The British and Irish co-produced film "Fathers in Difficulties" was unexpected at the beginning and caught people off guard. Behind the dirty words, there was a cold murderous intent. Murderous intent is like the sword of Damocles, which has been hanging over the audience's head, making the audience anxious and spend more than an hour.
The film is like a publicly announced murder. The murderer did not hesitate to set the priest's death date and told the priest himself. It's just that he was in the confession room and told the priest as his confession. This left the priest in a terrifying and absurd situation. Someone blatantly threatened to kill himself, but he was a priest. This threat came from confession. Because of the priest's duty, he could not publicize the matter, let alone call the police. He knew exactly who the murderer was, and during the week he was warned to be killed, he had to deal with the murderer and perform his duties.
This is a huge torture for the priest. No one can overcome the fear and get out of this absurd situation. And this is exactly what the murderer would like to see. The murderer picked the priest as the target of the attack, precisely because only the priest was the cleanest in this closed town. The murderer who has been bullied since he was a child wants to avenge the society. What he can't tolerate the most is that there are people like priests in this society.
During the week that the priest endured the physical and mental fears, he still maintained his apparent composure, completing his daily work. As the priest in the only church in the town, he is the spiritual support of the residents of the town. On the one hand, he is like an aunt in the neighborhood committee in China, doing all kinds of trivial matters and resolving the disputes within the family between the neighbors; on the other hand, he has to be like a psychiatrist, accepting that there are all kinds of things in the town. The confession of people suffering from various knots relieved their mental depression.
The director also asked the audience to follow the priest to the depths of this remote Irish town to get a glimpse into the hearts of the residents of the town. From the outside, everything is normal here, people are walking on a normal track, life is not happy, but it is not bad. However, as the camera progresses step by step, we can see the terrible aspects of this small town. Everyone in the small town has its own problems. From psychological worries to realistic dilemmas, it indicates that the town is actually Crisis is everywhere. When the priest spent the most difficult week of his life in troubles, the dark side of human nature also appeared in front of the audience one by one. The despicable heart and the overflowing desire made this small town like the city of Sodom before being destroyed by God. .
This small town can't help but think of the German town in "White Ribbon". The same dull and boring, the same gloomy and closed, the same full of malice, the same hidden murderous intent. People often praise the simplicity and poetry of a small town, and contrast it with urban civilization. In fact, in such a small town, evil is most likely to breed. Because in the small town, people know each other's details, and everyone has an entangled relationship. In this kind of closed interpersonal circle, everyone holds each other's handles tacitly. Once the chance happens, you will be stunned, and you have nowhere to escape. On the contrary, in the city, the expansion of the communication space and the strangeness between each other prevent the intensification of contradictions to a certain extent.
In the movie, the priest is like a saint. Facing the threat of death, he acted like a ritual, taking care of all those in need in the town. Of course, in the face of the ensuing difficulties, he has also been angry, hesitated, and thought about shrinking. He also drank his sorrows by drinking, and shot his anger to vent. What made him most uneasy was his feelings of guilt for his daughter. He was originally a priest who was a monk, but his wife's death made him feel the tastelessness of life. He dedicated himself to God, but neglected to take care of his daughter. His daughter had committed suicide, which made him feel distressed. Saints are actually mortals, with the affection of ordinary people, as well as the emotions and sorrows of ordinary people.
But the reason why a saint became a saint is precisely that he can appreciate the feelings of ordinary people, and can give up a little at a critical moment, abandon all of his own, even his life. The priest is like this. He gave up the idea of escaping and faced it bravely, with his own justice, with his courage, with his own beliefs, with his own body, to save this sinful town, and to awaken these malicious people. people. He acted like Jesus, and the film’s original name was Calvary (Calvary, the place of the crucifixion), which is exactly what it meant.
The priest's Calvary is the small town in the film. The place like Sodom is just a microcosm of human society. The morals in the town are degraded, just like human society. Some people say that in fact, the priest can completely abandon this small town and let it fend for itself. People like this are not worth saving, let alone redeeming with their own lives. But God loves the world and never abandons anyone. The purpose of God's crucifixion of Jesus was to awaken the world and redeem sinful mankind. Similarly, the priest used his actions to redeem this malicious town. When he came to the beach as scheduled, it embodied the fearless courage and responsibility of a priest. With a gunshot, it seems that the film is full of tragedy. But the actions of his daughter at the end of the film let us see hope and feel the warmth of humanity and the greatness of divinity.
One question that the film makes me entangled is, if the priest retreats and even reports to the police in violation of the rules, will the result change? The murderer’s anger is obvious. He wanted to show the world that innocence itself is a crime in such a bad society. From his perspective, killing the innocent is actually killing sin. He warned the priest to kill him in advance, in fact, to let the priest make a choice: should he be in the same way or continue to be innocent? The priest's withdrawal and violation of the rules will make the murderer feel that his judgment is correct, and in the end it is the priest himself who is saved, and the residents of the small town will lose the chance of redemption just like him. The priest's final choice, the murderer should be very surprised, he fulfilled the priest's will, and made the priest redeem the world with his crimes.
This is the story of the crucifixion, but the director modernized it and placed it in a cold town on the Irish coast. Suffering and salvation will probably be the eternal theme of mankind.
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