ScreenFish

where faith and film are intertwined

based on a novel

Recon – Moral Questions of War

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“I have had enough.”

How should we think of war? Is it a romantic, idealized story of heroics? Is it hell, as General Sherman said? Do we accept that “all’s fair” in war? Are there rules of morality that we must follow to maintain our humanity? Recon, written and directed by Rob Port, uses a real event in World War II to ask some of these questions. It is interesting that the film is being brought out for Veterans Day, a day we celebrate the military. While the film is not anti-military, is certainly has a perspective that war is a morally troublesome experience.

The film follows four soldiers as they climb an Italian mountain in search of German soldiers. They are being led by an Italian man who claims to be a partisan, but they are never sure of his real loyalties. The four are haunted, to varying degrees, by having seen their sergeant murder a civilian woman. As they make their way up the mountain with the dangers of landmines and snipers, they speak of life and death, of war and justice, of right and wrong.

They are a diverse group—liberal, racist, Jewish, Catholic, different educational levels, different backgrounds. Their perspectives on the murder range widely as well. At times, their differences threaten to bring them to violence. Only their taciturn leader, Corporal Marson, manages to keep them on focus and working together. The constant danger the squad faces as it seeks the enemy and then must find its way back home give the film a familiar war film tension.

This is not just a celebration of bravery—although there is that aspect as we see these soldiers carry out their mission. It also dives into the questions about the nature of war. It is not just the murder of a civilian that is at issue. These soldiers must also make decisions of life and death. They cannot just turn off their morality or their spiritual life. To kill another human is not an inconsequential occurrence. It leaves a spiritual mark. Perhaps some people can live with that, but not everyone. This film highlights the spiritual and emotional injuries that war brings as well as the physical costs.

As the story plays out, eventually Marson will have to decide just what kind of person he is. Can he kill just because it is war, or must he respond as a human—and as a Christian. That choice will have an almost karmic effect when we read the title card post script to the film.

From the times of the early church, war was seen as problematic. Saints Augustine and Thomas Aquinas both spoke of Just War—a recognition that war is inherently evil, but at times necessary. There may be questions whether modern weapons and technology make Just War possible. Part of Just War theory is not only the justice of the cause, but also the justice and morality of how war is carried out. Recon taps into that tradition of thinking of war.

Recon show through Fathom Events on November 10 and releases in limited theaters November 13.

Photos courtesy of Brainstorm Media.

Native Son – 1951 Film Still Speaks

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“Fear has haunted Thomas to the very end.”

Richard Wright’s 1940 novel Native Son is one of the standards of African-American literature. It has found its way to the screen a few times. The first such film, directed by Belgian director Pierre Chenal, was made in Argentina in 1951. The international flair is worth noting, because it is a film that probably couldn’t have been made at that time in the US (in part because Wright was blacklisted). When the film was released in the US it faced severe censorship. Many thought the unexpurgated film was lost for years, but in the 1990s a complete copy of the film was found in Argentina and was given to the Library of Congress for restoration. That restored version (actually restored from two copies, one 35 mm the other 16 mm) is now being released anew.

It is the story of Bigger Thomas (played here by Richard Wright himself), a young black man in Chicago’s South Side, (described in the opening voice over as “a prison without bars”). We’re told he longs to be an adventurer and explorer, but “when you’re black it’s better to keep your dreams locked in your heart.”

Bigger is on the edge of criminality, but is given a job as chauffeur for the rich white Daulton family. The parents are somewhat liberal in terms of race, Mr. Daulton tells Bigger that has wife “has a deep interest in colored people”. Daughter Mary Daulton is very progressive. When Bigger drives her to an evening out (supposedly to the library), she has him pick up her boyfriend Jan (a labor organizer) and they all go to a South Side club where Bigger’s girlfriend Bessie happens to be singing.

Mary and Jan believe in complete equality. Jan has various pamphlets on unions and racial equality. Jan tells Bigger, “One of these days we’re going to smash this Jim Crow system, and when we smash it, it’s going to stay smashed.” They expect Bigger to be their friend rather than just a chauffeur. It is very uncomfortable for Bigger to be in such a situation.

