Mr. Sleeman Is Coming

     Herr Sleeman kommer (Mr. Sleeman Is Coming), a television movie directed by Ingmar Bergman in 1957, stars Bibi Andersson as Anne-Marie, a young woman living with her aunts Bina (Naima Wifstrand) and Mina (Jullan Kindahl).  To reduce living expenses, these two old women have arranged with the county manager, Herr Sleeman (Yngve Nordwall), to marry their far younger niece to this old bachelor, "...second in importance to the governor."

     Anne-Marie, naturally, isn't thrilled.  She's to meet Sleeman the next morning at eight o'clock; per his letter to the aunts, he'll stop by and ask her to marry him.  The aunts coach Anne-Marie on how to greet him, saying he's "...infinitely welcome."  Infinity and the finiteness of minutes and hours running out on Anne-Marie's freedom show frequently on the clock face in the living room.  

     Anne-Marie's true love interest, Walther (Max von Sydow), shows up after the aunts have gone to bed.  He enters through a window, the front door having been locked for the night.  He wears a cap with a feather, like Errol Flynn's Robin Hood.  He seems to be some kind of forester.  The forest beckons to the young couple.  Freedom, and indeed the world's wonders, seem to abound there.  He responds to her romantic yearnings, answering poetically with words heard later in the movie, but with an ironic twist.  The pair leave the house through the open window at 10:15 pm, spending the night in the forest.

     Anne-Marie returns by eight o'clock.  Mr. Sleeman arrives promptly, a bent, tired man using a cane.  She barely looks at him as he professes his love for her.  He says the same romantic lines uttered the previous night by Walther.  It's as if Walther and Sleeman read the same book.  The poetic lines seem designed to take advantage of Anne-Marie's hopes and dreams.  She's now stuck with a physically half dead man, obliged, due to her aunts' devotion to her upbringing since her mother's death, to obey their wish that she marry an important, well-off government official.

     Mr. Sleeman Is Coming was written in 1917 by the prolific Swedish author, Hjalmar Bergman (no relation to Ingmar).  Slee in Swedish means sling, a strap supporting a weight.  Anne-Marie in this regard will be the old man's sling--he can barely walk.  It's easy to imagine that their marriage will partly consist of the young woman playing the role of caregiver, a kind of nurse but with carnal benefits for Mr. Sleeman.  Her one night in the forest with the dashing Walther will have to suffice as a compensation for a future of suppressed dreams.  

     As time ticks on the living room clock, Mr. Sleeman's absence becomes a growing presence, like the inevitability of death.  Ingmar Bergman, the previous year (1956), made his internationally famous film, The Seventh Seal, featuring a knight (Max von Sydow) delaying his demise by playing a chess game with Death.  The clock in the living room in Mr. Sleeman Is Coming serves the same purpose, its round face revealing also the constancy of life and death following each other, like day and night.

     

Vic Neptune