The Seventh
Seal, written (play and screenplay) and directed by Ingmar Bergman
10 out of
10
This is not
just one of the best films of all time, as attested among others by The New
York Times, with its list of Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made - https://www.listchallenges.com/new-york-times-best-1000-movies-ever-made/list/20
- it is a classic that is presented within other motion pictures and some
scenes have become iconic, part of the History of Cinema, just like the genius
film maker Ingmar Bergman, author of other masterpieces, such as Fanny and
Alexander - http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/fanny-and-alexander-by-ingmar-bergman.html
- a work of art that struck the under signed as the best ever, when seen for
the first time.
We could
argue that most of the films that Ingmar Bergman has written, directed or both
are such wonderful achievements as to be used in Art School…think of Through a
Glass Darkly - http://realini.blogspot.com/2019/05/through-glass-darkly-written-and.html
- or the remarkable feature that proves
that the Master can create both drama and comedy, Smiles of a Summer Night - http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/02/smiles-of-summer-night-written-and.html
- or to stop here with examples, The Virgin Spring - http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/the-virgin-spring-written-by-ulla.html...
Aside from
the tremendous skill of the incredible writer-director, The Seventh Seal
benefits from a superb, divine cast,
with legendary Max von Sydow as Antonius Block, The Knight, resplendent
Gunnar Bjornstrand as The Squire, Jons, the amazing Bibi Andersson as Mary,
symbolically the mother of an infant, the archetype of life, set against Death,
the character that haunts The Knight, shows on the screen from the very first
scenes, plays chess with the main personage, engages in sophisticated,
philosophical exchanges with Antonius Block, the one who has the chance to
postpone with some moves on the table the fate and might remind one of the hilarious
Monty Python’s Meaning of Life - http://realini.blogspot.com/2017/05/monty-pythons-meaning-of-life-by-graham.html
- wherein ‘a Mr. Death shows up at a party where he has to take guests and
hosts alike, presumably on account of some poisoned salmon or another dish, but
he is aghast at the manner in which he is addressed by Americans and others…’Well,
you are dead, so shut up!’
Evidently,
The Seventh Seal is the opposite of any Monty Python production, glorious and
intelligent as they are, in that the tone is grave, depressing, the film is black
and white, the attitude is gloomy, though we have inserted mirthful moments,
such as when the blacksmith is fooled – yet again – into believing the man who
had run with his wife is in such dire straits, let us not reveal details, that
he comes to feel pity and sorry for the one whom he had just wanted to kill and
before that torture…
It is a ‘rara
avis’, one of those few magnum opera that deals with the most important questions
of all, Meaning of Life, does the devil know, talk to God – the Knight tries to
help a witch (well, what idiots that would vote with Trump today consider to be
a witch and in fact a handsome, young woman) that is condemned to be burned at
the stake, giving her water and something to alleviate, even make her pain disappear,
perhaps with some herbs, opium from the Orient, where he had been traveling for
ten years, with his Squire, during the Crusades, and he tells her that he would
like to talk with the Devil, with whom she is supposed to be acquainted and in
cahoots.
We can
think of The Polyglots by William Gerhardie - http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-polyglots-by-william-gerhardie-nine.html
- and the question ‘why do men have to die’ and the answer that ‘they have to,
to make room for other people’, which invites alas the other question of ‘what
are the ‘other people’ for…and look at the presence of Death, the skeletons
used by the travelling troupe of actors, the bones that the Squire asks about
the way ahead – he had not known these are the remains of a dead man, when he approached
them…
Men are
very cruel in this film and we could argue that it is the middle ages, the dawn
of time, when people were not ‘civilized’, but we can see this kind of behavior
even today – again, The joker that sits on top of the world and his millions of
fans come to mind as the most grotesque representation, a replica of the
primitives from The Seventh Seal and the caves of the primordial people – and in
an inn, they take a poor actor, Jof, and make him dance like a bear, well
beyond the point where he is exhausted and they would have killed him, were it
not for the intervention of the Squire, who punishes the ring leader, a
demonic, vile scoundrel that had been on the point of raping an august,
seraphic, admirable woman, when again, this same angel of Hope would have
interfered…
The plague
has been killing men, women and children in droves – we are much better off
today, for there are means to stop the calamity that the Coronavirus would have
provoked in another age, Insha’Allah – and it seems to be hitting even the land
where the characters roam, some of them trying to act in a play for the
community, interrupted when the procession of the Witch to be Burned is approaching
– as a consequence of a ‘Real Witch Hunt’, not the phony scenario promoted by a
deranged old fool, sitting in a White House and complaining all day long, when
not showing disturbing, massive symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder,
Dementia and Paranoia combined, all in full display, for quite a few times
during almost every day, but alas, not for the fans and the senators and
leaders of a party that is so decadent and decaying now that it may never be resurrected…
The stupendous
Seventh Seal has won the Jury Special Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in
1957, when it was not even considered for an Oscar or a Golden Globe, proving
yet again that the French festival is the real thing, the one promoting the
real, eternal values, while the Oscars are so much less relevant and
sophisticated in terms of value…