When Ingmar met Woody

Bergman's death has been a godsend (couldn't resist that one) for Libération, forever eager to find ways to pad out their summertime editions. They lead with a full-page photo, as they did on the deaths of Jacques Derrida, Jean Baudrillard and Lucie Aubrac, and they follow with seven pages of analysis and interviews, with French directors such as André Techiné and Olivier Assayas. Interesting is Liv Ullmann recounting the 1995 meeting between Woody Allen and his Swedish idol, the only one that ever took place. Neither men spoke a word, despite having been keen to meet, and they then profusely thanked Ullmann for arranging the meeting. Poor Michel Serrault, ten years Bergman's younger, who also died yesterday, a formidable comic actor, best known for his roles in Louis Malle's Milou en mai, Bertrand Blier's Buffet froid and Claude Sautet's Nelly & M. Arnaud, was relegated to page 22, though he did merit two pages of homages.