Summer With Monika

Summer With Monika | |
| Director: | Ingmar Bergman |
| Cast: | Harriet Andersson, Lars Ekborg |
| Release Date: | 1953 |
| Genre: | Drama, Foreign |
Ingmar Bergman's black-and-white follows a Stockholm working-class young man and woman as they contend with the real-world consequences of their idyllic summer and, thanks to a sexploitative re-cut, drew ensuing generations of filmgoers into a perhaps misguided appreciation of liberated Swedish women and so-called "art" films. Monika (Harriet Andersson) and Harry (Lars Ekborg) spend a passionate summer in the sun; come fall, the seemingly endless expanse of summer days has been replaced the encroaching claustrophobia of pregnancy, marriage, and general disappointment. Long cited for scenes of Andersson's unclothed top and bottom, this 1953 drama is now better recognized for the already commanding dexterity of Bergman's mise-en-scene and visual storytelling, as well as the already mature handling of domestic themes.