Usually when Woody borrows an idea from Bergman he makes that idea his own, and turns it into something that's clever yet funny and entertaining. It is definitely not the case here. This looks like a Woody Allen parody,made by an unskilled director, totally unrealistic since X loves Y who loves Z who loves A and who in turn loves X to make the circle complete. We have a bunch of clichés thrown in among which the poor little daughter who lived her whole life in the mother's shadow was already brilliantly analyzed on screen by Bergman's Autumn Sonata (with Ingrid Bergman not this crazy old hag with artistic claims). The actors are for the most part quite OK, but what's the use of that? This is a gimmick meant for the soap opera admirers. The "postmodern", intertextual stuff that works incredibly well in movies such as Love and Death, Deconstructing Harry, Hannah and her Sisters etc. completely fails here making the characters appear like frustrated morons too intelligent to be clever. In the end nothing happens, we find ourselves after an hour and a half of murky bore at an abrupt end that took us nowhere. The music was the only thing that saved this movie from a total disaster, Art Tatum works good anywhere, but again, what's the use?... Boring cinematography, all dark and uninspired, too claustrophobic and I really don't care it's what they intended. Check Nykvist's cinematography in the aforementioned Autumn Sonata, or the same Nykvist in Woody's Crimes and Misdemenaors.