The Seventh Seal - Ingmar Bergman

Seen for the first time in October 2012.

This may very well be - and by head and shoulders at that - the very best film I have ever seen in my life. I can think of no other movie which attempts this amount of philosophical weight, and yet is also this good, and also this beautifully shot. Or to paraphrase someone else, what either movie has attempted this depth, and not been destroyed by these same attempts at depth?

Beyond the obvious heft of its ideas, like all great art and not mere treatise, it depicts the human experience without resort to sensationalism or sentimentality, or any other dodge. Bergman “paints things as they are,” and people can do as they like. The word amazing is oft abused. I do not abuse it here. It is an amazing accomplishment and filled with resonance. Grade A.