Brother Carl (1971)
By Susan Sontag
"Brother Carl" is Susan Sontag's second movie. But it is the first movie in which she seems to see film as a means to life rather than as a repository for ideas. "Duet for Cannibals" (1969) really dealt with a kind of rarefied mental cannibalism. In a very open way, "Brother Carl" really deals with human relationships.Two women, Karen and Lena, visit an island, a Swedish resort, where Lena's ex-husband, Martin, lives in comparative seclusion with a mentally disturbed ballet dancer named Carl. Carl is brother by guilt rather than blood, for Martin is somehow responsible for his breakdown, and Carl, who totally depends upon him, regards him as an enemy.Lena is young and full of life, and to some extent "Brother Carl" is the story of how she offers her life, first to Karen, then to Martin, and finally to Carl—before committing it in total and apparently wasteful sacrifice. Karen is older and very tired, and to some extent the film is the story of how her life is saved by the enigmatic Carl, who forms a bond with her own desperately withdrawn young daughter, Anna, and effectively brings the girl out of her private distances and back into the world.I have greatly simplified the story…
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