Aspects of Editing in The Seventh Seal (1957)

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Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal (1957) is set during the medieval times in the midst of the Black Death. Told through many editing techniques, the film centers around a knight, Antonius Block (played by Max Von Sydow) who is roaming around questioning the existence of God, while simultaneously at times playing chess with Death. Some of the editing in the film includes fade-ins, fade-outs and various techniques of the sort. Corrigan & White (2009) defines fade-outs and ins in the text so that one can understand the way they look and the way they differ from each other while observing the movie. The definitions are below:

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“[...] fade-outs gradually darken and make one image disappear, while fade-ins do the opposite,” the course text explains. “Alfred Hitchcock fades to black to mark the passing of time throughout Rear Window (1954)” (145). Some examples of these fade-ins and fade-outs occur randomly throughout the film. In one scene, Antonius Block is, of course, playing checkers with Death on the beach in the beginning of the film. As they play, the camera centers onto the checker board and the picture fades out, and fades in onto the beach's oceans (Bergman, Ingmar). How this looks in the film is like this: the checker board disappears into the ocean, which appears randomly in the scene (Bergman, Ingmar) .

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It's a special kind of editing technique that plays tricks on the viewers' eyes considering they are focusing on prop currently being displayed in the scene, and seeing it disappear right before their eyes into the ocean. Another example of a fade-in, I think, is the overwhelming light that surrounds the camera in between the scenes showing Antonius and his squire, Jons, (who is played by Gunnar Björnstrand) riding on their horses along the beach (Bergman, Ingmar).

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Just as how in the book, it referenced Alfred Hitchcock's film and how Hitchcock used fade-outs and all to “mark the passage of time”, I, too, believe that the light that fills the camera in between the horse scenes also marks the passage of time (Corrigan, Timothy). Another scene where Bergman uses the same technique involving the passing on time and fades, involves the march of the Religious nuts and their punishing of each other on account of the Black Death. As they march in single files, they whip each other in agony down the road. As the people march, the row gets smaller and lesser, and the fade-outs represent this happening. After each fade-out the row is lessened and the people have already marched on and away from the camera's view (Bergman, Ingmar).

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Another scene involves Jof, (who is played by Nils Poppe) sitting outside in the sunshine when he envisions Virgin Mary outside. The picture is brighter because she is the great and pure Virgin Mary, so the scene is edited really bright to make the scene look special and pure for Mary. The Virgin Mary is playing with his baby Miquel, and as Jof looks in amazement and excitement, he goes to wipe his eyes, and after he does that, Virgin Mary fades away. The film uses the fade to emphasize the fact that she, indeed, is only a vision. In reality, she was not there all along (Bergman, Ingmar).

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In conclusion, the picture seen on the right of Antonius Block walking along the beach with huge, gray clouds following him and the ocean surrounding him looks depressing to me, even with the beauty of the photo. We all know the man is depressed to begin with, walking around moping because his God will not talk back to him, so automatically I assume the picture to be a sad one. Antonius looks lost in this photo, which, he is exactly that in the film. He is wandering about, looking for questions about God's existence and yet they remain unanswered even after the film ends (Bergman, Ingmar).

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Yes, the knight learns to appreciate some of the beauty in life as he sits on the hill with his friends eating strawberries, (Bergman, Ingmar) but what did he do after? He left them to go play another round of checkers with his buddy, “Death”. The photo reveals what I already knew of the knight: he is lost, lonely, depressed, alone and confused. In fact, the gray clouds are so huge in that photo they look like they have cornered the lost puppy.

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Works Cited:

Corrigan, Timothy, and Patricia White. Film Experience: an Introduction. 2nd ed. New York, NY: Bedford/St. Martins, 2009. Print.

Bergman, Ingmar, dir.The Seventh Seal. Perf. Max V. Sydow and Gunnar Björnstrand. 1957. AB Svensk Filmindustr, 1958. DVD.