Max von Sydow Movies
Standing over six feet-four inches tall, the bony Swedish actor Max von Sydow spent much of his acting career portraying stern, oppressive characters. Born to a family of academics in Lund, Sweden, von Sydow studied at the Royal Dramatic School in Stockholm, where he made his screen debut in Only a Mother and married his first wife, actress Christina Olin. In 1956, he moved to Malmö and met director Ingmar Bergman at the Malmo Municipal Theatre. After starring in The Seventh Seal, von Sydow went on to star in more than a dozen films with Bergman, including Wild Strawberries, Virgin Spring, Through a Glass Darkly, and Winter Light. He worked almost exclusively with Bergman's acting company until 1965, when he took the role as Jesus in George Stevens' epic The Greatest Story Ever Told. This part opened the door to American films, where he was often typecast in strong, humorless roles, like the rigid missionary Abner Hale in Hawaii. In the '70s, he went back to Sweden to work with Bergman in four more films and appeared opposite frequent co-star Liv Ullmann in Jan Troell's two-part saga The Emigrants and The New Land. It wasn't until 1973 that he made his first big Hollywood blockbuster with the role of Father Merrin The Exorcist, which he reprised in Exorcist II: The Heretic. Moving to Rome in the '80s, von Sydow had a fun role as Ming the Merciless in Flash Gordon, played Barbara Hershey's intense artist boyfriend in Hannah and Her Sisters, and received his first Oscar nomination and numerous other awards for his work in Pelle the Conqueror (1988). After making his directorial debut with Katinka, he worked in several theater projects and a couple of biblical TV miniseries (Sampson & Delilah and Quo Vadis). It was during this time that he was cast as the devil in the Stephen King film adaptation Needful Things, marking von Sydow as the only actor to play both God and Satan. He also appeared in Judge Dredd and Wim Wenders' Until the End of the World. He continued acting sporadically in Hollywood for What Dreams May Come and Snow Falling on Cedars. Moving on to the international circuit, he appeared in Intacto (Spain), Vercingetorix (France), and Non ho Sonno (Italy). In 2002, he co-starred with Tom Cruise for the Steven Spielberg blockbuster Minority Report.He continued to work steadily throughout the decade in projects as diverse as Rush Hour 3, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, and Shutter Island. Coming nearly sixty years after his earliest film work, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close earned the venerable actor his second Oscar nomination - a Best Supporting Actor nod for his portrayal of a mute grandfather. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi
- 1982
- R
John Milius's jingoistic direction and pulpy screenplay fit perfectly into this film version of the Robert E. Howard fantasy story of the sword and sorcery hero, Conan the Barbarian. Complementing Mulius's heavy metal production is Arnold Schwarzenegger's leaden acting, which in any other context would be deadly, but here (as in The Terminator) corresponds nicely with the whole sonorous project. The story begins when a horde of rampaging warriors massacre the parents of young Conan and enslave the young child for years on The Wheel of Pain. The Wheel of Pain seems to have as its only purpose the building up of Conan's muscles, so it's no surprise that one day Conan grows up to become Arnold Schwarzenegger. As the sole survivor of the childhood massacre, Conan is released from slavery and taught the ancient arts of fighting. Transforming himself into a killing machine, Conan travels into the wilderness to seek vengeance on Thulsa Doom (James Earl Jones), the man responsible for killing his family. In the wilderness, Conan takes up with the thieves Valeria (Sandahl Bergman) and Subota (Gerry Lopez). The trio comes upon a weird snake cult, linked to Doom, and Conan wants to trek off to Doom's mountain retreat to kill him. But he is prevented from doing that by King Osrik (Max Von Sydow), who wants the trio of warriors to help rescue his daughter who has joined Doom in the hills. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Starring:
- Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Earl Jones, (more)
- 1982
Based on the novel by Per Olaf Sundman, Ingenjör Andrées Luftfärd (Flight of the Eagle) tells the real-life story of a Swedish engineer's attempted expedition to the North Pole in a hot air balloon. Jan Troell directs this over two-hour adventure drama set in 1897. Max Von Sydow stars as Salomon August Andrée, the engineer who leads the tragic journey in a balloon called The Ornen (The Eagle). He is accompanied by explorers Nils Strindberg (Goran Stangertz) and Knut Fraenkel (Sverre Anker Ousdal). Ingenjör Andrées Luftfärd was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film in the 1983 Academy Awards. Using his experiences making this film, Troell went on to make the hour-long documentary En Frusen Drom (Their Frozen Dream) in 1998 with archival information from the remains of the expedition found in 1930 on an island near the North Pole. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi
- Starring:
- Max von Sydow, Göran Stangertz, (more)
- 1982
