"The Diary of a Country Priest" moves as if it were marking every step along the Via Dolorosa. There is no let-up to its solemnity. Jean-Jacques Grunenwald's score is like a dirge commemorating all those who see Christ's place in the world as a desolate one; a place unconcerned about self even in the midst of suffering, misunderstanding, and rejection. The director Robert Bresson has been said to come as close to approximating the meaning of Georges Bernanos novel as any director ever could. I think he comes as close with this movie of approximating what the Church means by Christ as a Man of Sorrows.
The young, dying priest (played eloquently by Claude Laydu) must put up with a stomach that will only tolerate hard bread soaked in wine and sugar which sets the villagers of Ambricourt's tongues wagging about his being alcoholic. A girl he has high hopes of teaching the Church's truths spreads even nastier rumors about him. He hopes to obtain the barn of a Count as a sports grounds for the local youth, but encounters problems with his wife, daughter, and governess (with whom the Count is having an affair) that cause him to fall out of the rich man's good graces. He finds himself at a loss to pray, and becomes so ill that he leaves town to seek a diagnosis which turns out to be stomach cancer. He dies seeking the help of a fellow seminarian who has left his calling after a bout of drug addiction. He talks the man into corresponding with the only friend he has--the Vicar of Torcy--in the hopes that he will turn away from his life of drug-selling and fornication.
Georges Bernanos' book has been called existential, and maybe that is my problem with it. It obsesses on the "now" of this priest's trials, and by Bresson following Bernanos' lead, squeezes any joy that one could gather exists by doing God's work, and never suggesting what is to be won by it. "The Diary of a Country Priest" is always looking for the intrinsic value of a virtuous act, not what one has to look forward to for acting virtuously. And I think that's a serious omission. Intellectuals may like to champion this approach, and, granted, doing something for love of God rather than the rewards promised seems a higher road to follow. Still the movie belabors its suffering. I never felt this way watching Carl Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc."
Still, it is a milestone in movie history. Not even Dreyer's work captures exactly what this movie manages to. Its greatness lies in its unflinching way it meditates on the theme of religious conviction. There is nothing like it elsewhere in the movies.
The young, dying priest (played eloquently by Claude Laydu) must put up with a stomach that will only tolerate hard bread soaked in wine and sugar which sets the villagers of Ambricourt's tongues wagging about his being alcoholic. A girl he has high hopes of teaching the Church's truths spreads even nastier rumors about him. He hopes to obtain the barn of a Count as a sports grounds for the local youth, but encounters problems with his wife, daughter, and governess (with whom the Count is having an affair) that cause him to fall out of the rich man's good graces. He finds himself at a loss to pray, and becomes so ill that he leaves town to seek a diagnosis which turns out to be stomach cancer. He dies seeking the help of a fellow seminarian who has left his calling after a bout of drug addiction. He talks the man into corresponding with the only friend he has--the Vicar of Torcy--in the hopes that he will turn away from his life of drug-selling and fornication.
Georges Bernanos' book has been called existential, and maybe that is my problem with it. It obsesses on the "now" of this priest's trials, and by Bresson following Bernanos' lead, squeezes any joy that one could gather exists by doing God's work, and never suggesting what is to be won by it. "The Diary of a Country Priest" is always looking for the intrinsic value of a virtuous act, not what one has to look forward to for acting virtuously. And I think that's a serious omission. Intellectuals may like to champion this approach, and, granted, doing something for love of God rather than the rewards promised seems a higher road to follow. Still the movie belabors its suffering. I never felt this way watching Carl Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc."
Still, it is a milestone in movie history. Not even Dreyer's work captures exactly what this movie manages to. Its greatness lies in its unflinching way it meditates on the theme of religious conviction. There is nothing like it elsewhere in the movies.