Top 150 Most Anticipated Foreign Films of 2019: #8. Bergman Island – Mia Hansen-Løve

Date:

Bergman Island

Mia Hansen-Løve continues her prolific output with the French-produced English language Bergman Island, her seventh feature in just a little over a decade since her 2007 debut All is Forgiven. Produced through Olivier Pere’s Arte France Cinema and Mexico City-based production/distribution house Piano (which includes Rodrigo Teixeira and Julia Chavezmontes as producers), Hansen-Løve heads to the famed Faro Island in Sweden where director Ingmar Bergman lived and wrote his screenplays to tell the story of a heterosexual American screenwriting couple who retreat to the locale to work on their next projects. A stellar international cast includes Mia Wasikowska, Anders Danielsen Lie, and Vicky Krieps of Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread (2017). Hansen-Løve’s 2007 debut premiered in Directors’ Fortnight while her celebrated sophomore film The Father of My Children (2009) won a Special Jury Prize out of Un Certain Regard. While 2011’s Goodbye First Love competed in Locarno, Hansen-Løve scored a Best Director win at theBerlin International Film Festival for Things to Come (review).

Gist: In Hansen-Løve’s script, a pair of American journalists retreat to Faro Island as they work on their next scripts as a pilgrimage paying homage to Ingmar Bergman. However, reality and fiction begin to blur during their isolation in the wilderness of the island.

Release Date/Prediction: Although Hansen-Løve’s 2018 title Maya (read review) received a rather unenthusiastic premiere in the hubbub of the Toronto International Film Festival, we’re expecting Bergman Island, which is currently in post-production, to potentially appear in competition in a competition slot at Venice. The second half will be shot this summer.

Nicholas Bell
Nicholas Bell
Los Angeles based Nicholas Bell is IONCINEMA.com's Chief Film Critic and covers film festivals such as Sundance, Berlin, Cannes and TIFF. He is part of the critic groups on Rotten Tomatoes, The Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA), FIPRESCI, the Online Film Critics Society (OFCS) and GALECA. His top 3 for 2023: The Beast (Bonello) Poor Things (Lanthimos), Master Gardener (Schrader). He was a jury member at the 2019 Cleveland International Film Festival.

Share post:

NEWSLETTER SIGNUP

Popular