BP’s Top 100 Movie List Challenge #82: Wild Strawberries, by Sarah Brinks

I decided to undertake a movie challenge in 2017. This seemed like a good way to see some classic movies that I have unfortunately never seen – the Battleship Pretension Top 100 provided just that challenge.

Memory is a strange thing; some things you can recall with no difficulty, other things slip away or change. Memory is so often colored by the things that have happened since the memory occurred. Ingmar Bergman’s Wild Strawberries is an exercise in memory and reflection. The day Dr. Isak Borg (played by Victor Sjöström) is due to receive an award for his career as a doctor, he finds himself confronted by strange dreams and memories.

I had only seen this film once before at a screening at a local movie theater and I didn’t remember a lot about it. I remembered liking the film and that continued on a second viewing. I would say I am a Bergman fan even though I have only seen a few of his films. I liked Wild Strawberries because I think self-reflection and analysis is important. Our lives are the sum of our experiences and Dr. Borg found and lost love, healed the sick, raised a family, and in the end found himself old, mostly alone, and full of regret.

Wild Strawberries is a simple film on paper but on screen it is a meditative look at one man’s life. Dr. Borg is far from perfect but he learns a lot about himself on his road trip and gains some perspective from the people who join him on the journey. I really connected to that part of the story and am glad this film is on the Battleship Pretension Top 100 list.

I’ve decided to rate each film using an arbitrary scale based on the board game Battleship (lowest: Destroyer, Submarine, Cruiser, Battleship, highest: Carrier)

Wild Strawberries ranking: Cruiser