Cries and Whispers

Set in a Swedish mansion in the late nineteenth century, Cries and Whispers centres on three sisters who return to the family home as one of them, Agnes, lies dying of cancer. Maria and Karin arrive expecting to keep a deathbed vigil, but each is caught up in her own troubles, and the old resentments and jealousies between them surface during the final days. The household servant, Anna, turns out to be the one person able to offer Agnes real tenderness and care.

Ingmar Bergman wrote and directed the film, his eighteenth feature in a career that runs from The Passion of Anna in 1969 to Scenes from a Marriage in 1974. He also produced it with Lars-Owe Carlberg. Harriet Andersson plays Agnes, with Ingrid Thulin and Liv Ullmann as her sisters, Kari Sylwan as Anna, and Erland Josephson and Georg Årlin in supporting roles. The credited cast runs to twenty-one performers.

Cries and Whispers drew a critics' rating of 9 out of 10 from 36 reviews, placing it above its standing with general audiences, who rate it 7.9 out of 10 on IMDb from roughly 40,000 votes and the same score on TMDB from a much smaller base. It runs 95 minutes and was released in December 1972.