#127: DREYER, Carl Th.: Gertrud (1964)

CARL THEODOR DREYER BOX SET {Spine #124}

DREYER, Carl Th. (Denmark)

Gertrud [1964]

Spine #127
DVD
OOP

Carl Dreyer's last film neatly crowns his career: a meditation on tragedy, individual will, and the refusal to compromise. A woman leaves her unfulfilling marriage and embarks on a search for ideal love — but neither a passionate affair with a younger man nor the return of an old romance can provide the answer she seeks. Always the stylistic innovator, Dreyer employs long takes and theatrical staging to concentrate on Nina Pens Rode's sublime portrayal of the proud and courageous Gertrud.

116 minutes
Black & White

Monaural

in Danish

1:66:1 aspect ratio

Criterion Release 2001

Director/Writers

Carl Th. Dreyer was 75 when he directed Gertrud.
Screenplay by Dreyer.
From the play by Hjalmar Söderberg.

Other Dreyer films in the Collection:

#706: Master of the House (1925)
#62: The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)
#437: Vampyr (1932)
#125: Day of Wrath (1943)
#126: Ordet (1955)

The Film

Dreyer's final film — based on the melancholy play by Sjöderberg — is opaque, almost inpenetrable. It seems that the characters are frozen in place, as they deliver long speeches about love, or its absence.

• Gertrud (Nina Pens Rode) is no longer in love with her husband, Gustav (Bendt Rothe), although he regards her as an important possession.
• Neither is she in love with a fling from her past, the poet Gabriel (Ebbe Rode, her husband, at the time, IRL) ... he still loves her passionately.
• She loves a younger man, the composer Erland Jansson (Baard Owe), who after satisfying his own carnality, dumps her — but not before bragging about his conquest at a party, where Gabriel is present, dumbfounded.

To make matters even more exotic, a fourth man — Axel, a doctor (Axel Strøbye) — figures in the polyamorous constellation.

Dreyer seems to be chuckling at the entire proceedings, best revealed in a long sequence with a ridiculous musical number celebrating Gabriel, the poet.

The Extras

The Booklet

Six-page wraparound featuring an essay by Phillip Lopate.

"As with everything in this supremely uncoercive film, Dreyer doesn't tell us what to think, or how to judge: he challenges the audience to draw its own assessment, and this way of treating us like adults may be, even more than its unhurried pace, what continues to make the film a frustrating experience for some viewers. No matter, Gertrud may not be for everyone, but those who take to it will never tire of its subtle beauty."

Commentary

None.

Deleted footage

Of interviews from Torben Skjødt Jensen’s documentary Carl Th. Dreyer — My Métier (1995) {Spine #128}, with actors Owe and Strøbye.

Both actors express their bewilderment at Dreyer, his methods, and the finished product, although Strøbye admits that he liked it on the third viewing!

Archival footage

From the time of Gertrud’s production.

Stills gallery

81

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