After a long night of drinking, Mary needs help getting to her room. While Bigger is trying to get her into bed, events lead to him accidentally killing her. He knows that a black man killing a white woman will never be understood, so he tries to cover it up. As the cover up escalates, and then unravels, Bigger and Bessie are on the run from police. Bigger is eventually captured and put on trial.

The film is very much in the film noir tradition. Bigger is not a moral paragon or innocent man. He has had past issues with the law. At the beginning of the story he’s planning a crime that doesn’t happen. Yet he gets caught up in circumstances mostly of his own making. However, all of this is rooted in the fear ingrained in Bigger because he is black. He knows that justice can sometimes be very swift for black men. His father was lynched twelve years earlier. What might be for some people a terrible accident, Bigger knows could be deadly for him. His every action is based on growing fear of how the world will see this and react to it.

It’s important to keep in mind that this is a mid-twentieth century view of racism. (That is one of the causes of the censorship it faced.) While there are some very overt racist scenes, such as a crowd outside the courthouse complaining over the cost of a trial when they could just lynch him, often there are more nuanced views of racism. For example, when Bigger is driving Mary and Jan, Mary wants Bigger to sing something, suggesting “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”. For all her supposed liberalism, she has a pre-conceived idea of a black person that is very much a stereotype.

There are some interesting religious angles to the story as well. Bigger’s mother is very religious. Right after Bigger goes to work for the Daultons, he is brooding at home, and he and his mother have a brief dialog:

Mother: What’s you thinking about?

Bigger: About how we live and how they live.

Mother: Leave them things to God, son. In his Kingdom all men are equal.

Bigger: Yeah, I know, but we don’t live there.

After Bigger’s arrest, his mother takes his siblings to church and we hear her prayer seeking mercy. But Bigger never turns to God, in part because he believes he is deserving of what has befallen him.

Here is a nearly seventy year old film based on an eighty year old novel that continues to seem contemporary. That serves as a reminder of just how little progress our society has made in racial relations. We might want to join in Bigger’s mother’s prayer for mercy—for young men who must live such lives and for ourselves as we see our failure to bring about change.

Native Son is available on Virtual Cinema through Kino Marquee and local arthouses and includes in introduction by film historians Eddie Muller (Film Noir Foundation) and Najima Stewart (co-curator of Kino Lorber’s Pioneers of African American Cinema).

Photos courtesy of Kino Lorber

I’m Thinking of Ending Things – And Thinking and Thinking

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How best to describe I’m Thinking of Ending Things? The easy answer is that it’s a Charlie Kaufman film. (He both writes and directs.) His scripts (cf. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, and Synecdoche, New York) are always mind games (not only for the audience, but for the characters as well). He leads us through a twisted perception of reality. He challenges us to think about what identity means. He challenges us to think about what reality means. He challenges us to think about what life means. I would categorize him as an existentialist, but one who might befuddle Jean-Paul Sartre.

Jessie Buckley as Young Woman, Jesse Plemons as Jake in Im Thinking Of Ending Things. Cr. Mary Cybulski/NETFLIX © 2020

The story centers on a young woman (Jessie Buckley) and her boyfriend Jake (Jesse Plemons) on a road trip to his childhood home to introduce her to his parents (Toni Collette and David Thewlis). The young woman (in voice over) speaks of a thought in her mind of ending things—specifically, her relationship with Jake, which she thinks is going nowhere. As they drive through the snow, they talk about many things, sometimes in great depth.

Jesse Plemons as Jake, Jessie Buckley as Young Woman, Toni Collette as Mother, David Thewlis as Father in Im Thinking Of Ending Things. Cr. Mary Cybulski/NETFLIX © 2020

Perhaps you’ve noticed I haven’t told you the young woman’s name. It keeps changing. At various times she is called Lucy, Louisa, Lucia, and possible Amy. Her clothes change from time to time as well. And she is studying painting, quantum psychics (or physics), neurology, and/or genealogy. The disjointedness of her identity is just one part of the intentional confusion of the film. The young woman also sees the characters at different times of their lives. There is a bit of a dream/nightmare quality to what the young woman is experiencing.

