Editing Cries and Whispers (section)

==Themes and interpretations==
Previous Bergman films had focused on the apparent absence of God, but scholar Julian C. Rice quoted Bergman as saying that he had moved beyond that theme. Rice wrote that ''Cries and Whispers'', following ''[[The Silence (1963 film)|The Silence]]'' (1963) and ''Persona'' (1966), was based more on psychology and [[individuation]].<ref>{{cite journal |title=Cries and Whispers: The Complete Bergman |journal=The Massachusetts Review |last=Rice |first=Julian C. |date=Winter 1975 |volume=16 |number=1 |page=147}}</ref> Academic Eva Rueschmann said that [[psychoanalysis]] was an obvious tool with which to study the film, given the subconscious links between its characters.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=128}}

===Family and detachment===
[[File:1903 Ludwig Richter.jpg|thumb|alt=Elaborate ink-on-paper drawing of Hansel and Gretel and a witch|Illustration of "[[Hansel and Gretel]]" by [[Ludwig Richter]]; like ''Cries and Whispers'', the fairy tale suggests familial abandonment.]]
Professor [[Egil Törnqvist]] examined the film's title. The young Maria whispers to her mother, and Karin and Maria whisper to each other as they bond. According to Törnqvist, "The cries relate to the opposite emotions: anguish, impotence, loneliness".{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=152}}{{efn|name="Title"|Bergman claimed the title was derived from a description of the music of [[Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart]].<ref name="Nyrerod"/> Editor [[Ken Dancyger]] alternatively related the title to the sounds one makes when one dies.{{sfn|Dancyger|2013|p=385}} }} Professor Emma Wilson described the family's predicament, with Karin feeling endangered by touch and Maria seeking an "erotic" touch. However, Maria is repelled by Agnes' decay and her dead body.{{sfn|Wilson|2012|p=112}} Rueschmann explained Karin's repulsion to touch as a result of her degree of isolation and restraint.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=141}} The scene where Anna cradles Agnes suggests that touch and sensation are soothing, despite the "opaque" question of their relationship, which may be comparable to sisterhood.{{sfn|Wilson|2012|p=112}}

The [[magic lantern]] show the sisters enjoy is "[[Hansel and Gretel]]", which reveals Agnes' feelings of abandonment and her mother's favouring of Maria; according to Rueschmann, the [[Brothers Grimm]] story of sibling unity contrasts the sisters' estrangement.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=140}}{{efn|name="Lantern"|Bergman recalled receiving his own [[magic lantern]] at age 10, from his aunt.{{sfn|Steene|2005|p=32}} In his autobiography, he described it as personally significant, and also depicted a magic lantern in ''[[Fanny and Alexander]]'' (1982).{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=49}}}} Cinema historian [[P.&nbsp;Adams Sitney]] wrote that  Hansel and Gretel's parents abandoned them in the forest (symbolism), and Agnes' cancer is the equivalent of the witch in the Brothers Grimm tale.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Color and Myth in Cries and Whispers |journal=Film Criticism |last=Sitney |first=P. Adams |date=Spring 1989 |volume=13 |issue=3 |page=40}}</ref> Karin's cutting of her vulva means that her husband will not have sex with her, and the [[red wine]] symbolises blood from the womb. Törnqvist wrote that Karin's transfer of blood from her vulva to her mouth means that she will neither have sex nor speak, and preventing communication reinforces loneliness.{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=157}} Sitney wrote that the family is most united when reading [[Charles Dickens]]' ''[[The Pickwick Papers]]'', which describes "male solidarity and chicanery, threatened by female plots for marriage".{{sfn|Sitney|2014|pp=48-49}} According to Frank Gado, detachment returns after Agnes' funeral. Anna is dismissed without warmth or sympathy, and the men deny her monetary rewards despite years of service. Maria also rejects "sentimental appeals" from Karin.{{sfn|Gado|1986|p=420}}

