The influential book on the theory of cinema “Film Theory through the senses”, by Thomas Elsaesser and Malte Hagener, generated several audiovisual essays on each chapter. This essay begins with chapter 3, “The Face and the Mirror”, studying the theories which interpret the movie screen as a mirror where viewers can recognize themselves. It takes the films of Ingmar Bergman film as a case study. The recurring use of close-up seems to confirm, in Bergman, the importance of the screen as a reflection of the human emotions that overflow from the actors into the viewer of the film. However, a recurring look, straight into the camera, which characterizes so many iconic scenes by the Swedish director, confuses the viewer and destabilizes the safe, distantly secure position from which we usually watch a film. Focusing in particular on the example of “Persona” (1966), the essay discusses the “ontology of the screen” and helps us to understand the role of the close-up and the straight look into camera as central strategies not only of Bergman’s films, but also modern cinema itself. (TB)