Synopsis
When 'Vogler's Magnetic Health Theater' comes to town, there's bound to be a spectacle. Reading reports of a variety of supernatural disturbances at Vogler's prior performances abroad, the leading townspeople (including the police chief and medical examiner) request that their troupe provide them a sample of their act, before allowing them public audiences. The scientific-minded disbelievers try to expose them as charlatans, but Vogler and his crew prove too clever for them.
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Cast
- Max von SydowAlbert Emanuel Vogler
- Ingrid ThulinManda Vogler
- Gunnar BjörnstrandDr. Vergerus / Minister of Health
- Naima WifstrandGranny Vogler
- Bengt EkerotJohan Spegel
- Bibi AnderssonSara Lindqvist
- Gertrud FridhOttilia
- Lars EkborgSimson
- Toivo PawloStarbeck
- Erland JosephsonConsul Egerman
Recommendations
- 100
TV Guide Magazine
The Magician is still fascinating, presenting a myriad of challenging ideas about magic, reality, and the nature of film itself. The acting, as in typical in Bergman, is exceptionally good, with Bjornstrand a standout. - 90
The New York Times
This picture is full of extraordinary thrills that flow and collide on several levels of emotion and intellect. And it swarms with sufficient melodrama of the blood-chilling, flesh-creeping sort to tingle the hide of the least brainy addict of out-right monster films. - 90
The A.V. Club
It’s haunting and beautiful at times, surprisingly playful at others, and like all great movies about magic, it has more than a few tricks up its sleeve. - 90
Time Out
Widely underrated, probably because of its strong comic elements and a tour-de-force scene derived from horror movie conventions, Bergman's chilling exploration of charlatanism is in fact one of his most genuinely enjoyable films. - 88
Chicago Reader
Set in the 19th century, it's one of Bergman's most tightly structured and frightening films. - 88
Chicago Tribune
Perhaps Bergman's most typical variation on one of his major themes: the clash between raffish theatrical artists and sober rulers. [10 Dec 2005, p.C4] - 75
Slant Magazine
This piquant control over cinematic grammar doesn’t quite rescue the film from a laughably zombie-tinged climax and an anomalous deus ex machina denouement, but it makes The Magician one of Bergman’s more accessible failures, and collapses any suspicious connection between him and the fretful Vogler. - 70
The New Yorker
This Ingmar Bergman film isn't a masterwork, or even a very good movie, but it is clearly a film made by a master.
