The film I would like to put into historical context is the Ingmar Bergman film The seventh seal. The Seventh Seal was a film that was introduced during the period of New wave films. The seventh seal was a rather unconventional film, with a soldier returning from the crusades to find that his home has been ravaged by the black plague. This video review done by Renegade Cut does a good job of quickly introducing the film.
The film was influenced by Bergman’s internal debate about religion, and wether the afterlife existed or not. He uses his internal debate to create the story of the soldier who is also conflicted, having to play a chess game against death himself, who seems to not want to give any answers, or know any. Thus this film focuses on society and some of it’s deepest worries. The deep crisis that Bergman faced with religion and the afterlife is also noted by reviewer Roger Ebert, The Seventh Seal Review, in his review Ebert notes that religion and the afterlife fueled many of Bergman’s films, with The Seventh Seal being the film that really kicked off this creative process by him. The film The Seventh Seal also had a separate message that focused on the confusion and fear that was currently going on in the world. With the ongoing cold war, many were in a state of constant fear, doing fruitless drills and trying to prepare for something that they never really would be able to defend themselves against. This was represented by the fear that was presented in townspeople and the travelers fear of the black plague. At the time there was almost no way to prepare or to ward off the sickness that was killing millions in Europe. People were creating any sort of rituals and practices that they could in an attempt to ward off this looming but ever-present danger. In a scene people are seen walking, some whipping each other and others carrying around large crosses, they are attempting to atone for whatever sins they might have committed, in an attempt to be spared from the plague by a punishing god. 
There were also things society did to try to distract themselves from the evil that was quickly spreading around Europe, such as traveling performers. Bergman tried to incorporate the fact that despite it was a time of great peril and confusion, people still tried to keep the Arts, and most importantly fun and happiness alive.
I believe that this shows that while the film was about a somber topic, a soldier who lives through war yet comes face to face with death as he returns home, that nobody could possibly know what happens when you are forced to walk away from this life that the film was meant to convey a positive message to society. I believe that this shines through in this original trailer for the movie, in which they give up one of the nicest parts of the film, that the solider stalled death not for himself, but to help a family.
This sounds like a very interesting piece of film. I haven’t heard of it but I’m thoroughly invested in watching it. The concept of leaving what the soldier thought was hell to come home and find it suffering through the black plague is a story of horror almost, but to have the soldier be so willing to just help his family and get through the suffering, that’s true heroism. The Swedes are known for making movies off of such dark topics and Bergman seems to be no exception. It’s fascinating to take such a dark time in history and make a film out of it. Also, his use of incorporating arts into the movie is a nice touch to show what the arts have been through, along with other parts of culture. Religion was big part of the actions taken with the black plague so it’s a great move on his part to add that to his film. I’m going to have to put this on my list of movies to watch.
Hi Tristan, I have not seen, or even heard of, The Seventh Seal so I enjoyed learning about it. Everything I just read was something that was new to me, so I learned a lot. The thing that jumped out to me the most, which I learned, was that the film was influenced by the director’s internal debate about religion. This is very interesting me because it clearly impacted his life a lot considering he portrayed it within the film. It is kind of cool that the religious debate gave him a lot of different ideas for films, in addition to it actually being what was able to kick off his creative process.