'The Wolf Hour') is a 1968 Swedish psychological horror[n 1] film directed by Ingmar Bergman and starring Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann.

The story explores the disappearance of fictional painter Johan Borg (von Sydow), who lived on an island with his wife Alma (Ullmann) while plagued with frightening visions and insomnia.

He shares sketches with Alma of frightening visions he has had, and begins to give them names, including the Birdman, the Insects, the Meat-Eaters, the Schoolmaster, and the Lady With a Hat.

Heerbrand, one of von Merkens's guests, shows up at the couple's house to invite them to another party at the castle, adding that Veronica Vogler is among the invitees.

As he rushes through the castle searching for Veronica, he meets Lindhorst, who applies cosmetics to his pale face and dresses him in a silk robe.

[12] Psychiatrist Barbara Young writes that Hour of the Wolf, like Persona, was about "the disintegration of a personality" (also rejecting Gado's commentary on "Bergman's own unraveling" and instead praising his courage for addressing his issues).

[17] Williams links the artistic visions with "oppression by a group of aristocrats", as the castle's people become vampire-like and "the unreality of Johan's world takes over".

[18] Scholar Egil Törnqvist compares what he saw as vampirism in Hour of the Wolf to that in Persona, adding that the portrayals are similar to themes in the work of playwright August Strindberg.

Thomas wrote, "the von Merkens et al. are manifestations of Johan's own self-loathing, and Alma, because she loves him, must be present at her husband's phantasmagorical inquisition".

[23] While recognizing insanity as a major theme, writer José Teodoro argues another (shared with Bergman's later Shame and The Passion of Anna) is "the realization that it is impossible for any one person to truly know another", with Alma realizing she never understood her husband.

[8] Authors have related the story's couple to Bergman's real-life relationships: Thomas theorizes that during production Ullmann was "'at peace' with the world, while her genius boyfriend was not".

[3][33] Professor Fabio Pezzetti Tonion writes that the film's "stylistic ciphers" create "friction between objective and subjective elements".

[8] In establishing its mythology, including the boy Johan struggles with and tales of a little person in the closet, Kat Ellinger of the British Film Institute argues Hour of the Wolf draws on folklore.

[40] An external influence was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's The Magic Flute, with the opera's character Papageno transformed into an evil Birdman.

[44] The term was defined by Bergman in an explanatory note in his screenplay: The hour between night and dawn ... when most people die, sleep is deepest, nightmares are most real.

[25] According to Professor Birgitta Steene, the title is drawn from Swedish folklore, where the "hour of the wolf" refers to the period from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m., supposedly when the most deaths and births occur.

[57][n 4] Erland Josephson was busy as a managing director of the Royal Dramatic Theatre, but desired a role in Hour of the Wolf, having seen earlier versions of the Cannibals screenplay and deciding a frightening film would be fun.

[57] According to von Sydow, Bergman wanted to film the dinner table scene in one take, for the "continuity" actors experience in stage plays.

[59] During production Ullmann left for Norway to give birth, and returned to shoot her last scenes wearing a pillow under her clothes.

[57] Prologue and epilogue scenes along the line of Persona's, acknowledging the story as a work of cinema, were mostly cut during post-production because Bergman felt they became too personal.

[69] It grossed approximately $250,000 in the U.S.[2] At the New York Bergman Festival in May–June 1995, a version was screened with a prologue that had been deleted from previous releases, claiming the film is based on a diary.

[71] MGM released Hour of the Wolf on DVD both in the U.S. and the UK in single-disc editions and as part of a box set including Shame, The Passion of Anna, The Serpent's Egg and Persona.

Svenstedt of Svenska Dagbladet criticizing Bergman for preaching his message and Dagens Nyheter's Mauritz Edström writing viewers could not identify with the film.

[36] In 1968, Renata Adler from The New York Times opined that it is "not one of Bergman's great films", but positively reviewed the acting of von Sydow, Ullmann and Thulin.

[75] Roger Ebert rated Hour of the Wolf three out of four, calling it "a difficult film, and not altogether a successful one", and crediting Bergman with achieving "deeply emotional results with very stark, almost objective, scenes".

[76] In New York, Judith Crist called it "a minor effort" from Bergman, not adding much to his past filmography, while crediting it for "stark intellectualizing and lush fantasizing".

[77] Time hailed von Sydow as "gothically brilliant" and stated the film cemented Ullmann's position as one of the foremost Scandinavian actresses, also crediting Sven Nykvist for "phosphorescent" cinematography.

[81] The New Yorker recalled it in 1999 as "probably the darkest of Ingmar Bergman’s journeys into his shadowy interior", mentioning the "ferocity" of the scene where Johan murders a boy.

[82] In 2000 Kim Newman of Empire Online praised Hour of the Wolf as "one of the most sinisterly beautiful black-and-white horror films you will ever see".

Author Jerry Vermilye wrote that in exploring "the thread of violence intruding on ordinary lives," Hour of the Wolf, Shame and The Passion of Anna represent a trilogy.