Ingmar Bergman’s 1957 landmark is in many respects the ultimate “arty foreign flick.” Credited with launching the mid-century foreign film craze on college campuses and boho communities around the U.S., Sweden’s “The Seventh Seal” is frequently listed alongside “Citizen Kane,” “The Seven Samurai” and “The Rules of the Game” as one of the top four or five greatest works of film art. It’s also a serious contender for the most parodied film of all time, having been sent up in innumerable places and contexts including Woody Allen’s “Love & Death,” “Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey,” and the “Cheating Death” segment of “The Colbert Report.” The downside of its huge artistic rep is that probably no other single film has had to deal with as much of an “eat your vegetables” reputation, so that even some cinephiles approach watching it more as a duty than a pleasure – even though many other art house faves are actually far more unapproachable. It’s gotten to the point where even many serious film fanatics downplay it, avoid it completely, or achieve a kind of super film snob nirvana by looking down their noses at it.

They get away with that last part because of something you’ll never know about “The Seventh Seal” until you actually see it: as death-obsessed, arty foreign flicks go, it’s actually kind of fun. There’s no getting around the portentous stylistic flourishes or the deep dish subject matter – nothing less than the meaning of life and death – but Bergman’s signature film also has its share of risqué knockabout humor, as well as a bit of horror, violence, more than a little melodrama, and some of the most stark black and white imagery ever committed to film. It’s important to realize, though, that this might not actually be Bergman’s best film. Heck, as with any movie, it’s possible you’ll hate it. You have my permission.

The setting is medieval Europe at the time of the devastating Black Plague. Knight Antonius Block (Max von Sydow), who has recently returned from the pointlessly bloody crusades, is confronted by the hooded figure of Death (Bengt Ekerot). It should be curtains, but the warrior insists that, while his body might be afraid, he himself is not. He nevertheless challenges the specter to the most famous board game in movie history — a single game of chess, which he has correctly surmised is Mr. Personified Death’s weakness. The delaying tactic works for the length of the film, as the knight and his cynical squire (Gunnar Björnstrand) have a series of encounters, all variously dealing with the subject of life and its inevitable end, as plague-borne hysteria sweeps the land and threatens Jof, a likable actor (Nils Poppe), Mia, his loving wife (Bibi Andersson), and their infant son.

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Character actress Lorna Raver starred in the year’s best reviewed horror film, and all she got was this lousy button.

Being in the same general ethnic/religious cohort doesn’t give me the right to speak for writer-director Sam Raimi and his co-writer brother Ivan, but this Jewish kid was just a little bit traumatized when he first learned about the traditional Christian concept of hell. Judaism has no hell other than guilt and death, so learning about the fire, the pitchforks, and the eternal torment – and that millions believed that, by virtue of my non-Christianity, I was going to suffer all of it – was a little traumatic. I hadn’t even done anything bad enough yet to be grounded.

In “Drag Me to Hell,” Raimi and company fashion what is in some respects an only slightly less unjust universe, in which the failure to perform a single mitvah (usually translated from Hebrew as a good deed, but in reality it means the act of obeying a commandment) is transubstantiated from Jewish recrimination into Catholic punishment of the pre-Vatican II variety. In this case, a single selfish choice lands loan officer Christine Brown (Alison Lohman) in serious danger of eternal damnation after being cursed, Gypsy style, by Mrs. Ganush (Lorna Raver), easily the least attractive woman of any age in Los Angeles. It gets worse; the woman has very sharp and very ugly dentures, and she’s not afraid to use them, right alongside the supernatural abilities available to all Romani movie females over age 60. Naturally, poor Christine’s relationship with her understanding psychologist boyfriend (Justin “I’m a Mac” Long, playing straight man for a change) will be somewhat strained as she is subjected to one bizarre supernatural attack after another – including surprise visits in her car, a projectile nosebleed (at least a pint’s worth), and the old eyeball-in-the-“Harvest Cake” trick.

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Up to now, I’ve been a no-show at the several cinephile exams that have been hosted over the last couple of years at Dennis Cozzalio’s legendarily brainy film geek blog, Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule. Well, before splitting for a hard-earned vacation, Dennis has posted a new exam on film-related matters, up in honor of the cartoon dog genius, Prof. Peabody, which you’re all encouraged to take.

