The Seventh Seal (1956)

 

The Seventh Seal (1956)

 

"And when the lamb opened the seventh seal, there was in heaven a silence which lasted about the space of half an hour. And the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound."

n Revelation 8:1

 

Without much risk of controversy, this can be called among the greatest Masterpieces in the history in the cinema. It secured its already respected Director, Ingar Berman, his International Reputation, and its influence proved incalculable, seen in the work of countless other Directors, in almost every Genre.

 

The story, also Written by Bergman, concerns Antonius Block (Max von Sydow), a Knight returning from the Crusades, embittered by those far away and seemingly pointless Wars, only to find his home Nation suffering from the Horrors of the Black Death.

 

In the very first scene we encounter him reclining on a rocky beach with his Squire Jöns (Gunnar Björnstrand) asleep nearby. A Stranger dressed in black (Bengt Ekerot) approaches.  

 

Antonius "Who are you?"

The Stranger: "I am Death."

Antonius: "Have you come to fetch me?"

Stranger/Death: "I have long walked at your side."

Antonius: "That I know."

Death continues to approach, but then Antonius says: "Wait a moment."

Death: "You all say that."

 

Despite Death’s seeming dismissal, Antonius does, seemingly, succeed in delaying Death by engaging him in a game of Chess which will last throughout the rest of the film, thus beginning the weary Knight’s last and most important Quest, to find some Meaning in Life, and some Purpose in Faith, before all is taken away from him. This image, the Knight and Death playing chess, is the film’s most famous, now imbedded into our Cultural Consciousness. It begged Parody, and there are countless examples of that, but unlike when most iconic images that then become iconically mocked (example, Bella Lugusi’s landmark performance as “Dracula” (1931)) this mockery has not watered down our perception of the original’s power and beauty.

 

Cinematographer Gunnar Fischer, then a regular collaborator with Bergman, displayed incredible dexterity, the scenes by bodies of water are breathe-taking in how they capture the light of an overcast day, the angry clouds, sunrises and sunsets (these scenes were shot at Hovs Hallar, on the southwest coast of Sweden). The images remain powerful in the set-bound scenes (most of this film was done on studio sets, but aiding the Cinematographer tremendously, most of those sets were outdoors). The film had only a modest budget and shooting schedule, this wasn’t like “Wings” (1927), a passion project by one of the world’s richest men, Howard Hughes, who able to race up and down the coast of California to get the right clouds; Fisher had to film what was there, and do so better than any other man in his shoes could. Fisher displayed a love of nature, and captured it even in small and ways, like a playful squirrel leaping atop a tree stump in two key scenes. One can see the influence of Fisher’s eye in films being released even today.

 

Director Bergman was a contrarian in most of his cinema in both techniques and story-telling. Most great Directors earn their reputation with elegant camera motion (following Director F.W. Murnau dictum of the “unchained camera” which goes back to 1924) and certainly we see that here, but the heart of Bergman’s work is long takes with meticulous composed static shots, probably rooted in his greater experience in live-theater. This established the relationship between Characters and their landscape, speaking both of Desolation and Gravitas. Bergman’s script boldly mimics the Medieval Morality plays of the era in which the film was set, the 14^th c, but an all-but forgotten Genre by the time the film was made in the 20^th c.

 

Early on his quest, Antonius passes a Troupe of traveling Actors who preform those Morality Plays, but he does not engage them yet. The story, though, chooses to linger with them a bit, and would return to them later. We’re introduced the troupe’s leader, the licentious and pompous Skat (Erik Strandmark), but more importantly Jof (Nils Poppe), a warm-hearted Juggler, and his adoring wife, Mia (Bibi Andersson), and their infant child. As names Jof and Mia translate as Joseph and Mary, it’s not a subtle reference.

