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Unknown Ingmar Bergman Script to Be Made Into Film by Swedish Director Suzanne Osten

The script was a collaboration with Akira Kurosawa and Federico Fellini titled “Sixty-Four Minutes With Rebecka.”
Ingmar Bergman
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The late Ingmar Bergman is best known for films such as “Fanny and Alexander,” “Smiles Of A Summer Night” and “Wild Strawberries,” among many others. With a career spanning over 60 years, he’s recognized as one of the most accomplished and influential auteurs of all time. 

Many cinephiles know about his work and films, but there’s one in particular that was unknown to many, until now.

According to Reuters, a previously unknown script written by Bergman for a collaboration with Akira Kurosawa and Federico Fellini, titled “Sixty-Four Minutes With Rebecka,” will be turned into a movie by Swedish director Suzanne Osten.

READ MORE: The Essentials: The 15 Greatest Ingmar Bergman Films

The screenplay, written in 1969, was shelved after the project fell through and later found in the early 2000s when Bergman donated his collections to set up what would be the Ingmar Bergman Foundation. The “highly intense” story revolves around a pregnant and emotionally-alienated teacher and describes her search for sexual and political liberation in the midst of the radical 1968 movement.

“Bergman borrowed heartily from the French New Wave and Antonioni but made it all his own. The script is feminist, queer, homoerotic and anti-authoritarian. It’s an incredibly courageous, complex and radical script,” Osten explained to the daily Dagens Nyheter. “It’s a script about a woman exploring her sexuality, it’s all about conquering, discovering and to help oneself to what’s offered. It’s not ‘nice,’ but it’s a different image compared to romantic love without the compound, complex sexuality, which started being discussed at this time.”

READ MORE: ‘First Girl I Loved’ Exclusive Clip: Two Teens Struggle With Their First Queer Romance

“Sixty-Four Minutes” will first premiere as a radio play on the national Swedish radio on November 6. Osten will then begin production of the film, with hopes to premiere it in 2018, 100 years after Bergman’s birth. According to the site, the director received funds from the Swedish Film Institute to prepare the development of the movie.

Jan Holmberg, CEO of the Ingmar Bergman Foundation, calls the script “thrilling” and said he “cheered” when Osten was chosen as the director. “After all Osten and Bergman are a match made in heaven. Osten is one of our foremost filmmakers, and had a very complicated relationship with Bergman…I’m sure the result will be fantastic.”

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