The Seventh Seal

Patrick Ballard
1/29/2009

This was a rather perplexing film in many aspects. Its style was not one I am accustomed to. Thankfully there were bits and pieces of the film that were familiar enough to give me a frame of reference, such as Antonius Block playing chess with Death. This early scene immediately reminded me of when Bill and Ted play a number of games with Death in the movie Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey. While the delivery is a bit more crass in the modern day film, the basic premise remains very similar in that a bunch of people are bumbling about with no idea of what's going on while trying to understand the reality of death or a the very least figure out how to deal with it. We see our merry band of heroes meandering about the countryside making small talk with the locals, possibly for lack of a clearer goal. Block gets a few chances to speak with Death but those are usually overshadowed by the ever present chess game and Death's smugness over the fact that he'll eventually win but never have to reveal a thing. There were plenty of hints and symbols dropped along the way as to what the film was supposed to mean, but I get the feeling that to really appreciate it and pick up on all its subtleties would require a second and third viewing. The only thing that stuck in my mind for the duration of the film was an early scene in which the actor was juggling two balls, except he wasn't juggling so much as throwing one in the air and then pass the other ball to the throwing hand by putting his hands together. For some reason or other this screamed “important symbolism” at me. I read the scene as a commentary on how people are all actors in the sense that we only pretend to know anything, especially anything we claim to. If a juggler cannot juggle then the rest of society can't be very far behind. Then again I might be reading too much into this and it's actually just a case of poor casting or not having the budget for someone who could properly juggle.