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While upheavals in adolescence and middle life are favored themes of contemporary authors, crises of the senium have been far less frequently portrayed. Nevertheless, within the past century we have been given three masterful studies of aging men who, on the brink of the grave, experience profound psychic change—Tolstoy's “Death of Ivan Illytch,” Mann's “Death in Venice,” and “Wild Strawberries,” a motion picture by the Swedish auteur, Ingmar Bergman.
“Wild Strawberries” occurs within one day in the life, and in another sense the entire life of Isak Borg, a 76 year old Emeritus Professor of Medicine. The actual day is that on which his half-century of service is to be recognized by raising him to the honored post of Jubilee Doctor.
As the film opens, Borg is discovered in his study, setting down “the events, dreams, and thoughts” of this memorable occasion. His voice tells us that he is a widower, living alone save for an old housekeeper. His only son, also a physician, is childless. His 96 year-old mother is still active. He is grateful for his work. He is an old pedant, “quite trying to myself and to the people who have to be around me.” He detests emotional displays.
After this spare self-appraisal, the titles are presented against a neutral background. Then in sharp contrast, we are plunged into a world of nightmare. Borg walks through an empty city in absolute silence. He comes to a watchmaker's shop, whose sign is an enormous clock, under which hangs a pair of giant eyeglasses. The hands of the clock are gone, the lenses smashed. Reflexively, Borg checks his own watch: its hands are missing! The silence is broken by the crescendo pounding of his heart, which ceases abruptly as he glimpses a man dressed in black. Reassured, Borg touches the man's shoulder; he turns, showing