I’ve posted my responses in the comment thread over there already, but now that I’m a SLIFR slacker no more, I thought I’d make ‘em do double duty here because we know that my opinions matter, or something.

Here goes….

1) Favorite Biopic

“Lawrence of Arabia” – an obviously great film and a rather pedestrian choice given that I really like biopics, sometimes the cheesier and and more ridiculously fabricated the better. Therefore, quasi-demi-honorable mention is alluded this triumvirate of absurdly wrong biopics – “The Jolson Story” (it’s amazing how much Al Jolson’s life was just like the plot of “The Jazz Singer”!), “They Died With Their Boots On” (the love affair between Custer and the Indians your socialist history teacher doesn’t want you to see!) and “Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story” (he didn’t just appear in action movies…he lived them!).

2) Dyan Cannon or Tuesday Weld?

It’s close, but I give it to Dyan Cannon for being hilarious onscreen and genuinely wacky offscreen.

3) Best example of science fiction futurism rendered silly by the event of time catching up to the prediction

The Jetson’s treadmill? I’m drawing a blank here.

4) Annette Funicello & Frankie Avalon or Troy Donahue & Sandra Dee?

Frankie & Annette – I grew up watching those movies on channels 5 & 9 (I think) out here up to age 10 or so. Not that those movies are in any sense “good” (I wonder if I could sit through any of them now?), but F&A at least have a certain amount of charm and sense of humor, which I really can’t say about Troy Donahue, at least.

5) Favorite Raoul Walsh movie?

Not really “White Heat,” and no, definitely not “They Died with Their Boots On”… The winner is “The Roaring Twenties” – by far. Just a magnificent entertainment. I need to see that one again some time soon.

6) Sophomore film which represents greatest improvement over the director’s debut

This is tough, but I guess I’m going to say Polanski’s “Repulsion” as it’s brilliant and “Knife in the Water” left me feeling merely 90 minutes older after it was done. Though, that was in college and I might have a very different reaction now. (Another possibility is “Rushmore” – though I loved “Bottle Rocket” quite a bit, so it’s dicey.)

7) Ice Cube or Mos Def?

Mos Def – because he convinced me he was actually English in “Hithchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.”

Favorite movie about the music industry.

Many, many fun movies in this category, but I guess I’m going to have to go with “Nashville.”

(more…)

Though I culturally identify myself as Jewish, I’m not a believer in any religion. I nevertheless still feel the need get spiritual sometimes at this time of year, if only in a musical theater-adapted to film sort of a way.

This time, I’ll give you a couple of clips from the two musicals directed by Norman Jewison, who, famously, was not Jewish but was nevertheless, I imagine, forced to think about such matters because of his name. Jewison was not a great director of musicals, but he was a wonderful director of straightforward drama like In the Heat of the Night and had style to spare, particularly in The Thomas Crown Affair. That was close to being enough in his two back to back seventies musical translation of theatrical superhits, particularly when he had great music by Jerry Bock and lyrics by Sheldon Harnick behind him.

I’m no fan of Andrew Lloyd Weber. On the other hand, as the Lord says in “God’s Comic,” the Elvis Costello song which imagines Yahweh opining on Weber, among other matters, “I preferred the one about my son.” So did I, and this is by far my favorite musical moment from the film, featuring Ted Neeley as the eponymous leading man/diety and Carl Anderson as Judas singing some of the strongest lyrics Tim Rice ever came up with.

Judas in Superstar is a relatively sympathetic character, but when you think about it, Judas might have been world culture’s first purity troll.*

Have a happy whatever, folks.

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* Blogger’s note to those unschooled in the verbiage of political blog commenting. Dkosepedia defines “purity trolls” as:

…trolls from the left. Otherwise known in real life as drama queens. No matter how pure your position is, their position is more pure. No matter how compassionate or informed or skeptical or vigorous your opinion is, theirs is more of it. These trolls are insistent that they are the true spirit of liberalism, and spend their time being quite put out that the rest of us don’t turn over our resources, our audiences, and our respect to them, regardless of how thin their positions may be on the merits…..