As all of this plays out on the road, at the house, and on the road again going home, the discussions touch on poetry, musical theater, physics, cinematic history and criticism, and David Foster Wallace. People deliver very long quotations from a wide range of sources. And finally, we arrive at an empty school in the midst of a blizzard where we see a pas-de-deux based on Oklahoma in the hallways while the janitor (is it an old age Jake?) cleans the floors.

Guy Boyd as Janitor in I’m Thinking of Ending Things. Cr. Mary Cybulski/NETFLIX © 2020

Yes, that is a lot of input for a film. There are lots of moving parts in this invention. If I were to try to look at this film in depth, it would require a dozen or so viewings, plus various trips to the library to search out some of the quotations and people who are mentioned or alluded to. It would end up a term paper (or maybe a dissertation) with several chapters. But of course, most of us won’t be going down that rabbit hole. Instead we can just enjoy the rabbit hole that is this film.

Jessie Buckley as Young Woman in Im Thinking Of Ending Things. Cr. Mary Cybulski/NETFLIX © 2020

Like I said, it’s a Charlie Kaufman film. We know going in that things will get strange—that we may not know what is really happening. And what we experiencing and how we interpret what is happening is really what Kaufman is trying to get at. Our reactions are the real point of watching a film such as this. Our perceptions, our feelings, our sense of self are really what this film is ultimately about.

I’m Thinking of Ending Things is available on Netflix.

Transit – Just Passing Through (Or Not)

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There is an old gospel song, “This world is not my home, I’m just a-passing through”. A bit of that sense of temporariness is what we find in Transit from German director Christian Penzold. There are various aspects of this film that may leave us a bit off-balance, but that just adds to the depth of this film.

The film is based on a novel by the same name that was based in 1940 France as Nazis were in the process of occupying the country. But it is filmed with current day clothing, weapons, and vehicles, but not modern technology such as computers. The story certainly reflects the novel’s time frame, but the film also pulls the story into our world.

Georg (Franz Rogowski) has recently escaped from a prison camp, and is told of a chance to escape Paris for Marseilles, which has not yet been occupied, and so is a place where many have fled to seek passage to other countries. When delivering letters to a writer, he discovers the writer is dead. But the writer has letters that promise him a visa for Mexico, if he can get to Marseilles to get them. Soon he is in the city, doing what must be done to leave France. Also in the city is Marie (Paula Beer), the writer’s estranged wife, searching for her husband. The two are attracted to each other, but Georg cannot bring himself to tell Marie the truth. Will they sail off into the sunset together? Will the truth come out? Will anyone be saved?

There are various side stories that add to the plot and its complexity, including the young son of the man who died while en route to Marseilles with Georg, and a doctor with whom Marie is having an affair. There are also many stories of people in Marseilles struggling to find a way to leave. Meanwhile, the fascists keep “cleansing” towns and will soon be here.

The modern setting of a story that seems obviously to fit with the Nazi era reminds us that refugees and immigrants continue to deal with this sense of “just a-passing through” with hopes but no assurances of having a place to go to. As we hear the various stories of the different people who are in Marseilles, they reflect life as it is still being lived by people who seek safety and a new life in another land.

But because of the way the film draws this story into our own world, it becomes a dark, existential reflection of life as something in transit. Marseilles becomes a limbo or purgatory that we find ourselves in just as the characters have. It sees life as a kind of searching for a future that we do not know—one that could be our salvation or our ruin. In the meanwhile we are thrown together with other would-be pilgrims, stuck in a world that is simultaneously threatening and hopeful. And there is no guarantee that any of us will find our way out. This is made evident in the song over the closing credits, which is not “This World is Not My Home”, but “Road to Nowhere” by Talking Heads.

Photos courtesy of Music Box Films

La Religieuse (The Nun) – Restored Classic, Restored Culture War?

