Block
In Bergman’s film, The Seventh Seal, Block does not seem worried that it will all be pointless. He is returning from war, he has travelled through plague territory. He has seen how easily lives are lost. The thin knight with the tense expression is anxious not because of Death, but because God is silent. He has found no basis to his faith. Faith is a torment.
Goenawan Mohamad
July 26, 2021
“I MET Death today.” I remember now: it is from a scene in Ingmar Bergman’s film The Seventh Seal that I have watched numerous times, and written about in this column before.
It is a dark story. Antonius Block, a medieval knight, is riding a horse from distant Jerusalem to his castle in Sweden. He is returning from the Crusades, disappointed in God and confused. He is exhausted.
Along the way, he and his squire, Jon
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