There are some images that become permanently engraved on your memory. One such might be the planting of this spindly tree by an old man on his birthday. Another might be the skeletal remains of a house on fire, blazing and smoking, as a figure sits slumped on the muddied ground some distance away, transfixed by it. These and other striking compositions await all who revel in THE SACRIFICE’s slow takes, bleak scenery, and heavy questions of mortality, faith, and certain apocalypse. Clearly inspired by Bergman, THE SACRIFICE’s setting (a remote Swedish island), cast (Bergman favorite Erland Josephson), and cinematography (by Sven Nykvist) function as homage, but not as copy. Simultaneously nightmarish and breathtaking, Tarkovsky’s last film stands alone as the poetic final meditation of a master filmmaker, whose confrontation with his own mortality coincided with the film’s conception.

7:00 PM, 149 min.

Harvard Film Archive
Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts
24 Quincy Street
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138

$9 – Regular Admission
$7 – Non-Harvard Students, Harvard Faculty and Staff, and Senior Citizens
Free for all Harvard students with a valid photo ID.
Discounts apply for HFA Members

Part of Time Within Time: The Complete Andrei Tarkvosky.