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Jacques Rivette’s La Religieuse (The Nun) was the center of controversy in France. Banned for over a year by the Minister of Information in 1965, the film was a battleground of the culture wars of the day. The restored version of the film, made from the original negatives, is now in select theaters.
The film is based on a novel by 18th century Enlightenment philosopher Denis Diderot. It is the story of Suzanne Simonin (Anna Karina), a young woman forced to take vows as a nun, but who is never happy in the convent.  The film opens with Suzanne about to take vows, but she refuses. Sent home with her parents, she is punished and ignored because she was her mother’s illegitimate daughter. Suzanne’s sisters received large dowries assuring good marriages, but there is nothing for Suzanne. Her family convinces her that the religious life is her only option, even though she does not believe she has a vocation.

The film shows her struggles with convent life under three very different abbesses. The first is kind, and guides Suzanne to understand her place in the convent even without a vocation. This first abbess has her own set of doubts and troubles. But when she dies, the new abbess is authoritarian, vengeful, and seeks to break Suzanne’s spirit by harsh punishments. Suzanne sues, seeking to be released from her vows. Her suit is dismissed, but she is sent to another convent, one much different than the first.

The abbess at the new convent is much more liberal. She sees the convent a a place where each makes use of their gifts as they please. We notice the change of attitude as soon as we meet the new abbess—she has a frilly, haut couture, shapely habit. We also notice that the convent life here includes some intimate relationships. She has gone from a strict convent to a libertine one. The new abbess immediately falls in love with Suzanne, who tries to avoid such a relationship, but there is no escape for her, until her confessor arranges a chance to flee, but what can she do alone in the world?

You may see where some of the controversy came from. Many in the French Catholic Church didn’t want people getting the idea that this is what the religious life represented. They created a letter-writing and petition campaign that eventually lead to the film being banned by the Minister of Culture. That resulted in even more letters and petitions for the film’s release. After 13 months (and a change in Minister of Information), the film was released for adult viewing.

Was the controversy justified? The short answer is no, but let’s look at why I would say that (other than a default objection to censorship). The film (as part of the conditions for being released) carries an extensive disclaimer at the beginning:

Loosely based on a controversial book of the same name by Diderot, this film is the work of imagination. It does not claim to paint a true picture of religious institutions, even in the 18th century. The audience should place it in both a fictional and historical perspective, and refuse any hasty, unfair and indefensible generalization.

The film then has a voiceover explanation of Diderot’s inspirations that explains the historical context of convents in pre-Revolutionary France, when well-off families might send their daughters to convents rather than marry them off, and how some might even buy the office of abbess. This gives us a chance to understand a bit more of what is going on in the film.

The controversy was largely an overreaction. The film is not anti-religious or anti-church. On the contrary, those who express a true devotion (including Suzanne) are treated respectfully. But it also makes it clear that often people fall far short of the high calling of religious life.

The real issue in the film is not so much religion as it is freedom. For Suzanne, the problem is not that she doesn’t believe in God or the Church; she does not believe that the convent is where she belongs. She prays, but wants to do it because it is her prayer, not something that must be said at a given time. It is not the discipline that she objects to. Even in the second convent with its libertine ethos, she is not happy. She understands that a gilded cage is still a cage. What she truly wanted was her freedom. But sadly, even escape from the convent doesn’t bring true freedom because of the social strictures of the day.

All of this raises the issue of the ways religion can be either freeing or confining. There are those who would use religious teaching to force others to behave in certain ways. They expect rules to be followed and will denigrate or punish those who do not follow what they see as “God’s way”. But for some, faith can be the way out of the constraints put upon them. To know that God’s love is a constant can set us free to live in new ways.

That is what makes the controversy over the film in 1965 so interesting. It serves as an example of some who used religion as a weapon against freedom. Those who opposed the film would have done well to understand the message of film.

Photos courtesy of Rialto Pictures/Studiocanal

The Wife – Support, Loyalty, and Resentment

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This may be the perfect time for The Wife to find its way to the screen. It seems almost tailor made for the Time’s Up movement. Perhaps the fact that Jane Anderson’s screenplay (and Meg Wolitzer’s book it is based on) is fifteen years old reflects the way women have had a difficult time getting their stories out. And this film truly speaks to that issue in a clear and loud voice.

