The Seventh Seal

The Seventh Seal
Lauren Brooks
Despite the age of this movie I really enjoyed the questioning aspect of the knight. He was so conflicted internally with what would happen after his death that he was willing to play a game of chess with death to prolong his time on Earth to figure out the answer. I can not imagine knowing that I was going to die as soon as I finished a game of chess.
I think in each of us there is a little a bit of the knight and a little bit of the squire. I think the majority of people are afraid of death or dying, it is a time when beliefs, values and faith really play out. The knight is so unsure of what happens after death and really wants a guarantee that the choice in makes in life will be the best one for him in the afterlife. I especially love that the way the director chooses to portray death in this movie.
At this time period, death was all around with the outbreak of the black plague and in the movie he was seen constantly taking people. In the movie he seemed to play a neutral role in the afterlife and it was something that you hardly ever see in movies these days. Usually death is full of negativity about the afterlife and only comes when after death will be someplace similar to hell. Death takes his time with the knight and even offers to prolong the knight’s death with a chess game. The whole time the chess game is going on the knight ponders over the options of life after death, but gets no where with Death in the end. Finally Death comes for them all and they are able to face Death head on. I think the knight finally realizes that faith is a huge part of life after death no matter what you believe happens. At some point you have to take the leap and the chess game was just his way of trying to prolong that leap.
Eventually we all die, it’s just a fact of life and we have to make a decision about how we feel about the mystery of life and death, because I don’t know about you but I don’t play chess,.