Starring
Frauke
Music composed by
Hidetoshi Koizumi
Written, Directed, filmed, and edited by
Mile Nagaoka
Supported by
The Bergman Estate Fårö Foundation
Produced by
Nagaoka Motion Pictures
Filmed at
Fårö inland, Sweden 2017
The length of the film
あらすじ：バルト海に浮かぶ孤島フォーレ島。この島にある小さな家の中で死に瀕した少女の目前に悪魔が現れる。
悪魔はダンスを踊りながら、少女を「賽の河原」へと導くのであった。
Fårö island, floating in the Baltic Sea, a place much loved by Ingmar Bergman. One night, in a small house on the island, a solemn, dancing demon clothed in black appears in front of a dying girl, and leads her to the riverbank on the border between the living and the dead, where dead children go to build stone towers forever, in limbo.
Bio
Filmmaker. Head of Nagaoka Motion Pictures and Ubusuna Project. Born in Yotsukaido, Chiba, 1979. Lived in Tokyo, working freelance doing camera, lights and production design for independent film productions, apprenticed for a traditional paper craft artisan, worked as art director for an NPO. Moved to Kamiyama, Tokushima prefecture in 2010. Spent the next six years filming the short documentary "Kamiyama Alone" which won Best Documentary at the Sapporo International Short Film Festival in 2017.
【Production Note】
September 1, 2017. I set off for Sweden. It had been 19 years since I last spent time there at the age of 19. I transferred in Stockholm to a small propeller plane. My destination was an island called Fårö, bobbing in the Baltic. This is the location of a house where that radiant giant of film history, Ingmar Bergman, lived for 40 years. The dancer Frauke and myself had miraculously been selected for a highly-competitive two-week artist-in-residence that was started after Bergman’s death that lends his home, library, guest house, and studio to people who create art.
There are many Viking graves along the coast of this island, and there is something in the air that suggests it was once a holy place. The rauk sea stacks, a geological landform grouping along the coast, also looked like a scene from hell. We borrowed the guest house as we travelled around the island scouting locations, and thinking about what sort of story we might make. Then, I decided to actually use the landscape in a representation of the afterlife.
Bergman's house was located right in front of us, across the courtyard. We were free to go in anytime. It was not open to the public, and security was tight. We were warned to take care not to damage the rooms in any way. A collection of books said to have cost several hundreds of millions were housed in an overly fine library, and there were stacks of VHS tapes. We sat in the seat that Bergman sat in when he hosted guests, and in the chair he used when he was working, and looked out on the pine woods and the seashore as we imagined he must have done. I had never been particularly aware of him before then, but I felt as though I received several mute lectures just by being there. The house was completely, totally noiseless. The island had nothing you could call a shopping street. We were separated from the hamlet on the island, located on a distant shore. All we could hear were the sounds of waves. The foundation wanted to maintain it as it had been when Bergman was living, so there was no telephone and certainly no internet.
Surprisingly, Bergman lived for forty years this amazing home made of wood and stone, tormented by what he called his "daemons." In scribbles written as though by magic, he wrote: "I built a career, but I'm shaking alone." "Fear, fear, fear." and so on. I cannot find the words to describe it.
We spent the first week scouting locations and writing a script. The first day was t-shirt weather, by on the second say the weather changed to winter and it was though that first day had never existed We took our car on the ferry and crossed the sea before driving two hours to the Salvation Army Shop on Gotland Island where we bought some winter clothes.
We focused on the picture of a shipwreck we had found on just one old tourist pamphlet. We tried to go to it but didn't know where it was. We tried to ask around, but made no progress. After looking around and walking quite a long way, we found the wreck, protruding from the sea. The ship was called Fortuna, a goddess from Greek mythology.
The following week I filmed. I did most during the morning magic hour. With just myself and my subject, we went around shooting on location. The landscape in front of me, my subject, and the air and the sounds told me what to do. There is no reason other than that. The things I met somehow magically started to fit, and this led to a single story. The result is this work.
I think Bergman taught me something. I felt many things, and thought many things. What I shot was just a small fragment. The ghosts of this island that showed up in several small mysterious happenings seemed to say, "Just make it. Make a story."