I'm pretty sure that it will take no long for this one movie a day dare to be my end.
I usually look for intense stories, but in a bigger range of time between one and another. And despite trying to see lighter movies sometimes, the excelence of some of the films that I've seen in less then one month is astounding.
For April 5 I really wanted to see a movie related to religion, and so I got my wish in Stations of the Cross (Kreuzweg), by German director Dietrich Brüggemann.. By the first scene I've already realized that I would be devastated by the end.
The main set is religious education, but of course it goes ways farther from that. By the opressive manner in which 14 years old Maria is educated by her strict mother and dull father (a true banana, as we would call in Brazil), we can think about how some actually criminal acts are commited against children by their own families. But it is not physical agression or something that would call the authorities attentions, so it keeps going on and on, by unprepared parents in a familiar setting that is a nightmarish endless hole for children.
Stations is a loud cry for attention through the most heartbreaking silence of its protagonist. Maria is so serious, kind, commited to what she thinks is the right thing, beliefs that were hammered so strongly over her head that she has no other option than disappear into it.
At some point, her mother, when asked about her faith, says that it is not just a faith, as if we could mesure human beliefs in God. She affirms that it is the real faith, the true way to achieve a life without sin (more real than the one preached by the Vatican, according to her church's view). And in being intolerant as we see happening in many times in history, ours included, she achieves not salvation, but just the opposite.
Brüggemann's film screams so loudly, but he finals credits were silent. As I was, still am and probably will be for a long time yet.
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| This doctor is amazing... if only there were more like him. Stations of the Cross (Kreuzweg). Directed by Dietrich Brüggemann. With: Lucia Aron, Anna Brüggemann, Michael Kamp. Writer: Anna Brüeggemann. Germany, 2014, 110min., Color. |
So hard to discuss these kind of themes, but it doesn't mean we shouldn't discuss at all. One thing I am always worried about is to be sure that we can freely speak our point of view, even though some days religious matters aren't supposed to be just point of view. Some days they hammer upon us (as using your term on the text) like a hundred percent truth.
ReplyDeleteI always think how Cinema is a place to some debates, só difficult In our daily life. It is also a good training in tolerance and listening to different views, respecting different beliefs. As you well said as always!!!!
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