ChanBot i must have seen a different film!!

Console best movie i've ever seen.

Kaelan Mccaffrey Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Vonia The Best Intentions (Swedish: Den goda viljan) (1992) Director: Bille August Watched: 7/11/18 Rating: 7/10 For parents' story, Bergman hands over the reins; Finds lavish funding. Deft performances, But tedious fights/trite scenes. Haunting score/soundtrack. Her mother's rebuke. Class struggle, religious woes. Love's perseverance. Swedish beauty/Nordic gloom; Lengthy but quite affecting. Haiku Sonnets are comprised of 4 3-line haiku plus a couplet of either 5 or 7 syllables, adding up to 14 lines, the same number of lines found in a sonnet. (5-7-5, 5-7-5, 5-7-5, 5-7-5, 7-7/5-5) #HaikuSonnet #PoemReview #BasedonaTrueStory #ClassStruggle #Danish #PalmedOr #Swedish

gizmomogwai The winner of the Palme d'Or in 1992, The Best Intentions gave Danish director Bille August his second win of the highest award of the most prestigious film festival in the world, for a film Ingmar Bergman had written. Bergman himself never won the award and didn't direct The Best Intentions, even though he was still directing two decades after his fictional retirement with Fanny and Alexander (1982). If most people in English-speaking countries have never heard of The Best Intentions, there may be a reason- the vast majority would find a three-hour, subtitled unhappy marriage drama unappealing and boring. To some, however, there is a lot to recommend here.The film touches on issues of faith, the role of church in a changing society, a deteriorating marriage- many topics of which appear throughout Bergman's filmography. A priest struggles on the outskirts of the world in a small community, believing he might do some good, but his wife is deeply unhappy. There are some conflicts with locals who do not like him, including for renting out the church for socialist meetings. Henrik himself is no saint, not particularly deep, sometimes violent against his wife- aspects we see of him as the fictionalized Edvard in Fanny and Alexander. But here we see him suffer a lot more, and it inspires sympathy. Edvard also suffers and I felt sympathy for him too, but Fanny and Alexander is not his film. In a way, The Best Intentions feels like both Ingmar's criticism and reconciliation with his deeply flawed parents.The Petrus subplot also inspires sympathy and shock- the running to the stream scene is by far the most intense part of the film. It's definitely worth a mention, even if it makes a small part of the running time.

mockturtle If you read the box then you are ready to get your heart warmed when you pop in this Bergman scripted film by Bille August. But if you have half-a-brain then you're probably anticipating that the box is exactly what it turns out to be: bull that hopes to get people to watch it even though it's vintage Bergman.Brutal in a way that "Scenes from a Marriage" never is, in "The Best Intentions" Bergman accomplishes something extraordinary: he gets us to root for him never to have been born.What I mean is that his father (as expertly portrayed by Samuel Froler) is such a monstrous egotistical hubristic sociopath that I almost couldn't continue watching as he defined for the first time the ground rules of the Bergmanesque hell we would all become so familiar with in the future. Maybe that's why Bergman writes such strong women, because he casts his mother as the heroine and actually lets her overcome the obstacles, but here we get to watch a saintly intelligent woman get beaten down physically and mentally over and over by her psychotic husband's fetishizing of unhappiness and misery. As an example: he takes the very fact that she does not want to be in the desolate awful town they move to as a sign that it is the exact place she should be. She can't visit her family and she has to work like a slave for him. He strikes her several times, usually when he has been in the wrong. He makes her give up everything but whenever he has to he calls her spoiled and invokes God (but only in order to get things he wants). He holds every petty thing that ever happens against her. He keeps sleeping with his other fiancé without breaking it off when he starts sleeping with Anna, but neither of them can really hold it against him because apparently (though I don't know why) he's such a good person.If you believe the box then Anna's mother, who opposes the marriage, is the witch who will be proved wrong, but if you saw "Fanny och Alexander" then you remember that the grandmother was right (and that he relegated the monster father to being a stepfather). Both mothers oppose the marriage, and they're both right. That the grandmother is actually a good person is signified by Bergman's giving her the name "Karin" which is usually reserved for the pure of heart. This is so because his mother's name was "Karin," not "Anna." Also he gives Anna's brother his own actual first name, "Ernst," though I have no clue what that signifies.Bergman knows this, and some of the best evidence he gives of this is tenuously confirmed across a few films: the foil for Henrik Bergman in this film is Nordenson, a soulless capitalist pig who reminds us that secularism can be as monstrous as hubristic piety. Nordenson commits suicide (no big spoiler). In Bergman's final film "Sarabande" there is a husband named "Henrik" (spoiler coming up) whose sainted wife (whom he did not deserve) dies and then he commits suicide. Bergman's opposition to Nordenson looks for a minute like it is going to be the only decent thing he does, then you realize that he just wants to match egos with him.I wish the other ones ("Sunday's Children", "Private Confessions" and "In the Presence of a Clown") were available readily in the US, especially to see Peter Stormare assay an older "Petrus", that little zombie.The VHS of this film is shameful, blotchy letter often against a white background, completely indistinguishable. I don't think it is available on DVD which is a joke, it won best picture at Cannes in 1992! I would honestly not advocate that people see this if they are not already familiar with Bergman and inured to the site of a loving person's soul being crushed one step at a time. Pernilla August deserved her award, I saw every lash landing; All I could think in the last frame when she reaches out to him again was "NOOOOOO!"

bouncingoffwall In this film, we meet Henrik Bergman, a good but flawed man who seeks to serve God. We are also introduced to Anna, his future wife and mother of Ingmar Bergman. Henrik makes do with very little, but will not sacrifice his pride in order to enjoy a better life. He is a man of deep convictions. Anna, on the other hand, is accustomed to the finer things life has to offer, and will not be denied her desires.Henrik and Anna have to clear many hurdles, some of their own making, before they marry and move to a forbidding town in northern Sweden where they gracefully undertake their duties as the new religious leaders. It is specially in this part of the movie that we are shown the human frailties of those who represent the church and guide the flock. The best intentions (although the title does not necessarily refer to this) do not saints make. One has to strive to become a better person on a daily basis, and realize one's shortcomings. The characters in this movie do, and it makes one able to better relate to them.Like the locomotives one sees so often steaming through the glorious landscapes of this story, this movie starts chugging slowly at first - although never boring -- and barrels full steam ahead during the second half. The entire movie is 181 minutes. I recommend it highly, giving it 9/10.