The Seventh Seal (1958)

hyped garbage

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Blistering performances.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

A knight returning from the Crusades finds a rude church still open in the midst of the Black Death, and goes to confession there. Speaking to a hooded figure half-seen through an iron grill, he pours out his heart: 'My indifference has shut me out. I live in a world of ghosts, a prisoner of dreams. I want God to put out his hand, show his face, speak to me. I cry out to him in the dark but there is no one there.' The hooded figure turns, and is revealed as Death, who has been following the knight on his homeward journey.Images like that have no place in the modern cinema, which is committed to facile psychology and realistic behavior. In many ways, Ingmar Bergman's 'The Seventh Seal' has more in common with the silent film than with the modern films that followed it. It is considered to be one of the masterpieces of cinema with its stark imagery and its uncompromising subject, which is no less than the absence of God.Films are no longer concerned with the silence of God but with the chattering of men. We are uneasy to find Bergman asking existential questions in an age of irony, and Bergman himself, starting with 'Persona', found more subtle ways to ask the same questions. But the directness of 'The Seventh Seal' is its strength: This is an uncompromising film, regarding good and evil with the same simplicity and faith as its hero.All of Bergman's mature films, except the comedies, are about his discontent with the ways that God has chosen to reveal himself. But when he made 'The Seventh Seal' he was bold enough to approach his subject in a literal manner; to actually show the knight playing chess with Death, which is a brilliant metaphor for man's attempt to defy mortality's gravity through his accomplishments, perhaps most vividly in the idea of artistic genius, the need to create a vital work which will survive the author's death. And he had the confidence to end his film, not with a statement or a climax, but with an image. "The strict lord Death bids them dance," says the young actor, directing the attention of his wife to the horizon, against which Death leads his latest victims in a macabre parade. Ingmar Bergman's dark masterpiece effortlessly sees off the revisionists and the satirists; it is a radical work of art that reaches back to scripture, to Cervantes and to Shakespeare to create a new dramatic idiom of its own.10 out of 10.

The film begins, and the sky rises on us, and two people fall near the beach, and while in this silent silence there is a terrifying guest coming to them soon, comes the guest quickly and suddenly, ask the hero of the film Antonius Black who are you? I answer death! This is how the film starts with a shocking and breathtaking scene, a scene that critics have rated as the best opening in the history of cinema. Not surprisingly, they brought together people and death together. The film revolves around the return of the crusader Antonius Block to his country, Which leads people to believe that the resurrection has approached and became imminent, and then goes to Antonius great battle with the self in an attempt to search for answers about life and man, and the Great God! My story with this film is long, and it started two years ago. At that time I was bored to the limit of those classic and traditional Hollywood and European films. I was looking for films about life, dramatic human and philosophical films. , I saw the film for the first time and did not like it, I grew up in Bergman Cinema and watched its greatest movies and then became very familiar with the ideas and films of this man, I saw the film again, and it became the second best film I have ever seen! , This is the Bergman Cinema, the films of this man are different from all the films, and my words are only evidence that Bergman Cinema and others contain a great deal of ideas and novels deep, and certainly will not appreciate his work in just one view. I love Bergman,

I can see why this movie is a staple in film schools. It looks great, especially since it was made in 1957 with a budget much smaller than other gorgeous films of that time.The character Death has a simple but very striking look. I love the set design, the lighting, the camera angles, the play of light vs shadow. The premise is interesting, as well as the setting (Europe during the Black Plague).However, the story and the characters are pretty dull. Nothing much happens and I did not feel any emotional connection to any of the characters. The knight suffering from an existential crisis feels a bit weak and is overshadowed by his more grounded but unlikable squire. The rest of the characters come across as simpletons.

this film challenges the viewer to question their own faith and ideas that they may join the knight on his quest for answers as he plays a game of chess with death to buy time. the companions he finds as he travels all have troubles in life and play a role in the knights return to faith.This film is dark by nature (war beaten soldiers, plague, murder,witch burning, death all around) however no gross gore but mild violence. there are the comical relief moments though(surprisingly by death him self) good watch a film that hasn't lost its affect despite decades and language barrier.