Immigrating to America is a feat often fraught with many difficulties, no matter when it occurs in history. Whether it be issues with paperwork and wait time, biased government behavior, con artists looking to take advantage, or even just the journey itself and the risk of death that goes with it, immigrants have had to go through a lot of hardships just to make it over here (to say nothing of the hardships they face afterwards). Still, many have braved the trials of the journey just for the hope of opportunity and prosperity that America has, for so long, sold itself on. This week’s film shows the Swedish side of the immigration story and the sorts of issues that they had to face on their way to the new world. It’s quintessentially Swedish in style, being rather slow, quiet, and somewhat bleak in look, though the bleakness is mostly in the first half. In general, I found it to be a solid telling of this sort of story, though I did find certain choices odd, mainly the score, which often comes across as incongruous to what’s being portrayed on screen. I’ll get more into it later, so for now, I’ll give you a rundown of the story.
The film follows several people from a small Swedish community, with the main focus falling upon Karl and Kristina and their eventual family. Karl is the elder son of a farmer who has to take over the farm after said farmer breaks his leg. He and Kristina meet and get married not long after, which leads into a time skip where we see them in the present day, older and with many children. Sadly, farming hasn’t been going well for them, with a poor yield of crops and unpleasant weather, including a lightning storm that destroys their barn. Kristina puts her faith in God through all this hardship, but Karl is quick to dismiss matters of faith, instead looking at things practically. This causes tension between the two of them, especially when Karl won’t accept his part of the blame, namely when it comes to how many kids they have and that being a reason for their lack of sufficient food. Meanwhile, Karl’s brother Robert has never showed much interest in farming, instead being much more of a bookish “flight of fancy” type, but has had to take on a work contract with an abusive farmer who treats him, along with the other farmhand Arvid, terribly. Meanwhile again, Kristina’s uncle Danjel has been holding traditional Christian gatherings in his home, which flies in the face of the organized Church and causes him and his wife, Inga-Lena, to be prosecuted by the Dean. They are sentenced to exile, which seems bad at first, but it actually comes at a rather opportune time. You see, Robert and Arvid had been discussing running away to America in the hopes of something better but realized they didn’t have the money for it. Robert meets with Karl and offers to sell his part of the land to get some money for this scheme but is surprised to find out that Karl has been secretly thinking about taking his family to America as well. When Karl tells Kristina about this plan, she isn’t too pleased with it, as it would mean leaving their home and possibly dying trying to get to their new one. However, when one of their young daughters eats too much porridge and dies from a ruptured stomach, she decides to go along with Karl’s idea. Danjel and his followers, including the former prostitute Ulrika, decide to travel with Karl’s family as one big group, and Robert even gets Danjel to hire Arvid as an assistant so that he can come along too. The group get on-board a ship and set off for New York City, but encounter many challenges along the way, including rough seas, lice infestations (which Kristina blames on Ulrika, causing issues between them), various forms of disease, and several deaths, one of which was almost Kristina, who started bleeding massively from her nose at one point, though she managed to get through it. Sadly, Inga-Lena wasn’t so lucky, as she dies from what she claims is scurvy (though she says she found blood in her stool, and I’m not sure if that’s a symptom of that disease or not). Through all this hardship, the family do find a ray of hope, as an older couple on the boat claim that they are heading to Minnesota, where the land is good, or so they’ve been told, to join their son on his farm. While the husband of the two is sadly one of the casualties, Karl and the group decide to follow the wife on her trip to Minnesota. Will the group make it to their new land? Will there be more trials along the way? I’ll let you see that for yourself (though this film has a sequel, so it’s probably easy to guess). Now, let’s get on to my thoughts.
As I said, this film is very Swedish, being rather low-key and slowly paced, though not to Tarkovsky levels or anything. I think this sort of style does help the film, as it draws you more into the realistic situation of our characters, allowing you to feel what they’re feeling without overstating things. This tone, along with the writing and backstories, allows you to understand where our emigrant group is coming from, just a bunch of people that want to seek something better, whether it be freedom from persecution, a new life free from the one you were stuck in, or just a better version of what you had before. None of the major characters are wholly bad or good, you understand how much Karl wants a better life for his family in spite of how insensitive he can be at times, you can see why Danjel would view Ulrika as a holy entity even if she’s rather full of herself. Basically, you want to see these people succeed and reach their goals, which is an important quality in any story (or at least one’s of this nature), and the more down-to-earth and realistic presentation greatly enhances this. However, if there’s one major thing I want to bring up as a negative, it would be the score. Now, most of the film doesn’t have any music, sans a few diegetic songs, like the sea shanties that the ship’s crew sing. This actually helps the movie, I think, because it doesn’t overstate how the characters are feeling, and instead allows you to feel it all through their performances (as well as the writing and cinematography and such). At certain times throughout the movie, though, score music is present, and it’s very out of place in my eyes. The score has this quality to it that comes across like the film is trying to build suspense, but then nothing ever comes of all the tension the music is building to. For example, this sort of building music is used in a scene where the group is walking through the forest….and that’s it. Nothing happens to them, no injuries, no freakouts, not even a thief or bear attack. It’s such an odd choice, and all of the score music is like this. My only guess as to what they were going for is maybe that it’s meant to represent the uncertainty of their journey, but I can’t really be sure of that, as it never comes across like that’s what the film is going for. I noticed while looking in the credits for the double release, of this film and its sequel, that the composer changed in between movies. Maybe there was some sort of dispute over the music choice in the first film? Or maybe it was just because the composer retired after the first (it was his last film scored)? I’m not sure. Anyway, other than that, this is a very solid film. The cinematography is lovely, though, much like most elements of the film, isn’t overstated. I especially enjoyed the shot of the cloudy sky at dusk during the group’s trip up a river (slight spoilers, sorry), it hits that right balance of being dim enough to create an ambience, yet still bright enough that the image is readable. It was also cool to see performances from two Bergman regulars Max von Sydow and Liv Ullman, both of whom do a great job as usual. That’s about all I have to say on this film, so we’ll move on to my conclusion
While The Emigrants doesn’t tell a “new story” exactly, it does tell it well, and each group’s version of this story is worthwhile to see, since each and every one of them helped to form America. Now, there is a sequel to this film that was made right after this one and depicts the lives of our characters as they settle into their new home. I’ll probably cover it later on, though I’m not sure when, and it is included in a double release by Criterion, if you folks would want to look into the films yourself. So, until we return to this two-parter, take a journey with The Emigrants. It might not always be upbeat, but it’s an important trek worth going on.