It’s just over a decade since London-based Indian director Dheeraj Akolkar made his Liv and Ingmar (2012), about the personal and creative relationship between Norwegian star Liv Ullmann and the revered Swedish director, Ingmar Bergman. His new film Liv Ullmann – A Road Less Travelled, screens this week in Cannes Classics.
“Liv and Ingmar was very special in many ways because it was my first feature-length film as a director,” Akolkar recalls. At the time he made the documentary, the Indian filmmaker was still a student at Goldsmiths University. He had come across Ullmann’s story after reading her book, Changing, which he stumbled on by chance in the house of a friend in India. “I didn’t know anything about Liv at that point. I had not seen any of her films,” he acknowledges. The book made a strong impression on him.
At university, Akolkar read more about Ullmann and Bergman and began to watch some of their films, for example Persona and Cries And Whispers. “I thought, oh my god, I have never seen acting like this. My perspective on acting was largely based on Indian films.”
Bergman died in 2007. “I knew I could never leave him and, in a way, I never have,” Ullmann had written about their partnership which lasted for 40 years. They didn’t marry and weren’t always together but Akolkar saw them as one of the great couples. “She doesn’t write ‘I thought’ or ‘I felt.’ She writes ‘I knew.’ I think that knowledge is love…and that point of knowledge, how do you build it up?” That became the theme of Liv and Ingmar.”
“A friend was coming to stay with me from Norway to stay with me and she said what shall I bring from Norway and I said can you please bring Liv Ullmann’s address,” Akolkar remembers of how initial contact was sought with the star actress. The friend obliged. At this point, Akolkar sent the Norwegian star a handwritten letter and a poem inspired by her life with Bergman. That was in 2008. He can remember precisely the time and the day when he received an unexpected phone call. “Hello, this is Liv Ullmann,” said the voice at the other end of the receiver.
“I remember it so vividly. I sat down. This was not about being star struck because I am not easily star struck. This is about respect,” Akolkar recalls. At the time, Ullmann was on her way to direct Cate Blanchett in a production of A Streetcar Named Desire. She told him that if he put together the financing for his documentary on the relationship between her and Bergman, she would work with him. This gave him the spur he needed to find backing. He was very dogged, approaching 85 producers in 5 countries. “Everyone said ‘no.’ Some people looked at me funny, like ‘who is is this person?’ A lot of doors shut in my face but I am very grateful because the 86th company, Nordic Stories, were the right people.”
There was an early meeting between Ullmann, Akolkar and the producers in December 2010. She looked at the director sharply and asked him why he wanted to make the film.
“I started to answer…about three minutes later she held my hand and said yes.”
After the premiere of Liv and Ingmar, when Ullmann was asked why on earth she had agreed to make a film with a young, unknown director, she replied: “Sometimes you’re 73 and standing on a bridge and you meet a stranger. He comes from a different country and a different continent and speaks a different language even. He [offers] his hand. Sometimes you should hold that hand and jump.”
Akolkar acknowledges that he owes a huge debt to his subject. Ullmann took a risk on him. “She made me a filmmaker,” he declares. “She had a lot to lose…but she never said anything. She stood by me. She told in front of everyone ‘this is your film, I am with you on this.’ When we finished the film, she said we are friends.”
Now, they are back working together. This is actually their fourth project. Ullmann has collaborated on two of his other films, Let The Scream Be Heard about Norwegian artist Edvard Munch and Wars Don’t End, about war children in Norway.
Divided into three chapters, The Road Less Travelled explores Ullmann’s very varied life, and her extraordinary international career spanning over 66 years. “This film wouldn’t have come unless I had known her all these years. I have observed her very quietly in conversations and silences. I’ve had the privilege and gift of seeing the person behind the persona.”
Jeremy Irons, Cate Blanchett, Jessica Chasten and others talk on camera about Ullmann.
The director hopes the new film will allow its subject to be seen in her own right, not in the afterglow of Bergman. Quite apart from her work as author, actor and director, Ullmann has an extraordinary record as a humanitarian, as a goodwill ambassador for Unicef for over 40 years.
“It will allow audiences to look at a Liv Ullmann that is not just connected to Ingmar Bergman. He was a force in her life, a mentor, a teacher, a friend, a soul mate – but she has done so much more!”
The new doc was backed by Viaplay and Teddy TV, and is also supported by the Norwegian Film Institute. It is available both as a theatrical feature and a 3 x 43 minute TV series.
The director is now working on The Other Side Of Silence, a film about children born as a result of sexual violence.
