Carl Theodor Dreyer and Ordet: My Summer with the Danish Filmmaker

Chapter 6. The rain and the fiddle

The lip of Cay Kristiansen had healed. And Henrik Malberg was well again. Scenes were to be shot of mad Johannes leaving the house at night at the start of The Word. Preben Lerdorff’s collar had to be turned up in a special way, as Christ’s cloak, to frame his face; the coat was fixed in place by Fru Jensen with thread and needle. Sheep were to follow Johannes over the dune as he ducked under the clothesline. Then his father and brothers were to follow. Malberg was expected to stumble as he hurried up the hill. Cay was instructed for a full quarter of an hour in the manner of buttoning his jacket. Red filter “night” shots demanded a bright sun. Dreyer explained, “Because The Word is a realistic film, shadows, tones, lighting all must give characters a rounded and plastic The rain and the fiddle 6 Carl Theodor Dreyer and Ordet 52 appearance. It could not be done in the style, for example, of Murnau’s beautiful Faust, where the lighting had to originate from a single source in order to be allegorical, romantic.” Finally, the first important scene was to be attempted: the sermon of Johannes on the dunes. The day before, Lerdorff and Dreyer had already drawn into a kind of mental shell; in the evening, Dreyer took his coffee up to his room. He told me the scene required “complete isolation of the actor.” Only a skeleton crew would be on hand. Even Karen Petersen and Jesper Gottschalch were barred “so that Lerdorff can open up for the camera. He must not have the slightest distraction. He should feel no eyes are watching. Bendtsen and I must be regarded, at the most, as part of the apparatus. Then he can transmit directly.” Morning was announced with a thin volley of clouds. On the other side of the dunes, as Dreyer counted clouds, the hushed assembly waited near the sound truck. The gray covering thickened. Nothing was heard but the swell of the waves. Hours passed. The sun disappeared; then it rained. Reluctantly, Dreyer left for Borgensgaard, and Lerdorff returned to Vedersø Klit to rest. I followed Herr Dreyer, a distant ghost. Minutes ticked away. I watched him light a cigar, pacing up and down, going in the door and out, often peering through his little blue lens or framing a picture with his hands. Through the quiet air (I was now sitting in the kitchen), rain pattered on the roof. When I spoke with him he said, “Time is our cross.” The following day the company tried again. The scene lasted three minutes; therefore, Gottschalch measured open spaces The rain and the fiddle 53 in the sky. “Blow the dirty clouds off to Sweden,” Fru Petersen urged. The sound technicians grumbled, though they hoped Dreyer hadn’t heard. Hallelujah! A space in the sky suddenly appeared. It lengthened, freeing the sun. Bendtsen was able to take the scene twice. Immediately, the film was sealed in a can and put on the train at Ulfborg. In a shop there with Dreyer, we found a copy of Kaj Munk’s autobiography for only eight kroner (about one dollar). That afternoon, he and I took coffee with Fru Munk. She said Valdemar Kristensen had just informed her that he wanted to keep the name Borgensgaard for his farm, but he might have to get permission from the District Council, since in West Jutland there existed another Borgensgaard. After we left Fru Munk, we took a tour across the heath. Briskly, Dreyer climbed a hill to look out and contemplate . Then he asked, “Do you recall the story of Saint Veronica? How she met Jesus on the way to Calvary and gave him her veil to wipe away the sweat from his brow? His features became imprinted on the cloth. Now I truly see for my Jesus-film the screen—yes—an immense Veronica’s Handkerchief!” The company returned from location in a rye field, where the love scene between Anne and Anders was practiced. Copenhagen was on the telephone with serious news. Rushes from the important Johannes sermon had been developed—revealing a cut-off scrap of film lodged in the aperture of Bendtsen’s machine. It caused a heavy scratch that tore straight down the image, rendering it useless. This meant Carl Theodor Dreyer and Ordet 54 that all the opening shots had...