The Seventh Seal:

[Archaea]

This excerpt makes me wish to see it again.

Existentialism has often been expressed, as we have seen, in art. Probably the supreme Existentialist movie was the 1958 film The Seventh Seal, by the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman. At the beginning, we have a Knight and a Squire returning from the Crusades. They find that the Plague is raging. This is anachronistic, since the Crusades ended for most practical purposes in 1270 (Acre itself was lost in 1291, the latest a Crusader would actually have been in the Holy Land), while the Black Death began in Europe in 1346, arriving in Sweden in 1350. Be that as it may, after landing on the beach, the Knight is confronted by Death himself, who informs him that his time is up. Since the Knight does not want to die because he feels he has not found the meaning or purpose of life, he challenges Death to a game of chess. Death accepts, and through most of the rest of the movie, as the Knight and Squire travel back to the Knight's castle, the chess game continues in the evenings, with Death invisible to all others. There is an exception to that, however. The Knight and Squire begin to collect a group of travelers, and among them is a family of Players, a husband and wife (interestingly named Joseph and Mary) and their child. The husband plays the Fool in the performance we see. When we meet them, the Fool has a vision of the Virgin Mary -- as visible to us as to him. This ends up being an important factor in the meaning of the movie. Later, as the group approaches the Knight's castle, the Fool sees Death playing chess with the Knight. He tells his wife that they better get out of there, and they do. Meanwhile, we have been learning about the mentality of the Knight and the Squire. The Knight wants what, in Existentialist terms, he cannot have: A rational understanding of the meaning and purpose of life. The Squire has no such illusions. He is the type of the atheistic Existentialist, who knows that life is meaningless and the universe empty, with little but horror for us to expect. The very night that the Fool sees Death, the Knight loses the chess game. Death tells him that the next time they meet, he will take the Knight and everyone with him. The next day they arrive at the Knight's castle, where his wife has been waiting for him many years. At dinner that night, there is a knock on the door. No one is there, and everyone now knows that it will be Death. The Knight again prays for knowlege, and the Squire tells him, in some detail, there is none to have. The Knight's wife tells him to be quiet. The Squire will be quiet, but he says he protests. Again, this is the type of the atheistic Existentialist, who recognizes but doesn't have to like the absurdity of the world. But this is not the last word in the movie. In the end, we are back with the Fool and his family. Now he has a vision of Death leading the Knight and all the others away. He and his wife and child, however, will go on living. So who is the Fool? He is the theistic Existentialist. He has neither the aspirations of the Knight nor the disillusionment of the Squire. Gifted with his visions, like Pascal, he has no difficulty finding happiness and meaning -- indeed, he and his wife are the happiest people in the movie. They even find life, which is dramatically denied to the others. Presumably, this is Bergman's own final comment, reflecting a religious seriousness we also see in his The Virgin Spring -- though his public statements lead many to think that the Squire reflects his true sentiments. If that is the case, the Fool, with his happy ending, would not belong in the movie. Religiously serious or not, The Seventh Seal may have given rise to more parodies than any other movie, from Woody Allen's Love and Death [1975] to Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey [1991].

[OrangeUte]

i watched this movie with my dad when i was in high school and was absolutely riveted to it. i wonder if it will hold up to my adult tastes. this quote makes me think that it definitely will.

thanks for the link and post.