SCREENING LOG - 11/26-12/2, 2001

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I saw Diary of a Country Priest, Mouchette, Joan the Maid: The Battles, Joan the Maid: The Prisons and Jung (War): In the Land of the Mujaheddin. All are highly worthy of your attention, if you love movies about humankind. I'll start with the one that may be of the most relevent interest to us at the present moment:

Jung (War): In the Land of the Mujaheddin (2000, dir. Fabrizio Lazzaretti and Alberto Vendemmiati)

If you ever come across this film, you owe it to yourself to see it. It's gripping from start to finish, with incredible footage of what was the front lines of the Taliban and the Northern Alliance back when no one knew or cared about their conflicts. The story follows an amazing Italian doctor and an English nurse as they, single-handedly it seems, build a modern hospital facility in the midst of a war zone. Battlefield scenes are interspersed with everyday "normal" life of Afghans as they live, work and avoid stepping on line mines; and the doctor patching up a seemingly endless parade of both military and civilian casualties. At first it seemed that the film would be unwisely pro-Northern Alliance (it is resoundingly anti-Taliban), but after witnessing the doctor chew out a soldier eager to return to fighting even after his legs were blown off, I think they're all a bit crazy. The overall effect is quite sobering, and gives one pause to reflect on just what the U.S. government hopes to accomplish over there. Which is a lot better than deceiving oneself in a comforting cloud of blissfully patriotic ignorance.

Diary of a Country Priest (1951, dir. Robert Bresson)

A young, sickly priest attempts to practice his uncompromising principles to a resentful community, with results both tragic and miraculous. Robert Bresson is probably my favorite director of the moment. He doesn't screw around. Every frame, every second is not wasted and bears a relevance to the film's spiritual and sociological explorations. Bresson's unmistakable sense of integrity and resoluteness of vision is realized in a unique filmmaking style that is controlled, precise and powerful.

Mouchette (1966, dir. Robert Bresson)

Far less comforting and pointedly absent of a saved-by-grace conclusion, this is perhaps Bresson's most starkly challenging work. Basically, a slow-witted peasant girl lives a life of increasing misfortune and horror. Perhaps Bresson is saying that the fact of this film's existence, assembled with a supremely assiduous sense of craft, is salvation enough for this young girl's terrible life, to which the audience bears witness. Scorsese and Schrader owe a lot of RAGING BULL to this masterpiece, which is much less showy and far more powerful overall.

Joan the Maid (The Battles, The Prisons) (1993, dir. Jacques Rivette)

Currently I prefer this tag team to Dreyer's PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (the only other Joan movie I've seen). In many ways they're opposites -- while Dreyer's film is unrelentingly intense and formally disorienting, Rivette's is measured and natural. What they have in common are exceptional central performances, this time Sandrine Bonnaire as a womanchild Joan who can be both precociously commanding and uncontrollably giddy. Rivette gives us the gift of showing us a kind of "backstage" Joan of Arc story, with little scenes of people, including Joan, discussing everyday trifles, sharing equal time with the more historic moments. A landmark film that will hopefully gain more recognition with time.

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