Carl Theodor Dreyer – Gertrud (1964)



DVDrip | Danish | Subtitles (optional): Eng, Esp, Pt-BR | 1:56:46 | 720x400 | H264 | 1624kbps | NTSC 23.97fps | Audio: MP3 (Lame) 160kbps | 1.47 GB

For his final film, the Danish master, Carl Theodor Dreyer, opted to adapt a play (written by Hjalmar Söderberg) about a woman who is drawn to great men but then finds that they are incapable of offering her the depth of love that she requires. A writer, a politician and a musician comprise her past, present and (she hopes) future lovers respectively. As she carries on with an affair under her husband’s nose, word arrives that the writer will soon return to town to be honored for his influence and artistry at a special ceremony. The convergence of these three figures in Gertrud’s life put her into a state of deep self-reflection as she realizes that she is at a critical crossroads in her life. Not content to be proverbial ‘good woman’ standing behind the ‘great man’, Gertrud seeks a path that will lead towards personal fulfillment and, above all, true love.

When we first meet Gertrud, she resembles nothing so much as Nora from Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, unconvincingly playing the part of doting wife to a successful husband. Her dissatisfaction registers palpably on her face, hoping to communicate to her husband an internal state she would rather not have to put into words. Past the point of putting on a brave face, Gertrud already seems to have separated herself spiritually from her daily reality, even though her body is going through the motions. Dreyer further underlines the tension by not allowing his actors to even look at each other throughout most of the first twenty-minute scene. The effect is jarring and unnatural at first; but, slowly we come to realize that Dreyer’s lack of warmth is intentional, that he has denied his players the very thing that most actors feed upon – the energy that comes through eye contact and interplay with another performer. (...)

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