 

Jof sees Visions, but has long been exposed as a Fabulist, and quite likely also Delusional, but at a vital moment later in the film, he has one undeniably legitimate Supernatural vison, and changes the course of the lives of at least a few of the film’s Characters. He proves to be very much in the tradition of the Holy Fool, a person unable to conform to Social Norms, maybe because of Mental Illness or Intellectual Disability, but this is compensated for with some Divine Blessing or Inspiration. They represent an Innocence and Naivete that can see the Truth more clearly than Introspection or Intellectual analysis.

 

The first place that Characters Antonius and Jöns do linger is a Church where a Painter, Albertus Pictor (Gunnar Olsson), is working on a mural that summarizes the Hell on Earth the people of this Nation were enduring; the mural foreshadows most of the key scenes in the story that will follow. Speaking with Jöns, Albertus gleefully dwells of the Plague’s horrific Symptoms and muses that he paints Horrors because that’s what the people want. For his part, Jöns is quite open about his own lack of Faith.

 

Writer/Director Bergman has stated that Medieval paintings (like one of a man playing Chess with Death Painted by Albertus Pictor from the 1480s) were his inspiration. Seeing them as a child, "There was everything my imagination could desire - angels, saints, dragons, prophets, devils, humans. All this was surrounded by a heavenly, earthly, subterranean landscape of a strange yet familiar beauty."

 

Meanwhile, Character Albertus, standing apart from these two, longs for Faith even though he is almost as Cynical as Jöns. At this Church, Antonius partakes in the Sacrament of Confession, telling the Priest of his doubts, “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.”

 

Here we first see hints of the film’s highly specific, and I think legitimately Medieval, take of Atheism, distinct from 20^th c. Atheism. I find it hard to believe our Atheism as being possible before the 19^th c, because though, like those before us, we live in a World of Mystery, in the 19^th c. we enjoyed an explosion of Scientific Knowledge, specifically about Biology, and before that point we hadn’t the dimmest hope that any of the Mysteries could even be penetrated. No wonder the Roman Catholic Church tried to crush Galileo Galilei in 1609 (so almost two centuries after events of this film), they wanted such things snubbed before they got out-of-hand. Our Atheism is the assumption that no God exists, and need not be motivated by anger (yes, it generally is, but need not be). I perceive a Medieval Atheism as first and foremost rage at God’s Betrayal, more a Rebellion than a carefully considered Conclusion, and we even see Pious Antonius begging for evidence of God even during direct encounters with the Supernatural, the personified Death. All the Characters are surrounded by Supernatural forces that are casually accepted, yet Jöns is also without Faith, so this Atheism is less about God’s non-existence than Reality’s failure to resolve the Epicurean Paradox which has haunted all men of Faith since about 200 BCE (I’m told even earlier in the traditions of India). The distinction between the two Atheisms, in practice, seems to me that in the 20^th c, the perceivable rage isn’t at the non-existent God, but the insufferable Godly, while in the 14^th, it was rage at God Itself.

 

Albertus’ Confession is a practically cruel moment in the film, because his Confessor proves not to be a Priest, but Death again, a ruse to gain advantage in their Chess match. Also, Death will not verify the existence of God.

 

Later, at a Witch Burning, a Monk, who turns out to be Death in another disguise, scolds Antonius: "Do you never stop questioning?"

 

Antonius: “No. I never stop.”

 

Death/Monk: "Yet you get no answers."

 

Director Bergman wasn’t Catholic, but a fallen-away Lutheran. The film’s setting was before the Lutheran Faith was born (early 16^th c.), but Bergman demonstrated a significant knowledge of Medieval Catholicism throughout the film.

 

After making several films that were influenced by the Italian Neo-Realists, mostly respected but little known to us in the USA, Bergman’s “mature” films turned to matters of Psychology and Faith, for which he became universally acclaimed. A few years after this film, with “The Silence” (1963), Bergman insisted he’d left behind his Religious Obsessions, born of his difficult relationship with his father, a renowned Minister, but that wasn’t really true. “The Silence” is an allegory, with two sisters crossing through a gloomy city that is clearly Purgatory (note: Catholics believe in Purgatory, Lutherans don’t), one sister escapes and the other doesn’t. His last Directorial outing, “Fanny and Alexander” (1982), is a family drama awash with Supernatural and one of the main Characters appears to be a particularly vicious parody of his Preacher dad, who both suffers Divine Retribution and then takes vengeance from Beyond the Grave.