In this well-acted but very standard action thriller, Spanish police chief O'Donnell Max von Sydow) hires the tough mercenary David (Jorge Rivero) with the code name "Eagle" to infiltrate an international drug cartel. Carmen (Maud Adams), a policewoman, is to be David's contact. The plot thickens as the drug smugglers, headed by McFadden (George Peppard), also plan on selling nuclear materials to countries like Libya. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Jorge Rivero, Maud Adams, (more)
John Huston directed this exciting World War II action film, which culminates in a rousing soccer game. In a German prisoner of war camp, Major Karl von Steiner (Max Von Sydow), the camp commander, once a member of the German national soccer team, decides to put together a soccer match between a team of Allied prisoners, led by Captain John Colby (Michael Caine), a former English international soccer player. The game is to be played in Colombes Stadium in Paris and exploited for maximum propaganda effect by the Nazi publicity machine. Robert Hatch (Sylvester Stallone) is enlisted to assist the Allied prisoners to train for the event. But, in fact, the Allies are planning a risky escape during the soccer match. Famed Brazilian soccer great Pele makes an appearance in the film, along with Bobby Moore, the captain of Britain's 1966 World Cup champions, and Argentine soccer star Osvaldo Ardiles. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Starring:
- Sylvester Stallone, Michael Caine, (more)
- 1981
Director Robert Dornhelm casts Bud Cort for alter-ego purposes in She Dances Alone. Cort plays a documentary director, seeking to produce a film on the life of controversial ballet star Vaslav Nijinsky. He finds his goal of objectivity blocked by Nijinsky's elderly real-life daughter Kyra, who is as stocky as her father was sylph-like. Kyra's uncompromising insistence on total control over the project literally shapes (and frequently distorts) the film before our eyes. Adding to the Pirandellian atmosphere of the Australian-produced She Dances Alone is Max Von Sydow, also playing "himself." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Bud Cort, Patrick Dupond, (more)
- 1980
- R
Director Bertrand Tavernier provides an unexpected feminist slant to the otherwise standard sci-fi trappings of Death Watch. Harvey Keitel plays a man of the future who has had a camera implanted in his brain. The mechanism, which is endowed with special X-ray properties, is activated by the user's eyes. Keitel is assigned by ruthless TV producer Harry Dean Stanton to secretly probe the subconscious of a dying woman, played by Romy Schneider. Stanton is only interested in the grim spectacle of what goes on inside the brain of someone who knows she's doomed. Keitel, on the other hand, becomes increasingly compassionate--and disgusted by the tawdriness of his assignment--as he stares into Schneider's tortured psyche. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Romy Schneider, Harvey Keitel, (more)
Heroic earthling Flash Gordon saves the world from the nefarious Ming the Merciless in this lavish, intentionally campy adaptation of the famous sci-fi comic strip. The story is as basic as space operas get: Ming (Max von Sydow) has developed a plan to destroy the Earth, and Flash (Sam J. Jones) and his attractive companion, Dale Arden (Melody Anderson), are called upon to stop him. Along the way, Flash must battle Ming's goons and the temptations of a luscious space princess. Previously the basis for a more straight-faced 1930s adventure serial, Flash's story is mined here for exaggerated, cartoon humor by screenwriter Lorenzo Semple Jr., a central figure in the similarly campy '60s Batman television series. The simplistic plot mainly serves as an excuse for spectacular sets and cartoonish action sequences, all set to an appropriately over-the-top rock score by Queen. Certainly not a film to turn to for serious excitement, fine performances, or character development, Flash Gordon has nevertheless developed an appreciative cult of fans who admire the film's humorous approach and the detailed, colorful production design. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi
- Starring:
- Sam Jones, Melody Anderson, (more)
This film showed up on TV as Forbidden Paradise, but you can't fool us. It's really The Hurricane, producer Dino De Laurentiis' ill-advised remake of the 1938 Sam Goldwyn production of the same name. The story of the casual cruelties imposed by the white ruling class on the natives of the isle of Manakoora had the advantage of timeliness in 1938; forty-one years later, the story plays like a Gilligan's Island amateur production of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Playing the old Jon Hall role of the native lad whose rambunctiousness incurs the wrath of the provincial governor, the uniquely ungifted Daton Kane makes Hall look like Sir John Gielgud. Even the expensive hurricane finale (which ate up most of the film's $22 million budget) isn't one-tenth as exciting as the corresponding sequence in the earlier film. The saddest aspect of the 1979 The Hurricane is that it was directed by Jan Troell, who showed flashes of brilliance in his earlier The Emigrants and Zandy's Bride; perhaps significantly, Troell hightailed it back to Sweden after wrapping up his obligation to Dino De Laurentiis. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Jason Robards, Jr., Mia Farrow, (more)
