That didn't shoot. Malika's heartbreaking ”Hidden Life” conquered Cannes
Any competition that implies an award, be it an independent film festival or an Oscar race, only makes sense as long as there is no film on the program that leaves the audience and the jury no room to maneuver. This is exactly what happened when "Cannes - 2019" slightly crossed the equator. The genius author and reclusive director Terrence Malick returned (almost incognito) to the Cote d'Azur eight years later. Then the jury headed by Robert De Niro was conquered by his "Tree of Life". Now a miracle must happen for Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and the team to somehow dodge the obvious - the Palme d'Or in Malik's new drama The Hidden Life. However, a miracle has already happened: this powerful ode to humanity, faith, humanism, in essence, life as such is already a reward in itself. With such films, great masters like to say goodbye to their profession. We hope that the most mysterious director of our time will not choose such a path for himself.At the heart of "Hidden Life" is the real story of Franz Jagerstatter (played as if August Diehl, who had grown old during the film, with an incredibly deep look) - an Austrian who refused to serve Hitler and the Nazi army. 1943, the army carries out another mobilization of civilians for further battles. In the column of recruits, everyone reads the words of the oath, except for one person - he simply cannot swear to do what no person on Earth should do. Franz is immediately arrested and sent to prison, and then handed over to a military tribunal. All Jagerstatter's soul really hurts about is his wife Fani (expressive Valerie Pachner) and three daughters who remained in such a beautiful and already unattainably distant house in the village of Radegund. They lived simply, honestly and worked hard, cultivated a vegetable garden and tended cattle, raised children and took care of Franz's elderly mother. Now all he has left is a piece of blue sky on rare walks for prisoners and an unshakable belief that he must leave the world for his family. And there can be no peace as long as people continue to destroy each other.  After a monumental three-hour manifesto, Terrence Malick's philanthropy wants to leave silence in the air. Sacramental silence, broken only by quiet, simple phrases that communicate with the closest people, Malik fills every frame of the idyllic Austrian pastoral. The director is in no hurry and, before yanking out our heart and turning it inside out, lets us admire the vastness where trouble will come very soon. Leaden clouds over the majestic mountains, luscious greenery, like a girl's dress decorating the trees, fat black soil that covers the hands of peasants to the elbows - rural life with its burdensome everyday life and simple joys like playing catch-up with daughters. The more demonic look the soldiers of the Nazi army, who came to this Promised Land, not yet carrying with them obvious grief, but already in a businesslike manner demanding to give back For Franz, it’s not even a question of serving, hiding in the woods, or becoming a demolition spy. Any violence is contrary to its nature, any aggression is destruction and death. He turns against himself the peasant neighbors who have already lost their husbands and fathers in other wars. He becomes a pariah, and turns the family into outcasts, but does not betray the main principle - humanity. Here one could compare the plot of "Hidden Life" with the triumphant of 2016 "For reasons of conscience." Here is just the story of another pacifist, medic Desmond Doss, - a typical Hollywood fairy tale. It's easy to resist evil when it itself gives you that chance. Franz was less fortunate. This is probably why his story is a monument to creation itself, simple in its genius, a memorial prayer for humanism, and not at all a loud protest.  At the same time, one should not forget that the hero of Terrence Malik was neither more nor less a martyr, who after his death canonized. It would seem that this alignment greatly simplifies the placement of moral accents. But Malik ignores the easy paths and denies obvious evaluations. For example, the most poignant scenes of The Hidden Life are not even the ordeal of Franz convicted for unwillingness to destroy his fellows (not Germans or Austrians - people), but the life of his wife, who has lost her breadwinner, harnessed like an ox to a plow, spat upon by former friends, but understanding husband without words. Malik also has conflicting minor characters like the Nazi judge (one of the last roles of Bruno Gantz), who sentenced Jagerstater to death, but came to him as a confession: "Do you condemn me?". And Franz himself is an ambiguous figure. A deeply believing Christian passes the test, just like the biblical Job, but receives only silence in response. Alas, we are only people, and it is not given to us to know God's plan. At the Cannes Film Festival "Hidden Life" - this is the second decisive anti-war film after "Dylda" by our Kantemir Balagov, and therefore every worldly scene here is saturated with love, blossoming under the supervision of the calm and graceful camera of Jorg Widmer. The graphite clouds caught in his delicate lens want to breathe in deeply, through flooded meadows - to run until you fall into a pillow of freshly cut grass, listen to the rustling of golden ears of wheat, and children who still do not know fear laugh. The great recluse Malik gives life, difficult but so desirable, time to unfold in full force before leading it to imminent disaster.  It is all the more bitter to watch how this life is made a bargaining chip to achieve someone's supposedly great goal. To emphasize this, the countryside is replaced by stifling, claustrophobic prison corridors and fills the soul with oppressive despair. And when the viewer is completely ready to surrender under the onslaught of a stone sack, it is as if the voices of James Newton Howard's cleansing gospel are lifted above all earthly ground - one of the best soundtracks here at the Cannes Film Festival. And, we bet, this year in general. However, even in gloomy corridors, surrounded by gray walls, Malik and Widmer skillfully work with color and light, filling the frame with natural, natural shades. “Nature is unchanging, she does not notice the grief to which humanity has doomed itself,” says Franz. Therefore, her silent and dispassionate presence also comforts, and dooms to new suffering. Watching at the same time quiet and powerful, chamber and all-encompassing, sincere and heartbreaking "The Hidden Life" by Terrence Malick is scary and difficult. And not because the page from Wikipedia does not promise a good ending for this story. The thinking viewer will remain devastated and crushed not by this, but by Jagerstatter's decision, before which none of us would be better off ever standing. Fight for your beliefs or refuse to kill for them? To become a traitor to the Motherland or not to change the person within yourself? Shed blood for peace for their children or leave them a legacy of a different kind of world - in harmony with themselves and the environment? "Where did you get the idea that you have a moral right to refuse to fight?", - asks the hero one of the SS soldiers, who recorded the defendant as a traitor and considers his life no more expensive than a rag on which you can wipe your feet ...  But at least one question: “Who should take the cherished branch with him?” - we seem to already know the answer. Although after watching The Hidden Life, Terrence Malick's gift to all mankind, it doesn't really matter. After all, what could be more eloquent and more valuable than spectators who were completely shattered, but inspired by some kind of light sadness, who left the cinema in dark glasses? Not because of the bright sun outside for the first time ... Terrence Malik's film has not yet received a distributor in the USA box office. Author: Ksenia Shcherbakova The Topic of Article: That didn't shoot. Malika's heartbreaking ”Hidden Life” conquered Cannes. |
