Comments on: The Sound Barrier Podcast: 6: Der Müde Tod & The Seventh Seal https://freakytrigger.co.uk/see/2017/06/the-sound-barrier-podcast-6-der-mude-tod-the-seventh-seal Lollards in the high church of low culture Tue, 20 Jun 2017 11:49:35 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 By: Matthew Marcus https://freakytrigger.co.uk/see/2017/06/the-sound-barrier-podcast-6-der-mude-tod-the-seventh-seal/comment-page-1#comment-2170227 Tue, 20 Jun 2017 11:49:35 +0000 https://freakytrigger.co.uk/?p=30278#comment-2170227 Haven’t listened to the podcast yet but my jaw dropped at the suggestion in the above comment that The Seventh Seal is thought of some kind of po-faced arthouse film: surely only someone who hasn’t seen it, and really has no interest in it, could think it? For me its absolute cinematic greatness is in the fact that it’s equal parts light and dark, silly and deadly serious. I must admit that while I’ve enjoyed the other Bergmans I’ve watched (working my way through the Criterion Collection with Ewan; ~160 spine numbers in) none of them have matched up to The Seventh Seal so far for me, they’re often quite grim comparatively. Though Wild Strawberries is alright.

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By: Mark M https://freakytrigger.co.uk/see/2017/06/the-sound-barrier-podcast-6-der-mude-tod-the-seventh-seal/comment-page-1#comment-2169749 Sun, 18 Jun 2017 16:20:35 +0000 https://freakytrigger.co.uk/?p=30278#comment-2169749 I agree that The Seventh Seal is more fun than people are led to expect. Most early Bergman films (and I’m including TSS) are actually fairly lively, even the ones that get grim at the end. I guess the idea that his films were all terribly gloomy is partly due to stereotypes about Scandinavia, partly due to the idea that it was the influence of Bergman that made Woody Allen drop the jokes for a while (let’s not blame Bergman for anything Allen has done), and partly caused by the vibe of the later films obscuring that of the early ones.

(Let’s not forget Scott Walker’s unusual choice to provide a plot summary in the form of a song.)

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