“Scenes from a Marriage (1974)” is about adult war babies
Scenes from a Marriage (1974) or Scener ur ett äktenskap (original title) is Ingmar Bergman looking at upper-class war babies. The temptation to spoil boy war babies after one of “greatest” wars in this galaxy must have been irresistible.
Erland Josephson, his character, states explicitly:
You and I have taken refuge in a hermetically sealed existence.
Viewed under the shadows the post-war ruins, this fictional man is stating the obvious. Parents and/or children need to be over-protective of innocence. But, in its time, just after the counter-cultural pop, pomp and poetry of the 1960s, statements like these were interpreted as expressions of individuality, post-1950s consumer-cultural individuality.
The typical product acquired by such a sheltered man is a younger woman—and the plot moves forward…