Film scholar [[Marc Gervais]] wrote that ''Cries and Whispers'' has no definitive solution of whether suffering and death have any meaning, citing the pastor who expresses his own doubts and fears when he eulogises Agnes. Gervais likened this to the protagonist of Bergman's earlier ''[[Winter Light]]'', Bergman's own conflicted feelings and his relationship to his father, [[Erik Bergman (Lutheran minister)|Erik]], a minister of the [[Church of Sweden]].{{sfn|Gervais|1999|pp=120-121}}{{efn|Earlier with his 1963 film ''[[Winter Light]]'', which had a clergyman protagonist struggling with his faith while seeing suffering in the world, Bergman took the rare step of sharing the screenplay with Erik, and boasted that the latter read it three times. Bergman was possibly trying to communicate that he understood Erik, though the name of the character, Ericsson (son of Erik), may indicate the character represents Bergman more than his father.{{sfn|Gado|1986|pp=281-282}} }} According to Gervais, the ending presents Bergman's solution: a touch, on certain occasions, can make life worthwhile.{{sfn|Gervais|1999|p=121}} Törnqvist compared the ending to that of Bergman's 1957 ''[[Wild Strawberries (film)|Wild Strawberries]]''; it "points to the past, to a paradisaic existence in ''this'' life, to the communion inherent in childhood that has later been lost".{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=152}}

===Sex and gender roles===
Critic Marco Lanzagorta wrote, "Undeniably, ''Cries and Whispers'' is a film about the world of women, and is very open in terms of the gender and sexual politics that it portrays".<ref name="Lanzagorta"/> The story fits Bergman's motif of "warring women", seen earlier in ''The Silence'' and ''Persona'' and later in ''[[Autumn Sonata]]'' (1978).{{sfn|Orr|2014|p=67}} The film inspired essays about Bergman's view of women.{{sfn|Steene|2005|p=889}} Patricia Erens wrote, "Bergman's women in such films as ''Persona'' and ''Cries and Whispers'' are not simply objects of abuse, but creatures through whom Bergman can express his own subjective fears, his many frustrations and failures at preserving autonomy of self and control of reality".{{sfn|Erens|1979|p=100}}

Feminists critiqued the film.{{sfn|Steene|2005|p=889}} In ''[[Film Quarterly]]'', Joan Mellen acknowledged that Bergman used his female characters as mouthpieces and his women signify "the dilemma of alienated, suffering human beings".<ref name="Mellen">{{cite journal |title=Bergman and Women: Cries and Whispers |journal=[[Film Quarterly]] |last=Mellen |first=Joan |date=Autumn 1973 |volume=27 |issue=1 |pages=2–11 |doi=10.2307/1211448 |jstor=1211448 }}</ref> In Bergman's films, women and men fail to find answers to their dilemmas; according to Mellen, the men are unanswered or cannot care for anyone but themselves. However, she wrote that Bergman's women fail because of their biology and an inability to move past their sexuality: "Bergman insists that because of their physiology, women are trapped in dry and empty lives within which they wither as the lines begin to appear on their faces".<ref name="Mellen"/> Critic [[Molly Haskell]] assigned ''Cries and Whispers'' to Bergman's later filmography, which differed from his earlier works in their view of women. Women in his early films lived in harmony with each other and had more-complete lives; Bergman used the women in ''Cries and Whispers'' and his later films as "projections of his soul", revealing his "sexual vanity".{{sfn|Haskell|2016|p=315}} According to Haskell, Bergman attacked his female characters for the attributes he gave them: Karin's repression and Maria's sexuality.{{sfn|Haskell|2016|p=315}}

Academic Laura Hubner agreed with ''[[CineAction]]'' essayist Varda Burstyn's view that ''Cries and Whispers'' depicts the suppression of women, but it does not endorse the suppression and the film opposes patriarchy.{{sfn|Hubner|2007|p=136}}<ref>{{cite magazine |title=Cries and Whispers Reconsidered |magazine=[[CineAction]] |last=Burstyn |first=Varda |date=January 1986 |issue=3–4 |pages=33–45}}</ref> Rueschmann traced the emotional estrangement to the women's mother, who reacts to the era's [[gender role]]s with "boredom, anger and frustration". According to Rueschmann, her daughters assume (or reject) her position and harm themselves in the process.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=136}} Agnes' confinement to bed may reflect gender roles and expectations for women about sex, childbirth and death.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=139}} Author Birgitta Steene disputed what she called Mellen's [[Marxist feminist]] analysis, cross-referencing Bergman's realistic and metaphorical films to say that they are not the product of a sexist outlook.{{sfn|Steene|2005|p=889}}

Rueschmann quoted Bergman as saying his "ceaseless fascination with the whole race of women is one of [his] mainsprings. Obviously such an obsession implies ambivalence; it has something compulsive about it".{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=128}} However, he doubted that there was much difference between men and women: "I think that if I had made ''Cries and Whispers'' with four men in the leading roles, the story would have been largely the same".{{sfn|Tapper|2017|p=50}}

