Derived from a medieval ballad, THE VIRGIN SPRING was director Ingmar Bergman's first film to win an Academy Award. The movie represents a return to simpler themes for Bergman after the philosophical complexity of THE SEVENTH SEAL and WILD STRAWBERRIES. On its most basic level, it's the story of violent crime violently avenged, but it can also be interpreted as a religious allegory on Christian forgiveness. A young girl, Karin (Birgitta Pettersson), is raped and killed by two herdsman on her way to church. Her foster sister, played by Gunnel Lindblom, witnesses the crime and reports back to Karin's parents (Max von Sydow and Birgitta Valberg) shortly after the perpetrators arrive at the couple's home seeking shelter for the night, unaware of their hosts' identity. Karin's grief-stricken father decides to take brutal revenge on his daughter's murderers. THE VIRGIN SPRING represents Bergman's first full collaboration with director of photography Sven Nykvist, who had previously worked as a co-director of photography on SAWDUST AND TINSEL.

This haunting story of a father's vengeance after the rape and murder of his daughter was inspired by a medieval ballad. A young girl is intercepted by three herdsmen on her way to church and is subsequently raped and killed by the two older men. Unaware of their hosts' identity, the shepherds unwittingly seek shelter at the home of the girls' parents, a peasant couple. When the father learns what has transpired, he plots his gruesome revenge. This film won director Ingmar Bergman his first Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film.

Theatrical Release: February 8, 1960 (Sweden); November 14, 1960 (U.S.)

Filmed on location at Styggeforsen and Skattungsbyn, Sweden, and at Råsunda Studios.

Winner of the International Critics Prize at the 1960 Cannes Film Festival.

The story for THE VIRGIN SPRING was derived from the 14th-century Swedish ballad "Töres Dotter I Vange."

The movie's rather brutal rape scene was edited for the U.S. release.

The film was voted One of the Year's Ten Best Films by the New York Times, the Herald Tribune, the Saturday Review, and Newsweek.

DVD Features:

Keep Case
Audio:
[unspecified] - Swedish
Subtitles - English - Optional
Additional Release Material:
Audio Commentary - Birgitta Steene - Ingmar Bergman scholar
Interviews - 1. Gunnel Lindblom - Actress
2. Birgitta Pettersson
Introduction - Ang Lee - filmmaker
Text/Photo Galleries:
Essay - film scholar Peter Cowie

Max Von Sydow: Swedish actor, director, THE EXORCIST
Brigitta Valberg: Actress/"Virgin Spring"
Gunnel Lindblom: Swedish Actress

Ingmar Bergman: Swedish Director/Screenwriter

"...One of Bergman's most austere films..."
"Shot in deceptively gorgeous black and white, this is the rare Bergman film in which the violence is as much physical as psychological." -- Grade: A
"The film is a seminal, Oscar-winning favorite..."