- 1978
- R
What if General George S. Patton didn't die in a car accident, as history tells us, but at the hands of a paid assassin? That's the premise of Brass Target, another in a series of espionage thrillers, like The Eagle Has Landed, that speculates on the fates of real-life figures from World War II. Robert Vaughn, Ed Bishop, and Edward Herrmann are three Allied officers in occupied Germany who steal Nazi gold with the help of OSS officer Patrick McGoohan. Patton (George Kennedy) personally supervises the investigation of the theft, assisted by Major Joe DeLuca (John Cassavetes). Soon, however, a professional assassin (Max Von Sydow) is on their trail, Patton is killed on the orders of his own staff, and only DeLuca and his lover (Sophia Loren), who is also involved with the assassin, are left alive for the finale. ~ Don Kaye, Rovi
- Starring:
- Sophia Loren, John Cassavetes, (more)
Four years after her bout of demonic possession, Regan MacNeil seems at peace as she enjoys a privileged but lonely adolescence. Her actress mother, absent on-location, leaves her in the care of her childhood nanny, Sharon, who feels inextricably bound to her young charge despite the terror she endured during the girl's possession. Regan attends frequent counseling sessions with Dr. Gene Tuskin, an unorthodox psychologist who believes Regan remembers more of her ordeal than she admits. Meanwhile, Father Lamont, a protégé of the priest who died exorcising Regan, is called to investigate the death of his mentor. The Church is divided over the teachings of Father Merrin and wants to gather documentation of his views about demonic existence. Father Lamont himself is conflicted -- haunted by images of a possessed woman he could not save. As he and Dr. Tuskin become convinced that the demon still exhibits a hold on Regan, the priest sojourns to Africa in search of Kokuma, who as a boy was possessed by the same demon and exorcised by Father Merrin. Learning the true name and ancient origins of his supernatural foe, Lamont returns to America to stage a climactic battle for Regan's soul. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi
- Starring:
- Linda Blair, Richard Burton, (more)
- 1977
This 1977 documentary feature closely examines the person, views and life of Norwegian actress Liv Ullman, perhaps best known for her many appearances in the famed Swedish director Ingmar Bergman's films. Clips of her films are included, as well as numerous interviews granted by her especially for this film, which was released shortly after her autobiography Changing was published. This documentary is subtitled: "Norway's Live Ullman/Liv Ullmann's Norway." ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- 1977
- PG
Dick Richards directed this French Foreign Legion adventure that's at once parodies and pays tribute to the venerable Hollywood epics that preceded it. Gene Hackman stars as Major William Sherman Foster, a soldier who has been kicked out of West Point but has managed to obtain command of a group of Legionnaires after the end of World War I. His troops have been ordered to accompany an archeological expedition traveling to Morocco headed by Francois Marneau (Max von Sydow). Foster's motley band includes an on-the-lam cat burglar named Marco Segrain (Terence Hill), an ex-guardsman from the deposed Russian monarchy named Ivan (Jack O'Halloran), an adventure-seeking aristocrat named Fred Hastings (Paul Sherman), and an alluring beauty named Simone Picard (Catherine Deneuve). As the band makes their way to Morocco, they cross paths with the fervid and bloodthirsty Arab leader El Krim (Ian Holm), who vows to unite his people to expel foreigners from their land. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Starring:
- Gene Hackman, Terence Hill, (more)
- 1976
- R
Arturo Ripstein directs Foxtrot, a drama filmed in Mexico that borrows much material from The Rules of the Game. Wealthy European aristocrat Liviu (Peter O'Toole) and his wife, Julia (Charlotte Rampling) escape the harsh reality of WWII by vacationing on a tropical island. Due to unforeseen circumstances involving their ship, they end up stranded on the island along with their servants, Eusebio (Jorge Luke) and Larsen (Max Von Sydow). They run around lawlessly and slowly run out of food. Soon the servants revolt and the wealthy couple discover that they can't escape the war. Foxtrot was released with additional footage under the title The Other Side of Paradise. Features the title song written by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi
- Starring:
- Peter O'Toole, Charlotte Rampling, (more)
