Orson Welles never got an Oscar but most people think he was a
mighty fine filmmaker. There are many such examples of excellent
performers and behind-the-scenes creative types being passed over for
the kind of recognition that comes in metal or crystal or diploma
form. (If it's any consolation, Welles shared the Grand Prix at
Cannes in 1952 for "Othello.")
Acknowledging that an oversight might very well have transpired over
the decades that Cannes juries have been dispensing awards, the
Festival decided to honor a Palme des Palmes' d'Or. All of those
Palme d'Or recepients still living would be given carte blanche to
nominate a one-time special Palme to be given to a great film
director who had never won the top award at Cannes. Ingmar Bergman
won by a substantial margin.
Bergman got the Special Jury Prize in 1957 for "The Seventh Seal"
(shared with Wadja for "Kanal") and the Best Director award in 1958
for "Brink of Life" (which also nabbed a four-way Best Actress award
for his leading ladies). Close but no bananna.
Then again, there's always the outlying possibility that Bergman
isn't all that great a director. For a stab at bolstering this
theory, one need only turn to the handy volume "The Critics Were
Wrong" by Ardis Sillick ad Michael McCormick. (The British edition of
this entertaining book, subheaded: 'Misguided Movie Reviews and Film
Criticism Gone Awry" substitutes the excellent title "Some Like It
Not." But I digress.)
The book tells us that one Helen Weldon Kuhn, writing in 'Films in
Review' for November 1960 had this to say about Bergman's "The Virgin
Spring," an Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Film:
"...he could make great films. Instead, he thinks anything he hurries
to the screen will be accepted. This lack of professional integrity
is causing the discerning to withdraw their good will. Once they do
so completely, the vogue-chasers will forsake Bergman, and so,
thereafter, will the public he has never taken the trouble to
serve-by making a FINISHED film."
The blurb writer who assessed "The Virgin Spring" for "Leonard
Maltin's Movie & Video Guide" assigns the picture three stars
(out of four), concluding: "Remade as - or more appropriately, ripped
off by- LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT." (Wes Craven did the "ripping" in
1972.)
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