He proceeds to a haphazard survey of Bergman’s films: despite iis aggressively assured tone, the summaries are curiously slipshod, the analyses surprisingly shallow. There is little indication that the works are movies. He discusses them just as if they were stories, without analysis or interpretation of the photographic style, the staging, the performers and how they are used, the relationship of Bergman’s stage work to his screenwork, etc., everything, in fact, that enables the film director to put his stamp on the scenario...

It’s clear Donner can’t swallow Bergman: it must be very upsetting that the only wit or originality, the only seasoning in the book, is in the quotes from Bergman.