However, to me, an ordinary audience, "The Seventh Seal" carries too many religious aspects, but unlike "Winter Light", "The Seventh Seal" tries to use the metaphor of the picture, or it can be said to be a religious painting The images are used to express the theme, while "Winter Light" emphasizes the relationship between characters and the strength of dialogue.
Speaking of "The Seventh Seal" alone, the main clue is the game between the knight and the god of death, and there are two additional lines of the actor family and the entourage. The knights took part in the crusades, a war founded on a religious sense, but as the followers say, the war was fought for a nihilistic figure "God". For the knight, however, God is always silent, never showing his power to bless. However, as a fearful and evil god of death, he always followed the knights, which caused the knights to doubt their beliefs.
I think Bergman's greatest skill is to set up different characters around the protagonist, and through the contrast of these extreme characters, the theme to be expressed is highlighted.
The family of actors, to a certain extent, symbolizes the common people, who never distinguish metaphysical problems, and their sincere praise to God, this simple faith and the sharp objection of the followers are in stark contrast to the doubts of the knights. . And from a certain point of view, Bergman expressed the existence of God through the actor. Since he can see the god of death, the Virgin he saw at the beginning of the movie can also affirm the existence of God. But God never reveals himself to doubters, so God is silent and ruthless. Because, for the life of the actors, they will not pursue the so-called meaning of life, but they survived at the end of the film. From a certain perspective, Bergman's belief that metaphysics cannot heal human mental pain, but can only Deteriorating thoughts, so instead of searching hard, it is better to go back to grasp the substance of life, to live simply.
The entourage corner shows a type of person who completely denies belief, that is, those who have no religious belief. On the way, the witch they meet about to be hanged is a symbol of evil or paganism. And, it seems to me, there is a pagan character in their group as well, the entourage woman who says, "It's all over" throughout the movie. She showed great nostalgia and enthusiasm when the witch was burned to death and when the god of death finally appeared. In a way, these people are selfish, they are looking for an outlet for their own existence, and they are not responsible for the existence of others. Therefore, they are not painful.
There are many religious scenes in the film, and it strongly expresses a kind of eschatological complex. As the name of the film suggests, "The Seventh Seal" symbolizes the arrival of the Judgment Day of the last days. The many metaphors and symbols in the film are too abstract for me to fully grasp.
View more about The Seventh Seal reviews