 

Most, but not all, of Bergam’s films are bleak. He had a couple of notable Comedies, and the same year as “The Seventh Seal” he also released “Wild Strawberries” which, despite a couple dark scenes, is perhaps the sweetest and gentlest movie of his long career. Given the subject matter and reputation of “The Seventh Seal” one will be surprised how much of this dark film is actually light-hearted and witty. If you were to take on these two, radically different, films as a double-feature, one can see they cross-reference each other: They are both about men near the end of their lives, on a journey, and searching for Meaning. Bergman was 67-years-old at the time.

 

Here, the dourest Character is Antonius, obsessed and tortured with Philosophical Profundities. Hell, even Death has more of a Sense of Humor than Antonius. But always at Antonius’ side is Jöns, square-jawed, virile, earthier, livelier, concerned with the Practical, dismissive of the Metaphysical, and consistently Sardonic. Their devotion to each other is undeniable, but ironically, each man’s most important conversations are not with each other, but with subordinate Characters, the distance between them is as profound as the bond they share.

 

As the Knight’s Quest continues, a crowd grows around him, but this will eventually prove to be evidence of Death’s plan, that he’s only allowing Antonius to live a little longer to serve his own purposes. The first member of the accidental entourage is a mute girl (Gunnel Lindblom) whom Jöns rescues from being raped by Raval (Bertil Anderberg). Raval is a wholly loathsome fellow who steals from the corpses of Plague Victims who litter abandoned towns. A decade before, Raval was known to Antonius and Jöns as the Theologian and convinced Antonius to go on the Crusades. Jöns, who life was squandered as much as Antonius’ on the pointless Wars, holds a special hatred for Raval, but allows him to escape alive. Raval will return later to cause more trouble.

 

After this scene, an extremely strained relationship emerges between Jöns and the mute girl, he has strong impulse for Decency, but an equally strong one for Misogyny, and spends the rest of the film alternately Protecting and Abusing her. One of Jöns more memorable lines, spoken later and in a much different context, is revealing, "Love is the blackest of all plagues."

The film is episodic, and one of the strongest of these episodes features the Troupe, with Jof and Mia preforming a Miracle Play on stage while backstage Skat absconds with Lisa (Inga Gill), the buxom and wanton wife of the town Blacksmith Plog (Åke Fridell). The wordless flirtation between Skat and Lisa, intercut with the performance which is basically telling the same story, is amusing.

 

But almost immediately after Skat and Lisa run off into the bushes, everything turns darker. Jof and Mia are interrupted by a procession of Flagellants entering the town. The Flagellants’ Masochistic Rituals are full of Threat and Fury, and though they might be trying to beg the Forgiveness of God, they Preach only Punishment and Terror. Notable here is that though it is a parade, there’s very little camera tracking, instead the mostly static shots while cuts between Flagellants and crowd are quicker than most of the rest of the film, maintaining the sense of motion.

 

Then, after ruining all the joy, the Flagellants march off, and more deft cuts suggest they disappeared into dust: This was quite an achievement by the Cinematographer Fischer and Editor Lennart Wallén working in perfect sync. Using a stationary camera, looking down on the crowded procession from above, the image fades into a later part of the procession wherein the crowd has thinned, then again, then again, until the road is empty and all have disappeared like Ghosts; there were no FX used to establish this illusion. That disappearing was a strong visual statement, representing Bergman’s rejection of the Cruelty of Faith he associates with this terrible era but also clearly, the Cruelty of Faith of his own abusive father.

 

Another plot point is that Antonius if forced to abandoned his original strategy in his Chess match against Death, a combined Assault by the Knight and Bishop pieces (Military and Church Authority, so the Crusades); after abandoning that, he still manages to play well, yet is still doomed.

