Death of Max von Sydow, from the "Seventh Seal" to "Game of Thrones"

Text by: RFI Follow

Franco-Swedish actor Max von Sydow died on March 8 at the age of 90. He had lent his long, slender silhouette for 70 years to the greatest directors performing more than a hundred roles.

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For 70 years, her two-meter tall silhouette and her blue eyes have marked world cinema. Max von Sydow had gained notoriety thanks to his compatriot, the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman, with whom he will shoot a dozen films, notably The Seventh Seal , in 1957, where his role of knight returning from the crusades playing his life in chess with Death marks the spirits.

He is noticed in Hollywood and multiplies the supporting roles. In 1973, it was the consecration with one of the great successes of the American box office; William Friedkin entrusts him with the character of father Lankester Merrin in The Exorcist , he is 43 years old.

The Three-Eyed Crow

European cinema also opens its arms to him. He plays in La Mort en direct , by Bertrand Tavernier, and in Pelle le Conquérant , by the Dane Billie August, Palme d'or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1987. The roles of villains have long stuck to his skin, but his acting has knew how to seduce the biggest. David Lynch makes it turn in Dune , Steven Spielberg in Minority Report or Martin Scorsese in Shutter Island .

The youngest discovered Max von Sydow through the Star Wars saga that he integrated in 2014, for the seventh episode The Force Awakens before playing the Three-Eyed Crow in the globally successful series Game of Thrones .

Since 1997, he was married to French director Catherine Brelet. In 2002, Max von Sydow had acquired French nationality.

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