The Seventh Seal (1957) is very much a journey into the mind of its director, Ingmar Bergman. His contemplative mind had many doubts and concerns about the existence of God, the meaning of life, and the potential emptiness of human existence. The film’s DVD commentary says Bergman once said in a press conference that he believed there is no afterlife, that death is the finality of human existence, and he found great comfort in that complete sense of annihilation.

The Seventh Seal uses the Crusades period as a means to convey his criticisms and questions. Countered between the characters of the God-fearing knight, Antonious Block (Max von Sydow) and his hedonistic squire Jöns (Gunnar Björnstrand), the film operates through allegory in one of the most devastating and religious times in human history. The result is a lesson in figurative fantasy, not authenticity. Bergman’s dialogue is poetic and theatrical, and is presented in a fashion that transcends traditional cinema.

Bergman’s choice of allegory is a means of conveying his own thoughts and questions in a setting that disguises the directness of his themes. As Brian Eggert of Deep Focus notes, “Detractors wary of Bergman’s allegories suggest he unnecessarily disguises questions about God through his historical setting and metaphoric imagery. Unabashed confrontation of the audience in a modern setting, however, results in more challenging material for the viewer; moviegoers often disconnect when modern cinematic environments so clearly try to make a decisive and difficult connection. Bergman films like Persona (1966) and Wild Strawberries (1957) that do not enclose their meaning inside figurative backdrops are more demanding. By disguising his most aggressive argument, his filmic question, within the Medieval setting, Bergman lightens the intellectual load on the viewer and makes these questions apparent but not brazen attacks on his audience’s modern ideologies. Of course, Bergman absolutely means to challenge his audience, but The Seventh Seal achieves this in the most clever, illusory way of any Bergman film.”

The above article goes on to mention how Bergman believed film should step outside of reality, and take people out of the settings that surround them. That’s an artistic outlook on cinema - why show people the same type of things they could look out the window and see? Filmmakers have the ability to do anything and take people anywhere, so they should.

“Setting and period therefore play crucial roles in devising the director’s form of questioning within The Seventh Seal, making the picture more accessible as an allegory to be sure, but also camouflaging its modern resonance behind veiled, atmospheric, and symbolic locales that service his commentary.”

The middle ages provides an escapist setting for Bergman’s narrative, and an effectively captivating context for the material.