Netflix released an updated American series of this name earlier this year but the reviews for it seemed mixed. So I thought it might be more interesting to go back to this original series made for Swedish TV and directed by Ingmar Bergman. Watching this is quite a draining experience as it feels more like a documentary than a television drama and it is so dense and intense, forswearing any kind of light distraction or entertainment to lighten the mood. It is an amazing showcase of writing and acting but I really would not care to go through this ordeal again.

Across six episodes and spanning several years years, this series documents the relationship between Marianne, who is a divorce lawyer, and Johan, who is a professor of psychology. At the beginning of the series, they have already been married for ten years with two daughters and are even interviewed by a magazine for being an ideal couple. But the truth is that their marriage is far from perfect, with conflicts ranging from the quality of their sex lives to arguing over whether to have another child when Marianne gets pregnant again. One day at their holiday cottage, Johan surprises Marianne by announcing that he is leaving her and that he has been in fact having an affair with a much younger woman, Paula, for months. Marianna is so shocked that she is unable to respond properly and breaks down completely when Johan says that he is leaving with Paula to live in France for almost a full year the very next day. Despite Marianne’s efforts, Johan does leave though they would not fully complete their divorce for several more years.

Despite the big names involved in this production, this was made on a very low budget and it shows in the limited quality of the images and the cheap sets. There are episodes which consist entirely of the two leads having an hour-long conversation within a single room. The series does some unusual things as well by not having any credits in text at all. Instead a narrator reads out the credits accompanied by images of the scenery of Fårö. It adds up to an experience that is very unlike any other television show. Every conversation in here is intense and heavy and there are no light moments at all. The show is so focused on Johan and Marianne that we see a brief glimpse of the two daughters in the first episode and then never again. You really do need to make a committed effort to watch this as it requires both energy and concentration.

That said, the conversations and arguments in here are an incredibly incisive and comprehensive record of all of the problems that crop up in a marriage. It covers everything and the moment to moment detail is both insightful and realistic with the two leads being such amazing actors that we are instantly pulled into their personal drama. They are not always coherent or consistent in what they say but then who is when highly emotional. Being both highly educated people, they are able to articulate their thoughts with exacting precision and astonishing depth. This is actually too introspective for my tastes and at times it feels that they are just monologuing to themselves. Indeed this is incorporated at one point when Johan simply falls asleep while Marianne is talking to demonstrate how insincere he is when he says he is interested in hearing her point of view. But as an intellectual exercise this is very impressive.

Unfortunately I don’t think it adds to a convincing story as it is so determined to have the couple undergo each of the scenarios one by one that the whole thing doesn’t feel quite real. It feels like a clinical documentary of all of the permutations and changes rather than a studied whole. It also brings to mind my previous comments about Marriage Story about this being a portrayal of marriage and divorce between affluent and highly intellectual people. While there is eventually one episode in which Johan talks about his daughters, it still strikes me how the subject of children doesn’t really seem to figure into their feelings and aspirations. The film is similarly dismissive about the practicalities and financial aspects of marriage and divorce as if these were petty details unworthy of serious discussion. Ironically in the first episode, Johan and Marianne are flummoxed when they hear two of their friends gripe about their marriage troubles. In that case, the two hate each other yet their financial well-being depends on staying married together. I thought that the rest of the series would similarly consider such earthly matters alongside navel-gazing psychanalysis but this was not to be.

In the end, I found myself very impressed by what Bergman made here and it truly is fascinating to watch the changes, contradictions, insights and lies play out. But I’d be hard-pressed to say that I actually enjoyed watching it. I am somewhat curious about what the American remake manages to accomplish but it will a while yet before I get around to it, if ever.