100 Movies Every Catholic Should See #9: The Seventh Seal (1957)

Written & Directed by Ingmar Bergman. Starring Max Von Sydow, Gunnar Björnstrand, Bengt Ekerot

The game of chess has often been used as an apt metaphor in cinema, whether to establish power dynamics, show one character’s superior intellect, or, more interestingly, to put into metaphor conflicts of life and death. In his 1957 masterpiece The Seventh Seal, Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman opens his film with this last kind of chess metaphor quite literally, pitting a recently returned Crusader, Antonius Block (Max Von Sydow) against the embodiment of Death (Bengt Ekerot).

Death’s appearance, portrayed in a long black gown that makes him look almost like a chess piece himself, is instantly recognizable to Swedish audiences as the image of Death portrayed in many a fresco from the medieval era. This image of “chess with Death” is actually derived from a specific painting from medieval fresco artist Albertus Pictor. Death comes to collect his due from the knight who has escaped his clutches for so long, but Block, confident in his own ingenuity, decides to challenge Death to a chess game, stating that if he wins, he will continue to get to live. Death readily agrees (drawing black, of course, when choosing what side to play on) and the game sets the stage for the rest of the film to follow.

Death, but more specifically the fear of death, is something that Bergman wrestles with throughout most of his films, whether that be through an old man recalling his life near the end of it (Wild Strawberries) or through a priest who is struggling with doubts about his faith (Winter Light). Bergman has confessed that he often struggled with this fear, and has said that the production of The Seventh Seal, which deals most directly with this fear, actually was therapeutic for him, and actually brought him back his belief in God. The Vatican includes this film in their list of “Important Films”.

Hanging like a sheen over most of the film’s events is the devastation caused by the scourge of the Black Plague; Block and his squire, Jöns (Bergman regular Gunnar Björnstrand) have only heard the stories of the Plague since they have been away at the Crusades, and despite their brave faces their fear only grows as they experience a Europe different from the one they left behind. In their journey they encounter a witch (Maud Hansson) who is being held by friars pending her burning at the stake; Block takes pity on her but in the end is unable to save her from her fate. When little answers could be given for the deaths of so many, faith in God began to crumble in many and extreme measures were taken by those affiliated and unaffiliated with the Church. The film went into production just over ten years after the end of World War II, and like the films of the Italian neo-realist movement, such as Bicycle Thieves by Vittorio De Sica, aimed to capture the sense of dread Europe felt preceding the peak angst of the Cold War.

In a time when artificial intelligence threatens to take over Hollywood with executives anxious to utilize it is a tool to streamline the scriptwriting process, The Seventh Seal stands as a poignant reminder that the best kind of storytelling derives from real human beings confronting the effects of the Fall: our concupiscence, our suffering, and namely, our mortality. It may be impossible for us as humans to win the proverbial “game of chess” with Death, but through Christ, hope shines like a ray of light seen by only those who have the Faith to see it.