Often described as "Ship of Fools with a conscience," Voyage of the Damned is based on a true story. In 1939, the Nazis ostentatiously loaded a luxury liner with hundred of Jewish refugees from all walks of life. The ship then tried to drop anchor in Havana, Cuba-only to have its passengers refused entry by the Cuban government, in keeping with its super-stringent immigration policies. This was exactly what the Nazis expected to happen, and indeed wanted to happen. By having the refugees turned away from Havana, the German government could "prove" that the Jews were indeed the most unwanted race on earth, thereby justifying Hitler's extermination policy. The crosssection of humanity on board the ship includes the requisite big-time stars: Faye Dunaway as a monocle-sporting countess and Oscar Werner as Dunaway's society-doctor husband; professor Luther Adler and his wife Wendy Hiller; poverty-stricken Nehemiah Persoff and Maria Schell, who hope to be reunited with their "fallen" daughter Katherine Ross; disbarred attorney Sam Wanamaker and his family (wife Lee Grant, daughter Lynne Frederick); anti-Nazi captain Max Von Sydow; and so on. Representing the Cuban government are president Fernando Rey and bureaucrat Jose Ferrer; other Havana denizens include businessman Orson Welles and minister James Mason. Despite its morbid overtones, Voyage of the Damned ends on a faintly positive note. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Faye Dunaway, Max von Sydow, (more)
- 1976
- R
Francesco Rosi utilizes the breathtakingly beautiful Italian landscape in an unspecified Italian city to hatch this mystery film involving murder and corruption in high places. As the film begins, a well-known prosecutor is killed. The murder turns out to be the first in a series of murders -- and all the victims are judges. With Italy lapsing into chaos because of the crimes, the craggy and careworn Inspector Rogas (Lino Ventura) is brought in to solve the murders. Rogas thinks that a man, sent to prison for a crime he didn't commit, is the person responsible for the killings. But when Rogas reports that fact to his superiors, they want nothing to do with the case. When more killings occur, Rogas uncovers a plot involving his superiors who are using one man's revenge murder as a ploy in order to affect nefarious changes on the entire country. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Starring:
- Lino Ventura, Alain Cuny, (more)
With fear and trepidation, the military division encamped in a desert fort await the return of a Tartar army--which attacked the fort years ago. One young soldier (Jacques Perrin), however, can't wait for the boredom to end and the fighting to begin. Ennio Morricone provided the musical score. ~ John Bush, Rovi
- Starring:
- Vittorio Gassman, Giuliano Gemma, (more)
- 1975
Swedish director Hans Alfredson adapted his own novel Pojken i Vattnet into Ägget är löst!, this musical tragicomedy starring Max von Sydow as The Father, the patriarch of a seemingly nameless family. A factory owner whose workers transform eggs into specialized tools for scratching certain unreachable human itches, The Father rules both his business and his family with an iron fist. So when The Son (Gösta Ekman) rebels against him, it comes as no surprise that The Father doesn't take it very well. In fact, the two end up squaring off to see who can kill the other first. Birgitta Andersson and Anna Godenius also star. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi
- Starring:
- Gösta Ekman, Jr., Max von Sydow, (more)
"His code name is Condor. In the next 24 hours, everyone he trusts will try to kill him." As the ads ominously announced, a low-level spook confronts the unfathomable in Sydney Pollack's 1975 political thriller, adapted from the James Grady novel Six Days of the Condor. CIA researcher Joe Turner (Robert Redford) returns from lunch to find the entire staff of his small New York office assassinated. When he meets his boss (Cliff Robertson) at another location to tell him what happened, someone tries to shoot Turner as well. On the run from the cops and his agency, a desperate Turner resorts to holing up with innocent civilian Kathy (Faye Dunaway), who becomes his only ally. Joe decides to save himself the only way possible -- by going to The New York Times. But will it work? One of a cycle of conspiracy films from the 1970s that also included The Parallax View (1974) and Redford's All the President's Men (1976), Three Days of the Condor pits a working everyman (albeit a CIA everyman) against a far-reaching conspiracy, as it also criticizes the CIA during a period of increasing publicity about federal wrongdoing, from the Pentagon Papers through Watergate and other congressional investigations. The challenge of negotiating New York City, shot on location, becomes one more sign of the forces that Joe must face. With its timely subject matter, taut suspense, and sympathetic Redford hero, Three Days of the Condor became a substantial hit. Balancing the conspiracy cycle's pessimism with a margin of attenuated hope, Three Days of the Condor suggests that one man can still discover the truth, but whether it helps him remains to be seen. ~ Lucia Bozzola, Rovi
- Starring:
- Robert Redford, Faye Dunaway, (more)
- 1975