==={{anchor|Myth and Biblical allusions}}Mythical and biblical allusions===
[[File:LaPieta-MichelAnge detalle.jpg|thumb|alt=Michelangelo's sculpture of Mary holding the dead Jesus|Michelangelo's ''Pietà''; Agnes' death is reminiscent of Jesus' Passion.]]
Although Agnes' apparent resurrection may reflect Anna's fear (or desire), Emma Wilson wrote that it blurred the line between life and dream and might involve supernatural activity.{{sfn|Wilson|2012|p=115}} Bergman explained the scene:
{{blockquote|Death is the ultimate loneliness; that is what is so important. Agnes's death has been caught up halfway out into the void. I can't see that there's anything odd about that. Yes, by Christ there is! This situation has never been known, either in reality or at the movies.{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=157}}}}
Törnqvist advised against a literal reading of Agnes rising from the dead, relating it to the sisters' guilt.{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=158}}

According to Sitney, the statue in the prologue may be [[Apollo]] or [[Orpheus]]. If the artistic, doomed Agnes matches Orpheus as well as Bergman, Agnes' mother may correspond to [[Eurydice]] (representing "the green world").{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=48}} P. Adams Sitney concluded that ''Cries and Whispers'' tells of an "Orphic transformation of terror into art, of the loss of the mother into the musical richness of autumnal color".{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=51}}

The sisters' Aunt Olga uses the magic lantern to narrate "Hansel and Gretel", and Sitney connected this with "the gift of [[fairy tale]]s—and thereby the psychic-defense machinery for exteriorising infantile and [[Oedipus|Oedipal]] terrors".{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=49}} In the folk tale "[[Cinderella]]", the wicked stepsisters' bleeding feet as a metaphor for menstruation is magnified by Karin's cutting of her vulva.{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=50}} Her laugh is reminiscent of the wicked witch in "Hansel and Gretel", as she reacts to the damage her sexuality has done.{{sfn|Sitney|2014|p=50}}

Törnqvist, seeing that Anna prays for her dead daughter while eating an apple, wrote: "The eating of the apple links Anna, whose dead daughter was undoubtedly an illegitimate child, with the [[Eve]] of the Fall, with [[Original Sin]]".{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=148}} According to editor Raphael Shargel, Anna seems oblivious to the sacrilege of snacking immediately after worship and that her choice of food is the [[forbidden fruit]].{{sfn|Shargel|2007|p=xii}}

Törnqvist wrote that Agnes' prolonged pain and death resemble the [[Passion of Jesus]],{{sfn|Törnqvist|1995|p=153}} and Wilson compared the position of Agnes' arms and legs to Jesus' body after his Passion.{{sfn|Wilson|2012|p=115}} Gado also saw parallels to the [[crucifixion of Jesus]] and [[flashback (narrative)|flashbacks]] to [[Good Friday]] and a mention of [[Twelfth Night (holiday)|Twelfth Night]] at the end of the film (which he considered ironic, since Twelfth Night is associated with revelation).{{sfn|Gado|1986|p=420}} The magic-lantern show takes place on Twelfth Night.{{sfn|Rueschmann|2000|p=140}} Sitney, Rueschmann, and Irving Singer described the scene where Anna cradles Agnes as reminiscent of ''[[Pietà]]'',{{sfnm|1a1=Rueschmann|1y=2000|1p=138|2a1=Sitney|2y=2014|2p=48|3a1=Singer|3y=2009|3p=196}} with Lanzagorta specifying [[Michelangelo]]'s ''[[Pietà (Michelangelo)|Pietà]]''.<ref name="Lanzagorta">{{cite magazine |url=http://sensesofcinema.com/2003/cteq/cries_and_whispers/ |title=Cries and Whispers |last=Lanzagorta |first=Marco |magazine=[[Senses of Cinema]] |date=March 2003 |issue=25 |access-date=9 December 2017 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170522062657/http://sensesofcinema.com/2003/cteq/cries_and_whispers/ |archive-date=22 May 2017 |df=dmy-all }}</ref>  According to academic Arthur Gibson, the ''Pietà'' rite becomes redemption: "Anna is holding in her arms the pain and loneliness and sin of the world caught up in the innocent Divine Sufferer".{{sfn|Gibson|1993|p=27}}