Wednesday 27 July 2016

Of Gods and Men again

The only film to watch after the horrific murder of an 86 year old priest, which makes my heart hurt as much as the execution of Palmyra's elderly curator, is one of the few masterpieces of recent years, Des hommes et des dieux. No need to write more about it here than I have already on the blog - invoking that entry for a third time - except to say that it sums up the best thoughts of religion rather than the (many) worst. This very short clip encapsulates connection between people on this earth instead of division. Context: the Catholic priests serving a Muslim community in Algeria, and threatened by terorism, are discussing whether they should leave or not.


4 comments:

Jan Kucera said...

I have ordered the BluRay version of 'Of Gods and Men'... it should arrive in a few days. Thank you very much.

Re your previous post, the "Brexit Blues" article by John Lanchester is very good and it curred me of my persistent (if illogical) bad feelings concerning the fact that without so many people from 'Eastern Europe' the Brexit would not have taken place... I also took the liberty of advertising this article on my Facebook profile.

David said...

And thank you, Jan. i hope Lanchester reassured you as to what a valuable role your fellow Eastern Europeans are playing in this country. They work so hard, and you can be sure that if they leave, unemployed Brits will not be prepared to take over much of the work they do.

I asked my good friend Magda, who also cleans for us, whether as a Pole she had experienced any negativity. She said that the only problem was when her niece was looking for a job here; our sandwich chain which always employs cheery folk Pret a Manger said they were no longer giving jobs to Poles.

Susan Scheid said...

A beautiful movie, and certainly exactly the thing to highlight in the wake of the priest's murder. This is all so unbearable.

David said...

It's a masterpiece of cinema, one of the very best and certainly the most important of all I've seen over the past 20 years.