Joe (Jonathan Pryce) and Joan (Glenn Close) Castleman have been together for nearly forty years. They each have their role in the marriage. Joe is gregarious and often quite full of himself. He is a world renown author. Joan is quiet and spends most of her time being a buffer between Joe and the rest of the world—including their son David (Max Irons), an aspiring writer who futilely seeks his father’s affirmation, and Nathaniel Bone (Christian Slater) who is determined to write Joe’s biography—with or without authorization.

(I should note at this point that with this film, the awards season is officially open. I’m sure that actors and filmmakers will be seriously considered by various groups. The lead performance are especially strong.)

As the film opens, Joe learns he was been awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. This is the pinnacle of a long career. As the couple moves toward the ceremony in Stockholm, however, it becomes a time when long buried resentments return to life. The story shifts between the present and the Castlemans’ past from the time they met in 1958, when Joe taught creative writing to Joan in college and the early years of their marriage and careers. (The younger versions of Joe and Joan are played by Harry Lloyd and Annie Starke.) There are compromises that have had to be made—especially by Joan.

In one of the flashbacks, Joe introduces Joan to Elaine Mozel (Elizabeth McGovern), a woman author who dissuades Joan from following a career in writing because people only pay attention to male authors. Joan believes “Writers have to write.” Elaine counters, “Writers have to be read.” This encounter causes Joan to put her own writing career on hold, but she becomes Joe’s primary supporter as his career begins to flourish. (Just how that support happens becomes a key part of the story.)

Over the years the roles they have been forced into grate on both Joe and Joan. They each have their own ways of dealing with the falsehoods and compromises that have made up their relationship. But as the Nobel ceremony draws near, it brings all the feelings they have held inside for decades to the surface and their family is about to implode. If the key secret that would-be biographer Bone is seeking to reveal were to come out, everything the Castlemans have created could be brought to naught.

The film reflects the sexism that was intrinsic to the times (and in many ways continues still). The roles Joe and Joan played within the marriage were the social reality of the day. So too was the dismissal of women’s voices in literature. Things may have improved since that time, but it is important that the film never looks at blatant sexism, but rather at the more subtle ways women were (and often still are) discouraged from seeking and achieving full acceptance in not only the arts, but in many (most) professions.

It is this point that makes the film so fitting for a time when Hollywood is struggling to find more ways of bringing women’s talents and voices to the fore. It should be noted that this film involves a number of women in creating this film: the screenwriter who adapted the book of a woman writer, and most of the producers of the film. The film is, however directed by Björn Runge, of whom screenwriter Jane Anderson says in press notes, “[He} is the most feminist of male directors!” The inclusiveness of the production is very much in line with the story it tells.

Photos courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

 

The Sense of an Ending – Unhistoric History

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I have a t-shirt that reads “The older I get the better I was.” That sentiment immediately came to mind when I watched The Sense of an Ending. It is a story of memory of past times, but we see that those memories may not be a reliable recounting of what happened.

Adapted from the Man Booker Prize winning novel by Julian Barnes, the central character of the piece is Tony Webster (Jim Broadbent), a semi-retired recluse. When he gets a letter from someone about something that has been left to him, it starts his recollection of times and people from his past. The film wanders back and forth between the present day and his memories of the past. In the current sections, Tony deals with his ex-wife Margaret (Harriet Walter), daughter Susie (Michelle Dockery), and his first love from long ago Veronica (Charlotte Rampling). In the flashbacks, we meet the younger Tony (Billy Howle) and Veronica (Freya Mavor), and Veronica’s mother Sarah (Emily Mortimer).

Through it all we may think that Tony’s memories are accurate but, as the story progresses, he begins to have memories that he has long suppressed—memories that may change the way he understands himself after all these years—and may reflect on the person he has become.

There is a scene in flashback where Adrian (Joe Alwyn), Tony’s friend and rival at school, reflects on the impossibility of truly knowing history. There is always so much that is not known that we tend to make assumptions based on inadequate information. This plays out often both in Tony’s memories and in the world in which he is growing old.