 

The next important encounter is the one in which we first see Antonius smile, and the only smile he will offer without hesitancy. He finally meets with Jof and Mia and their devotion each other and their child enchants him. He has long lost his own wife (or at least he thinks he has), and when he speaks of this, one can’t miss that the dialogue seems to speak of his loss in his Faith in Jesus, whom he is, in part, Questing to find again. Profoundly moved by the couple’s happiness he says, “I will remember this hour of peace. The dusk, the bowl of wild strawberries, the bowl of milk, Jof with his lute.” As Jof and Mia are in problematic circumstances because Skat ran off, Antonius offers his protection; if they follow his to his Castle where they should be safe from the Plague.

 

Bergman was a 20^th c. man recreating a 14^th c. world view. His choice of the Plague years was because he was exploring the 20^th c. Philosophical ideas of Existentialism, which became codified and prominent only after WWII, but Existentialism was always with us, and as a Philosophical system we see its roots going back at least as far as Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” (514 –520 BCE).  During this encounter, Antonius embraces the Moralism of Existentialism, that the Meaning of Life is attained, not through Faith or Grace, but Deeds, namely his protection of these Innocents.

 

It is just then that the plot adds to the Suspense to Antonious’ newly embraced role, because he plays a little more Chess with Death and realizes he has been a Pawn throughout the whole game.

 

The whole cast is exceptional, with von Sydow making the most striking figure: His blond hair is close cut, snow-white when filmed in B&W. He’s tall, bony, and stern, his face deeply etched with lines despite being only 27-years-old. Bergman had such an exceptional ensemble available to him because he could draw from his live-theater productions at the Malmö Municipal Theater. Bergman had been going back-and-forth between live-theater and film from the beginning of his career, and would continue to do so, proving amazingly prolific at both (this film’s script has its roots in one of his plays, “Trämålning” (“Wood Painting” 1954)).

 

Throughout there are many jokes about theater, and even after the performance was interrupted by the Flagellants the action of the Characters in their “real” lives unsubtlety reflect the contrivances of the stage, building an argument of life-itself being Farcical. Though much of it is funny, Life being a Farce is an uncomfortable idea when one is on a Quest to establish if Life has some Meaning.

 

By the end of the film, Antonious’ accidental Entourage has grown to nine souls, of whom only three will escape Death (at least for a little while). The Sanctuary of Antonious’ Castle proves a Death-Trap, it is there the climax is played out. Here, finally, we see Bergman fully embrace the unchained camera, a very long shot of six people sitting at a table. The camera tracks back from them and each slowly notices something not in frame yet. After an agonizingly long time, there’s a cut to Death standing in the doorway. Antonious prays, Jöns is proudly defiant, but it is mute girl who first moves toward Death, and speaks her only words, "It is finished." These were the last words of Christ on the cross.

 

The film's grim ending is inevitable, but there's also those who (temporarily) escape, and the final shots belong to them. All throughout the film life is treated as theatre, and its second-hand representation in the Arts and through its Actors, especially the Actors playing Characters who were Actors, but it is also treated and rich theatre, in the face of inevitability, we remain moving forward, even as the film fades to black.

 

The escapees from Death witness those who had not escaped, being led away. That last shot, now known as “The Dance of Death” is almost as famous and the Chess match by the sea, but was, in fact, an after-thought. Shooting was completed, much of the Cast had departed, but Cinematographer Fisher spotted an exceptionally beautiful cloud and started shooting again. Bergman had the remaining Crew dress in costume and “we shot it spontaneously in ten minutes with the actors in silhouette.” Dialogue was written to accompany it, “And Death, the grim master, bids them dance. He commands them to hold hands and dance in a long line. The stern master leads the way with his scythe and hourglass, but Skat dangles at the end with his lyre. They dance away from the dawn, in a solemn dance, away to the dark country, while the rain runs down their faces and washes away their salty tears.”

