Back in the 60’s when I was teaching in north Georgia, I used to drive into Atlanta every weekend and cruise Peachtree Street. For a callow lad from the mountains, the book stores, theaters and restaurants had all of the allure of a three-ring circus and I found myself in the midst of new, provocative and fascinating experiences every weekend. I ended up addicted to “fine arts” theaters that presented a venue of directors that I had never heard of: Fellini, Antonioni, Truffant, Jean-Luc Godard and Bergman. Certainly, those were not names that were common in Rhodes Cove nor had any of the films ever played the Ritz in Sylva.

The “fine arts” theaters were a little pretentious, I guess, but I liked the atmosphere: no popcorn or Goo-Goos in the lobby. We drank Mocha or exotic teas; admission was handled like some kind of offertory. Sometimes there were discussion groups after the films, and we sat around in the lobby and talked about motifs and Jungian archetypes. I loved it.

Last week, when I watched Bergman’s “Persona” again, I was reminded of a time (1960-l970) when films were something more than glamorous stars, slick plots and thunderous musical scores. For a decade, film actually became an intellectual pursuit. Frequently, the experience of watching a story unfold became a kind of unspoken dialogue between the audience and the director — a director who sometimes interrupted his own film to pose questions: “What do you think you are seeing?” Followed by the observation, “Perhaps I tricked you. Let’s watch the last scene again and change the inflection of the hero’s speech.” Suddenly, the audience discovers that they do not know what is real anymore.

“Persona” is a classic example of shifting reality. When the film begins we quickly learn that a famous actress (Liv Ullmann) has suddenly stopped speaking (she suddenly became silent in the midst of a performance) and her bewildered friends and associates don’t know how to deal with her. She ends up in a mental hospital where she is placed in the care of a young and inexperienced nurse (Bibi Andersson) who takes her patient to an isolated, ocean-side cottage. The story quickly becomes a study in duality. The nurse talks constantly — perhaps a nervous reaction to the silence of her patient. Despite her inability (or refusal) to speak, the actress is genial and the two women get on well together... at first. The nurse confides her inner-most secrets to her silent companion.

At one point, the nurse gives a long monologue that recounts a secret sexual adventure. She has been involved in a kind of mini-orgy at the beach involving a friend and two teenage boys. The nurse recounts the episode to Ullmann in graphic detail, noting that she was married and had to have an abortion afterwards. This remarkable confession may be one of the most erotic scenes in cinema but everyone is fully clothed. It gradually becomes apparent that the roles of the two women are being reversed. Who is the nurse and who is the patient? This is followed by scenes which may be dreams, but if they are ... who dreamed them?

A strange metamorphosis begins and the two women (who bear a superficial resemblance to each other) begin to acquire each other’s personalities. Even their features seem to merge and shift. Additional tension is added when the actress writes a series of letters to her friends, (Yes, she writes, but doesn’t speak) and gives them to the nurse to be mailed. One of the letters is not sealed (an accident or an intentional ploy?) and the nurse reads it. It contains references to the nurses’s behavior, noting that she seems to have a “crush” on her patient. Andersson feels ashamed and betrayed ... She confronts the silent actress and their relationship quickly escalates into a tense and volatile standoff.

The relationship between the two women becomes both sensual and frightening. Did the actress visit the nurse’s bedroom at night, or did one of the two “dream” the incident? Did the actress’ husband visit the cottage and mistake the nurse for his wife? (He is blind, or is this, too, merely imagined by the nurse?) All of this is interspersed with remembered sessions with a doctor — sessions that are repeated with subtle variations.

What is real then? “Persona” seems to suggest that reality can be manipulated in film. There is no single truth, and all is determined by changeable elements — darkness, light, weather, sex, age and gender can be manipulated on film. Bergman seems to be saying that your own “reality” is perhaps just as unreliable. How about your own persona? Is it inviolate or can it be changed? Is it genetic or created from experiences?

Throughout “Persona,” Bergman uses images that seem unrelated to the film: the crucifixion, holocaust scenes, film racing through a projector, volatile, jumping off the sprockets and burning. Ullman’s character seems haunted by scenes of television violence — Ullmann watches the self-immolation of a monk; there are recurring photographs of a young man that may or may not be her son — Why does she tear up his picture? Does she hate him as one monologue suggests? Is he deformed, or is that a fantasy of the nurse? (We are given two versions of the son’s birth.)

There are no easy answers in “Persona” — In fact, there may be no answers at all. At the end of the film the viewer may be just as perplexed as he was in the middle — we still don’t know why Ullmann stopped talking.

One of the final images in my VHS version is a shot of Bergman’s crew filming the movie we have just seen. It is a shock — a sudden, jolting reminder that we have, after all, been watching a film ... not a real event. That conclusion reminds me of another scene — this one in an Italian horror film. In this thriller, the mad slasher pursues his hysterical victims into a theater. Killer and victims burst through the screen and race into the audience. Then suddenly, the scene changes. The camera retreats and we are in another theater watching a film of a theater in which the mad slasher race, down the aisle. Of course, there is the final audience (us) watching all of this, and for a moment we have the uneasy feeling that the knife-wielding maniac is going to burst this final screen into the real world — whatever that is.

“Persona” is definitely not for everyone. If you like to have all of the problems resolved, a predictable plot, sweetness and light or justice served, this film is not for you. This is, as John Simon and Pauline Kael say, a film “for thinking people who love film.”