How we remember (and what we choose to remember or forget) greatly impact on the way we understand our lives and the world. Nostalgia often makes us think of “the good old days”, but those days are often filled with darkness that we have forgotten. Certainly (as my t-shirt attests) that can create personal histories that are only real to us. It’s understandable that we concentrate on the good things from our past and let our mistakes slide into the void of forgotten history. Being able to do that sets us free to find happiness without the continued burden of guilt.

But this can also be found as something we do as a society. It was a happy coincidence that the day after I screened The Sense of an Ending I came across a reference to an article on Time.com written by Serenity Jones, President of Union Theological Seminary in New York. The article, written during last year’s election, reflects on the ferociousness of the discourse. She talks about our nation’s theological national story, but points out:

From a spiritual perspective, the problem is that this story has not incorporated a serious account of our wrongs. Our enduring flaws, profound failures, egregious harm and horrendous evils–none of these are part of our core story. The clearest example of this is our failure to sufficiently deal with our two most obviously horrific wrongs—the carefully orchestrated genocide of Native American and the 300-year-long story of the most brutal social system ever created, chattel slavery.

Whether it is on a personal level or as a nation, the flaws of our memory may make life easier for us on some levels. Forgetting past sins may well seem like a blessing. But it can also block us from experiencing repentance and the true freedom from our mistakes that can lead us to find new life ahead.

Photos courtesy CBS Films

 

The Great Gilly Hopkins – Finding Family

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For Gilly (short for Galadriel) Hopkins (Sophie Nélisse) family has always been a daydream. She has been through a load of foster homes. She has developed an attitude that serves as her armor. No one is going to get close to her. Yet she dreams of her mother coming to rescue her—even though her mother has never wanted anything to do with her. The Great Gilly Hopkins is a story about the meaning of family. Based on the long-popular YA book by Katherine Paterson (which won a National Book Award and a Newbery Honor), the film is adapted by Paterson’s son David, who also adapted her book Bridge to Terabithia for the screen.ggh-6-8-14-251

The film opens with Gilly being brought to what is a last chance for her, the very lower middle class home of Maime Trotter (Kathy Bates), a foster mother who has never found a child she cannot love. And through all Gilly’s tries to fight against that love, Trotter keeps right on loving. Her first day at school she gets in a fight (beating six boys). She writes a card with a racial slur to her teacher (Octavia Spencer). When a girl in the school seeks to befriend her, Gilly treats her miserably. She mildly bullies W.E., the younger foster child in the house, but won’t let anyone at school bother him. She steals from Mr. Randolph (Bill Cobbs) the blind neighbor across the street that Trotter has brought into the family was well. Let’s face it; most people would have given up on Gilly long ago. And she pushes everyone to the limit. Then, finding where her mother is living, she sends a letter full of exaggerations then tries to run away to her.

Trotter still refuses to admit defeat, and soon Gilly is beginning to find her place in the oddly put together family. But then, as a result of the letter to her mother, her grandmother (Glenn Close) (who never knew about her) shows up. Her grandmother is very well off and wants to take Gilly to live with her. Just as she has finally found happiness, is she to be uprooted yet again?

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While stories of children in foster care often show settings of abuse, this home is a place of love and acceptance. Gilly’s dream of being united with her mother has stood in the way of her seeing the people around her willing to love her and make her a part of their family. Dreams, of course, can help us find happiness as we follow those dreams, but for Gilly they have been a barrier to happiness. Just as her attitude has served to protect her from harm, it has also been a hindrance that has blocked any chance at love and happiness.

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Perhaps one of the reasons for the popularity of the book is that it focuses on the struggle of people of that age to feel as if there is a place for them—even those in loving families. It is certainly age appropriate for tweens to feel as if they don’t fit in anywhere. Gilly has given tween readers someone who gives voice to their feelings. That comes out well in the film. I think the kinds of feelings that Gilly exhibits at various stages of the film reflect the fears and hopes of many children of that age. The film also shows that even when there is great disappointment in life, if there are those around who love you and you love in return, happiness can still be found.

Photos courtesy of Lionsgate Premiere