Film-making
The tightrope and the cathedral
Think about art and the ego.
His producer, Dymling, trusts the artist more than profit, and that lets Bergman work freely. Without that freedom, he says, he would stop making films.
Today the film-maker walks a tightrope without a net. If the public stays away, he may lose his 'wand', his chance to make films. The film industry is a ruthless 'sausage machine'.
As a clergyman's son, he finds religious questions always alive in his mind, but as questions of the intellect, not of emotion.
He tells the story of Chartres cathedral in France. It was burned down by lightning, and was rebuilt by thousands of anonymous people, of every rank, who worked together and left no names.
Art, he says, lost its creative drive when it separated from worship and began to worship the artist's own ego. He wants to be one anonymous craftsman, carving a figure for the common cathedral that we all build together.
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