Nils Poppe makes innocence engaging without making it foolish. In The Seventh Seal, the practised physical comedian brings a warmth that keeps Bergman’s questions about faith attached to people we care about.
Fi1m perspective
In The Seventh Seal (1957), Nils Poppe plays Jof, a visionary juggler whose company we welcome amid the knight’s distress. Poppe gives him enough individuality to be worth watching without having to decide what he represents. We were moved by the companionship around Jof and Bibi Andersson’s Mia, because their warmth makes ordinary physical life matter beside the talk of faith. This is where we rate Poppe highly: he makes a figure in a morality play feel like someone we might want to know.
His earlier comic characters were considerably less accommodating. The law-quoting student of Sten Stensson kommer till stan (1945) and the pedantic soldier introduced in Soldat Bom (1948) made rules a recurring source of comedy. Both became repeat roles, with four films for Sten Stensson Steen and seven for Fabian Bom. Poppe’s specialities were dance, acrobatics and physical timing; Annalisa Ericson was a dance and comedy partner.
The casting makes sense once we stop expecting a film about faith to be solemn throughout. Bergman leaves space for broad, sometimes coarse humour, and it belongs to the same frightened world as the knight’s distress. Gunnar Björnstrand’s Jöns is important to that company too; each of these figures has more to offer than a position on belief. The dialogue occasionally labours its questions, and the actors cannot make every solemn exchange necessary. We value Poppe’s gentleness here because the film needs people whose company remains a pleasure when the discussion becomes hard work.
Bergman cast him again as the Vicar in The Devil’s Eye (1960), their second and final film together. Poppe’s later career returned to the stage: he performed at and managed the open-air Fredriksdalsteatern in Helsingborg from 1966 until 1993. Those supporting parts occupy only a small stretch of his working life. Start with The Seventh Seal, and give its comedian as much attention as its knight.
Biography
Nils Poppe was a Swedish actor, comedian, director, screenwriter and theatre manager. Born Nils Einar Jönsson on 31 May 1908 in Malmö, he died on 28 June 2000 in Helsingborg. He appeared in more than fifty films for cinema and television, and was widely popular in Sweden for his comedic performances.
Internationally he is best known for playing the jester Jof in Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal (1957). He also appeared in another Bergman film, The Devil's Eye (1960), as the Vicar. Poppe began his career in theatre and dance before making his film debut in the 1940s; he frequently wrote and directed as well as acted, and continued stage work into his eighties.
