The most obvious to notice are the references to Christian teachings: the opening quote from the Bible (Job 38: 4,7: Where were you when I laid the foundations of the Earth?….When the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?) sets the mood and all through the movie we have no doubt that it would keep the religious perspective. But not in a usual way: the obvious religious characters of institutional religion fail to explain the questions raised. It is easy to see in the convo when one son dies in the family and a Christian priest tries to comfort the mother for her loss by saying:
FATHER HAYNES
He is in God's hands, now.
MRS O'BRIEN
He was in God's hands the whole time, wasn't he?Just as another churchgoer's words of 'You still have two sons' seem unsuccessful in easing the pain of the mother. I often experienced similar religious advice failing the same way, too. Spiritual journey of ours is so intimate that it is hard to understand by an outside viewer and though they may have kind purposes in comforting with the Word, it often feels cliche to me... and reductive. Sometimes it would be better not to say anything, just be there for the other. I think Church could get closer to people if instead of telling them what to do would start to be there for them and show them how to do.
The second thing I noticed was that the director surely likes structures: unusual structured buildings captured in different angles, golden ratio as church interior and unusal cuts all suggest that we see the story through somebody's eye who surely believes everything is structured and in order. Far from postmodern, every scene of the film has a meaning and they are all part of the big picture. This idea resonates with my views again: I also believe the same and often get mesmerized by the structural beauty of a building or a sunflower.
Getting deeper and deeper in the movie, the father and mother figure became two fighting forces - nature and grace. As the mother put it:
MRS O'BRIEN [voice over]
The nuns taught us* there were two ways through life - the way of nature and the way of grace. You have to choose which one you'll follow.
Nature and Grace are the possible ways to choose from, one option is embodied by the father and the other by the mother. I let you choose which one is which:
MRS O'BRIEN [voice over]
Grace doesn't try to please itself. Accepts being slighted, forgotten, disliked. Accepts insults and injuries.
[...]
MRS O'BRIEN [voice over]
Nature only wants to please itself. Get others to please it too. Likes to lord it over them. To have its own way. It finds reasons to be unhappy when all the world is shining around it. And love is smiling through all things.
Here's the casting: the father figure represents the way of Nature and the mother figure promotes Grace, so we are the children who have to choose from the two ways. I am not sure whether the film suggests you should choose grace over nature, it is a question the film leaves open, I guess. Anway, I like the idea to put that eternal question into a metaphoric surrounding of a family. While watching, I myself often got reminded how my mother really represented grace by her unconditional love towards me and often thought about my father too who kept pushing me into being stronger.
It is not what happens to the characters that is important but what happens inside the viewer. The long animations capturing the genesis of life helped me slow down and think about my role in the universe. Much more like that, I travelled a thousand miles through this movie keeping this in mind:
MRS O'BRIEN [voice over]
The nuns taught us* that no one who loves the way of grace ever comes to a bad end.
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* If these nuns taught Mrs O'Brien so much wisdom, I think I'll have no problem with my children attending Catholic school :) - that's for those having doubts that current change in Hungarian education policy is malevolent.
