Filmography for The Seventh Seal (1957) 
Prepared by students in the 2008 class...I haven't had a chance to check these links!

 

Written and Directed by Ingmar Bergman

DVD: Criterion Collection, ASIN 6305174083

Produced by Allan Ekelund

Cast: 

              Actor/Actress                         Portraying

            Gunnar Bjorstrand                    Jons, the Knight’s squire

            Bengt Ekerot                            Death

            Nils Poppe                               Jof

            Max von Sydow                       The Knight, Antonius Black

            Bibi Anderson                          Mia

            Inga Landgre’                           The Knight’s wife

            Inga Gill                                    Lisa

            Maud Hansson                         Tyan, the witch

 

Script:  Modern Film Scripts, a film by Ingmar Bergman.  Trans. By Lars Malmstrom and David Kushner. Simon and Schuster, NewYork (1960).

IMDB page: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050976/

 

Major Reviews:  Steene, Birgitta (Ed.), Focus on The Seventh Seal, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.  (1972).   Pg 46-65.     Compilation of reviews from:

 

            Veckojournalen, no. 9 (1957),  by Jurgen Schildt,  Trans. by Steene.

            Dagstidningen, Feb 19, 1957, by Hanserik Herten, Trans. By Steene.

            Cahiers du Cinema 14, no.83 (May, 1958), by Jean Mambrino,  Trans by Georgette Steisel.

            London Sunday Times, March 9, 1958.  by Dilys Powell.

            Sight and Sound 27, no. 4 (Spring 1958) by Peter John Dyer

            Film Quarterly 12, no. 3 (Spring 1959) by Colin Young

            Films in Review 9, (Nov. 1958) by Henry Hart

            Die Zeit, February 16,1962. “Apocalypse und Todentantz” by Theo Furstenau, Trans. by Gisela Savage and Brigitta Steene.

 

Suggested Readings:

            About Existentialism from its ”founder”, Soren Kierkegaard . Swenson, David F.  ThePhilosophical Review, 42,5.  590-92.   Untitled review of Fear and Trembling, Available at: http://0-www.JSTOR.org.library.winthrop.edu:80/stable/2181150.

           

            About Existentialism from Frederich Nietzsche, via a Review of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil, Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future.   By FrankThilly in The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Method, 5,3. (Jan, 1908).  Pg 75-78.  Available at: <http://0-www.JSTOR.org.library.winthrop.edu:80/stable/2012221>.

 

nota bene:  The above readings are very short: 2 or 3 pages each.

 

Plot Summary: 

            Colin Young review cited above (From Film Quarterly), also available at: http://0-www.JSTOR.org.library.winthrop.edu:80/stable/3185982.


Possible Questions:

·        Compare/contrast the Knight / Squire in The Seventh Seal with your stereotype of Beowulf of Lancelot. How are they similar or different?

·        Would this movie be more (or less) effective in Technicolor or colorized now?

·        Do today’s viewers respond to this film in the same way as the viewer of 1958?  In what ways are they the same?  Different?

·        What is the thematic purpose of the chess match?

·        Bergman is the son of a Preacher.  How does he treat the clergy?

·        Can we relate in any way Darkon to The Seventh Seal?