Through the actual actions of eight French Cistercian monks living in villages in North Africa, the director showed us his attitude-that violence should never be used to control violence. Today's extremely brutal ISIS terrorist organization is precisely the evil result of violence against violence.
These eight monks did this physically and with constant doubts until they achieved complete spiritual freedom and crossed the boundary of life and death. What helped them to do this was not so much religion as fraternity. It is the common belief of mankind. Whether they are monks or terrorists, whether they are Christians or Muslims, they believe in different gods, but first of all, they are all human beings.
The director spent a lot of space and meticulously described the procedures and details of the eight monks’ daily lives. The director used this sense of ritual to distance himself from the audience, and at the same time filtered out the director’s own identity and projection in this way. , So everything that follows seems to show no trace, at the same time calm. The director's portrayal of the group portraits is concise and powerful. Every monk has flesh and blood, not flat religious symbols.
When the young girl was killed and the Croatian worker was sung by the horror, the breath of death quickly surrounded the solemn monastery sheltered by the Holy Light. Bishop Christian rejected the "help" from the army and police on his own initiative. The army is another form of legalized violence. When illegal violence appears, it seems to be violent. Protected by such violence, it is obviously the monks. His religious beliefs are unacceptable.
The threat of death caused the monks to doubt their beliefs and the choices they made, and this suspicion tortured every monk. As one of them said, "I shouldn't be so painful when I stick to my beliefs." The monks’ daily practice life continued in doubt. They prayed, chanted, meditated, and then experienced some kind of "rebirth." When they expressed their attitude for the last time, they all chose to stay calmly, that is, to complete their martyrdom and sacrifice. Out of life.
The montage passage from close-up to close-up accompanied by "Swan Lake" helped the film reduce the suspicion of "moral nobility". The expressions of the monks went from the joy of tasting the wine to the sadness to the contemplation. They were not afraid of it. Died, but made the final choice. And the oldest monk among them, he did not hesitate to say that he would stay, but at the last moment he still betrayed his faith, just because of fear, fear of death and desire for survival, these feelings came Too real, it does make people forget the invisible God. Here, the director also laid the groundwork early, just as the doctor said when examining the body of the old monk, "You will be the longest living among us", as expected when the ending subtitles appeared.
Regarding the question of how we face violence, there are two other films that can be used as a reference. One is "A Better World" from Susanna Beal in the same year, and the other is "The Big Bad" recommended by Quentin last year. Wolf".
If you analyze "Better World" from the perspective of feminism, it marks the current stage of feminist films: shaking hands and making peace with men. The stage of resistance has passed. What is more practical than resistance is to create an ideal image of a good man. In a broad sense, it is to build a "better world". Therefore, the film's protagonist, Doctor Anton, was created by the director. A new good man in, and the director's definition of "good", one of the very important indicators is not to use violence, even after being assaulted. In front of his son, after he was slapped a few times by the repairman, he chose to forbear and teach his son (the boy who had learned how to use violence to control violence at school) how to do in the face of violence. This is obviously the director's attitude, and it is also the director's hope and hope for a "better world".
And the other movie "Big Bad Wolf" still did not break out of the vicious cycle of using violence to control violence. Even the director himself was violent to the audience, tirelessly showing every detail of violence as much as possible to torture the audience. This behavior is really true. It's regrettable. The director calmly and calmly told a frightening story with strong political metaphors. He also made unridiculous jokes about the Palestine-Israel issue. He set up a funny Arab man riding a horse and holding an iPhone. Image. The director is aware of the horror of this vicious circle, but he accidentally becomes the perpetrator involved in it, and the accomplice he wants to denounce.
At the end of the film, the monks disappeared in the snow, and the martyrdom of several monks was completed quietly. The hope that this violent world will become better because of this seems too slim in the fog. But still thinking of the climax in Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc", when Joan of Arc was asked what that great victory was, she answered "My martyrdom".
We don’t know if there is a God, but at least violence has given birth to the devil.
View more about Of Gods and Men reviews
