The reason I despise this movie
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przgzr — 18 years ago(March 14, 2008 01:55 AM)
Sorry? No, I'm, grateful.
Funny? No, helpful.
In fact I was using a word "motive" before, but as I've read some posters that (obviously mis)used the word "motif", I thought that they know English better than me (and even felt ashamed for the mistakes that I had done). I should have checked the dictionary instead.
Anyway, thanks again. -
a_hat_trick — 14 years ago(December 18, 2011 03:28 PM)
"So once again, for the last time, the aspects of this film that made the turning of the natives into Christians as a right and glorious thing drove me to dislike the film."
The film does not do that. People may see some of the religious figures as heroic and, thus, assume that the film portrays all their actions as heroic. But it does no such thing. It is common for people to give this reading to films becuase people are used to seeing white hat characters in their entertainment. However, what the film does is portray a variety of actions and their consequences. Indeed, we see some of the natives return to the jungle and it seems that this is perhaps the best outcome as they others lead to slavery, death from fighting, or death from passive resistance. Sohardly a film that is cheerleading European culture.
Regarding the lack of depth to some that respond to you: you just have to get used to that around here and ignore them. Don't let them turn you off. At least, I hope they haven't. -
Liberanos5 — 18 years ago(April 21, 2007 06:00 AM)
Wow Maynard, what an over simplification. The sub plot, if you would like to call it that, is one of sin and forgiveness. Rodrigo commits murder most foul and cannot forgive himself much less accept forgiveness. The theme of a "burden" is definately there but it's not "white man's" it a literal burden..a penance if you will. Mendoza drags it through the jungle until it is again literally cut loose from him. The most powerful scene IMO. Metanoia. Forgiveness both of self and of others and consequestly conversion. It is in these scenes where the Cinematography oscar is earned I think! A certain kind of person cannot "get" a certan kind of movie. I walked out of "Borat" and will never "get" Will Farrell. That's just me. Your screen name suggests you will never "get" this movie, Maynard. The Politics of Portugal in that time, slavery, protection from slavery, you let you anti christian agenda cloud your sight. The exploitation of these natives was carried out by the slave hunters of which Mendoza was one before committing murder. His conscience got the best of him. Would that we ALL could experience forgiveness on the level he did!!! This is a story of conversion on many levels. I'm sorry you missed it.
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rodderstenio — 18 years ago(May 09, 2007 02:53 PM)
This will be my first post on here. Just wanted to say thank you to all who posted, good or bad, regarding the subject and intent of the film. Having not watched it yet I feel I will now do so a slightly more enlightened soul, if you'll pardon the phrase.
Much obliged. -
Eliakim48 — 18 years ago(May 12, 2007 03:50 PM)
Quote from you: "This was a concept that was born around the age of exploration that essentially said that it was the white man's responsibility to convert everyone to Christianity in order to save their souls. I don't really need to point out that this is one of the most disgustingly arrogant and racist concepts in history, basically stating that all non-Christians are heathens and are all going to hell unless they convert to the words of Jesus."
Well, considering that Christianity started in a completely different race, you're wrong there. In fact, when it spread, originally, it was Middle Eastern primarily and into the races around there, spreading on over to those races of the East and also of the Far East, as it made it into India. In fact, it made it up to the English areas, before there ever was an England. And it spread world-wide, through many races, before there was ever a Western culture, as we have today.
The Western nations were not the perpetrators of Christianity, they were the recipients of Christianity, having received it from other races and other countries first before it ever becames established in the "West". Heck, there wasn't even a "West" yet.
And today, that's still true. You find Christians in Africa, who claim that their own heritage goes back to the days of Israel and not from some Western nation. In many countries around the world where in past years missionaries were unable to get into the countries, those countries and their native citizens spread /Christianity within their own borders by their own people.
In fact, it's highly arguable that Christianity is less a "white man's religion that it's a religion of the world, containg more people of color than of whites. I would venture to say that white are far outnumbered in that way.
So, your understanding an analysis is deeply flawed and shows an extreme ignorance of how Christianity started, how it was spread, and what people groups it consists of today. You need to do a bit more studying on the topic before you open your mouth again and embarass yourself even further -
WDformerWB — 18 years ago(May 31, 2007 07:54 PM)
Part of why I love movies is how they make me feel, and how they get me thinking. This movie was achingly beautiful to watch (cinematography), broke my heart listening to it (music - IMHO Morricone's best), and the themes of guilt, redemption, exploitation and futility were very powerful to me. I can understand how someone else with a different background, temperament and sensibility than me might take something completely different away from it, however.