 

The film forever shaped how cinema realized the Medieval era. The contribution of P. A. Lundgren's sets and Manne Lindholm's costuming to the film’s sense of Reality can’t been over-estimated. The film was not, though, in full fidelity to history. Need it be? After all, it was a Fantasy.

 

The film’s unnamed Nation would’ve had to be Sweden, but Sweden’s role in the Crusades ended a century before the coming of the Black Death to that part of Europe. The Horrors were not exaggerated though, when the Plague arrived, it killed about a third of that Nation’s population, and even in the 20^th c, the population numbers had not fully recovered from that devastation. Other fidelity issues included making Witch Burnings common in Sweden a century too early and including the Flagellants that were largely unknown there.

 

This film’s shaped later cinema in all Genres. Directors as diverse was Woody Allen, Roger Corman, Daivd Lynch, and Vincent Ward, were all devoted Bergman fans, all explicit regarding his influence, and these are the influences represent the most serious-minded films.

 

It was even more popular in Parody. Bergman devotee Allen parodied this film in “Love and Death” (1975) and “Stardust Memories” (1980). So did the Monty Python Troupe in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” (also 1975), “Jabberwocky” (1977), and “The Meaning of Life” (1983). The parody list goes on-and-on, like the infamous student film, “De Düva” (mock Swedish for "The Dove," 1968), which substituted a Badminton match with Death for Chess; “Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey” (1991), which substituted the games Battleship, Clue, Electric Football, and Twister; and a Bergman-influenced Death even appears in “The Last Action Hero” (1993). Novelist Terry Pratchett’s Bergman-influenced Death proved one of the most popular Characters in his “Discworld” novels (first one published in 1983).

 

The reach was farther than that. I see clear references to this film in many of the Westerns of the 1970s, especially the surprisingly poetic, “The Outlaw Josey Whales” (1976), which borrowed it narrative structure.

 

Bergman’s vison was no doubt born of the traumas of WWII and then the looming threat of the Cold War. Richard A. Blake, a Lay-Catholic Writer observed that the Seventh Seal” was the first of "a series of seven films that explored the possibility of faith in a post-Holocaust, nuclear age," but all through metaphor, as Bergman produced only one Genre SF film, not set in the future, but 1923 Germany, called “The Serpent’s Egg” (1977). “The Seventh Seal” is referenced, most often indirectly, is a fair amount of post-Apocalyptic SF, like the adorably stupid “Damnation Alley” (1977).

 

And it is true that, “The Seventh Seal” is Apocalyptic; we are warned of this with the opening quote from the Book of Revelations. But it is also about an Apocalypse that wasn’t the End of the World. The film’s Apocalypse falls on most of the Characters, but the power of this film’s take on the Apocalypse is that inevitability of Death, a personal Apocalypse none was escape, also inevitability behooves us to address Death and Life bravely before our hour comes.

 

Initially, the film was ill-regarded in its home country, but was an unconditional triumph Internationally, starting with a Special Jury Prize at Cannes.

 

Critic Bosley Crowther described it as “essentially intellectual” and “as tough—and rewarding—a screen challenge as the moviegoer has had to face this year ... the profundities of the ideas are lightened and made flexible by glowing pictorial presentation of action that is interesting and strong. Mr. Bergman uses his camera and actors for sharp, realistic effects."

 

Critic Pauline Kael called it "A magically powerful film."

 

The overwhelming Foreign support seemed to have some effect at home, as it was eventually selected as the Swedish entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 30th Academy Awards, but the it then not nominated by the Academy itself.

 

Given the Themes that questioned, perhaps even condemned, the existence of God, the most surprising accolade came in 1995, when the Vatican included The Seventh Seal in its list of its 45 "Great Films" for it “convincingly re-creates the religious context of the Middle Ages but the knight's quest to find meaning in a world of physical suffering and spiritual emptiness is more directly related to the contemporary search for life's meaning in our own age of doubt and uncertainty.”

 

Trailer:

The Seventh Seal (1958) - Official Trailer (youtube.com)