her unconditionally and attaches herself to a younger man who showers with romantic affection. But his love, too, is a sham and Gertrud is just another of his many conquests, so Gertrud leaves both men, and the poet she truly loved but who put his work above her and has now returned to reclaim her, and settles instead for a solitary but more 'intellectually' satisfying existence. It is a cold movie, it moves at a snail's pace and it is a film of ideas almost devoid of emotion if not feeling, (there is so little happening on screen it often seems like it could just as easily have been done on the radio). The acting is either intensely wooden or deeply cerebral depending on your point of view and since the characters are really only paradigms it is very difficult to engage with any of them. But it is also an incredibly beautiful film, displaying all of Dreyer's visual mastery, (as a 'stylist' Dreyer has always seemed very under-valued), and it's a film that challenges our preconceptions of what a romantic melodrama should be. Even by European art-house standards this is a much more rigorous dissection of the relations between men and women than we are used to. It won't be to everyone's taste but stick with it and you will be richly rewarded with a difficult and a bold film that strives to be a serious work of art and more than succeeds in its aims.

Cinema Great Carl Dreyer's final film is said to be his masterpiece as well. The innovative b&w cinematography, featuring only a handful, drawn out scenes in confined spaces, makes use of mirrors, shadows and suggested action. The story begins ca. 1900, studying several characters in depth. Gertrud, the wife of a wealthy lawyer with political aspirations, feels unappreciated by her work-consumed husband. The viewer quickly learns that Gertrud is about to end what appeared to be years of boredom as the "attache" of a man who lives mainly for his secular accomplishments. Despite his protests and assurances that he couldn't live without her, she leaves to see a lover.

Drawn to men of the arts, Gertrud herself was once a celebrated opera singer. A lengthy love affair with a man who later becomes a nationally honored poet, left the jilted author heart broken. Another man, a pioneer in the field of psychiatry, becomes Gertrud's friend and confidante, but never a lover.

The story, via flashbacks, present action and time scan forward shows Gertrud's entire adult life. The final scene offers somewhat of an explanation for why this woman has seemingly denied herself any true happiness. The men who offered her everything, even with the greatest possible concessions on their part, were told not to bother. Gertrud's extreme sense of pride, as noticed by a young musical genius who sees her as a convenient fling, leaves no wavering of the determined mind.

If this film appeared to be scandalous in 1964, how would society view this kind of real activity in the early 1900s? A strong sense of "truth", as a philosopher may call it, will always override any kind of compromise. "Love is all", the only words on Gertrud's head stone. There must be more to life than strict adherence to an ideology, especially at the high cost. A critically acclaimed film, "Gertrud" nonetheless lacks entertainment value due to its fatalistic story telling

If one can get past the utter simplicity of the story and look at the images, it becomes, for me, a striking film. I just returned to watching the films of Dreyer, those that I had not seen. Apparently, this was the last one. Gertrud is as cold as you can make one. She has a determined role for herself and never varies and slips into perpetual unhappiness. She is a standard bearer for feminine longing, but she can't crack through the realities of the world. She has made bad choices and then seems to punish herself and those who can't live to her standards. Worth a look, certainly.

Carl Theodor Dreyer marked his place forever in the film canon for his terrific masterpiece The Passion of Joan of Arc. Back in film's most primitive stages, he managed to lift it out from its limitations and give us one of the greatest performances of all-time from Maria Falconetti. 36 years later with his final film, he again studies a single woman in an intimate minimal style. It tackles a complex issue, one of universal sensitivity, with the expectations of love. There's great subdued performances of characters who can hardly bear to look at each other. Based on a play built on a handful of sequences, it ends up inherently stage-like with its 3 walls and dialogue-driven narrative. While it may struggle with pacing with a few too many scenes that don't drive the story forward, its rich backstory is compelling and plays with the imagination. In that limitation, Dreyer makes elegant use of camera movements with long takes that are constantly changing frame size, it's really magnificent to watch. What makes the film hit hard is its sudden epilogue. The majority of the film takes place over a few days and we suddenly jump 30 years into the future to study the consequences. It's a profound, if incredibly dreary film. Many lessons to take from Gertrud, both in filmmaking and in life.

8/10