I think - and this is personal opinion, not fact - that the OP's comments on "white man's burden" were understandable, but I didn't see it the same way and after many viewings over the past 20 years I still don't see it.
If anything, I viewed the Jesuits' presence in much the same way that those living 200+ years from now might very well view my attitudes and opinions: as being a product of my culture and time, some good, some not so good, some potentially wise and enlightening, some ignorant and destructive.
I've never watched this film - and I've seen it multiple times - with the thought that the Jesuits' converting the natives was something "good" for the natives. I understood the Jesuits' motives, but motive alone isn't enough to ensure a morally satisfactory outcome. You know what they say about the road to hell. Anyway, I put much of it into historical context, and while I might appreciate and even deeply admire Gabriel's motives and methods they weren't enough to compensate for or ward off what ultimately happened.
Perhaps I'm not making sense - for me, this movie is not meant to glorify anything, very least of all religion or Christianity. If anything, it could be used as an indictment against same along with colonialism. Human frailty combined with the futility of doing what one thinks is right against a far more powerful enemy makes for compelling cinema - for me, anyway.
This is ultimately a beautiful, tragic movie - always makes me cry. It is a complex, not easily pigeonholed look at the clash of colonialism, evangelistic religion and how some societies have been crushed underneath both yokes when having the misfortune to encounter both at the same time. -
AzraelArt — 18 years ago(June 04, 2007 02:14 PM)
I think you're missing the point. While they were definitely missionaries out to spread the word of God, the fundamental truth they were preaching was that they were more than the men and women who lived viciously in a jungle. There was much more beauty and technology in the world that could make their struggle to exist as human beings simpler. Running water, music, planting crops, etc.
You will remember Gabriel answering that 'some had converted,' but that it did not seem as big a concern to him as protecting so-called primitive people from slavery. The fact that it was a missonary who took on this role is inconsequential to the story. Do you not recall the scene where he first encounteres the Guarani and begins to play music? Remember how the younger warrior reacted? It was not God, but music that brought out this response.
Do not see this is a 'Christians must save the world' type of movie. This is not a religious epic, this is a human tale, a struggle against slavery and the 'ways of the world.'
Hontar: "We must work in the world, your eminence. The world is thus."
Altamirano: "No, Seor Hontar. Thus have we made the world. Thus have I made it." -
MLHendrick — 18 years ago(February 17, 2008 02:01 PM)
A glorification, maybe. But historically accurate without a doubt. Doesn't mean that we agree with those methods anymore, but it's what people really thought before Vatican II introduced more open thinking, including the so-called "anonymous Christian" of Karl Rahner (which sounds condescending too, I realize, but it too is a notion from the times).
As misleading, perhaps, as the "White Man's Burden" is the whole mythology of the "Noble Savage" which one could almost think was another fault of this film, except that we see a different tribe (different markings) assist the European forces attacking the mission (the ones who shot flaming arrows with their feet). You see this in Dancing with Wolves, too. And we of course know, by now, that African slave trade at least was greatly aided and abetted by competing African tribes. Not that the Europeans don't bear the greater burden for perpetrating wholescale evil because they do. My knowledge of history, admittedly, isn't as rich as some people's is, but I suspect that greedy white settlers would have conquered the New World and waged their obliterating campaign against the natives with or without missionaries who espoused Christianity. But I'd like to think that at least the real Christians not the bejeweled ones who sided with political power, but the ones who died defending the innate human dignity of the natives (and would have, whether they'd "converted" or not) imparted a small taste of the dignity, holiness, and liberty that all peoples are due as God's creatures. And so maybe they wouldn't turn around and resort to slave trading themselves, or warring, etc. Christians obviously held African American slaves at the time of the civil war, e.g., but it was the liberating message of the Bible Moses the great liberator, Jesus who followed in his footsteps that helped spawn the abolitionist movement, among both the slaves and the free. -
anticaria — 18 years ago(March 21, 2008 01:51 PM)
<<<<<"We're going to make Christains out of these people." WHAT THE HELL WAS WRONG WITH THEIR OLD BELIEFES AND WHY ARE WE GLORIFYING THIS KIND OF INDOCTRINATION!!!>>>>>>
you missed the whole point of this fine film which isn't to glorify the catholic faith, but rather to glorify the 'human spirit,' for this movie isn't really about men of the cloth as much as it is about mere men following their hearts. as such, this movie is about 'humanity,' not religion.. and humanity, regardless of its many flaws, deserves to be glorified at every turn especially when it involves the protection of the most defenseless among us against exploitation.