Based on the story by Mikhail Bulgakov, this Italian film tells the story of Preobrazhensky (Max Von Sydow), a surgeon, who is a professor of medicine in Moscow. Because he occupies a "big" 5-room apartment, after the Russian revolution is thoroughly in place, he is visited by the housing committee, who feels that he should share this spaciousness with several others. In an experiment he implants a dog with the heart and brain of a tramp. The dog gradually transforms into a man (Cochi Ponzoni), but still has some doggy attitudes: for instance, in the original story he chooses to call himself Sharikov (in the film he is called Bobikov). Since Sharik is a common Russian dog name, just as "Rex" might be in the West, it is clear where the man-dog's sympathies lie. Bobikov becomes associated with the local Party officialdom, and begins to terrorize the professor and his assistant, Dr. Bormental (Mario Adorf). After he becomes a member of the housing committee, he wangles a room in the professor's apartment. And after becoming a member of a state committee to deal with stray animals, Bobikov refuses to allow dogs to be killed, only cats. Bulgakov's works were very hard to find in Russia. After perestroika people began reading them for the first time, and were amazed to discover how daringly he criticized the emerging Soviet system. This Italian production is perhaps not the most successful realization of the story: a Russian TV version was made in 1987. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Max von Sydow, Eleonora Giorgi, (more)
- 1975
- R
This lively action-adventure, is set in the near future where the population of New York has been decimated by a terrible plague. The city is terrorized by violent street-gangs running amok. The tale centers on one leader who insists on keeping vast stores of potential valuables and a helpful wanderer who single-handedly takes on the gangs to help a scientist and his pregnant wife. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- 1975
A Trompe L'Oeil is something which fools the eye, a harmless illusion, something which clearly cannot be what it appears to be. This suspense drama is about a woman who has reason to be afraid and suspicious but cannot get anyone to take her fears seriously. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Max von Sydow, Micheline Presle, (more)
Abstract images produced with an electronic video mix -- as well as the surrealist paintings of artist Mati Klarwein -- highlight this adaptation of the literary classic by Herman Hesse. Max von Sydow stars as Harry Haller, a self-absorbed, misanthropic writer contemplating the duality of his nature as both a social outsider disenchanted with the chaos and disorder of the everyday world and an inner "steppenwolf." Planning to commit suicide by the age of 50, Haller seeks a reconciliation of these different aspects of the self, while encountering a mysterious woman who leads him into a magical realm where his efforts to achieve redemption may be realized through a metaphysical transcendence. Whether it is mental illness, narcotics, or an authentically supernatural experience that overtakes Haller remains unclear. Essentially as plotless as Hesse's source novel, Steppenwolf (1974) was mostly memorable for its avant garde visuals, which made it a favorite of youthful audiences seeking hallucinogenic cinematic experiences such as those in the final half hour of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). ~ Karl Williams, Rovi
- Starring:
- Max von Sydow, Dominique Sanda, (more)
Novelist William Peter Blatty based his best-seller on the last known Catholic-sanctioned exorcism in the United States. Blatty transformed the little boy in the 1949 incident into a little girl named Regan, played by 14-year-old Linda Blair. Suddenly prone to fits and bizarre behavior, Regan proves quite a handful for her actress-mother, Chris MacNeil (played by Ellen Burstyn, although Blatty reportedly based the character on his next-door neighbor Shirley MacLaine). When Regan gets completely out of hand, Chris calls in young priest Father Karras (Jason Miller), who becomes convinced that the girl is possessed by the Devil and that they must call in an exorcist: namely, Father Merrin (Max von Sydow). His foe proves to be no run-of-the-mill demon, and both the priest and the girl suffer numerous horrors during their struggles. The Exorcist received a theatrical rerelease in 2000, in a special edition that added 11 minutes of footage trimmed from the film's original release and digitally enhanced Chris Newman's Oscar-winning sound work. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Linda Blair, Ellen Burstyn, (more)
- 1972
- PG
This is the second installment of the Swedish epic which began with The Emigrants. Nybyggarna is a chronicle of the life and times of the Swedish immigrants in Minnesota, covering the time period up to and beyond the Civil War. Even though they did not come to America to become Americans, they are gradually drawn into the culture of their new country. Father Karl-Oskar Nilsson (Max Von Sydow) and his wife Kristina (Liv Ullman) battle the elements and political changes in order to survive. The family members have little contact with their neighbors, and because they know so little English, they have difficulty buying things from the nearby general store. Robert (Eddie Axberg), Karl's younger brother, wants to find gold and travels westward with Arvid (Pierre Lindstedt), the Nilsson's strange and skittish farmhand. The two lavish epics, The Emigrants and The New Land were the two most expensive films made in Sweden up to that time. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Max von Sydow, Liv Ullmann, (more)
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