As my opening post on WordPress, I’d like to copy a dialogue from my vox blog, hoping that the contributors don’t mind having their insights replicated across cyberspace.
After seeing the powerful Russian movie Ostrov (The Island), I posted these thoughts:
We recently watched Ostrov, a brilliant Russian movie highly recommended by my sponsor into Orthodoxy, Seraphim. The movie depicts a life of repentence, and the results of that repentence. One Russian commenter over at imdb.com (here) says, “For all taking the spiritual development seriously – the film will also be useful no matter what is their religion. People say that they are becoming better and cleaner after watching the film.”
If we believe comments on IMDB, the main character, Father Anatoly, is “played by unique and genius Russian actor/musician/now-hermit- Petr Mamonov. The movie actually reflects the real current life and spirituality of the actor.”As I prepared to return to work tomorrow, I was tempted to see that action as my version of hauling coal, the constant “obedience” of Fr. Anatoly. But with further reflection, I think the coal, and the shipwreck, and the rickety boardwalk that the near-monk built between his little island and the shipwreck, are all further symbols of the life he’s repenting of. At the beginning of the film, the young Anatoly is found by Nazi’s hiding in that same pile of coal, and he betrays his captain by revealing to the Nazi’s where the captain is hiding in the coal. So to me the coal is basically the symbol of Anatoly’s previous cowardice and betrayal, which he repents for throughout his life, while he at the same time converts the symbol of his shipwrecked life into heat for the church and monastery he now labors for. He daily walks that boardwalk back to the place of his failure, and hauls the remembrance of his shame back to the furnace where it’s converted by fire into a service to God.
Stretching things a bit more, it occurs to me that the Nazi’s at the beginning of the film, by ridiculing and debasing the young Anatoly, represent satan in the way he works constantly not just to prevent salvation, but to destroy human dignity. The captain, once his hiding place is betrayed, displays dignity in the face of imminent death (unlike Anatoly). I’m not sure what to make yet of his fate, though it’s interesting to contrast how his life turns out with that of Fr. Anatoly. The captain develops into one who has all the trappings of success, yet there are hints of fear in his life, having to carefully guard what he says amongst party operatives.
Getting back to Fr. Anatoly and the meaning of the coal and shipwreck… I’m a little confused, having read that one should not dwell on past sins, lest he be pulled back into them (maybe it was St. John of San Francisco?). If my take on the coal is right, then I’ll have to figure out how one should balance a remembrance of past shortcomings for purposes of repentance with St. Paul’s exhortation to forget what is behind and press on… But I’ve seen in the Lives of the Saints some hints of doing exactly what Fr. Anatoly is doing in the movie. It just seems significant to me that Fr. Anatoly lives in constant proximity to the shipwreck, and goes back to it everyday, and by the end of his life (while lamenting that his sins still weigh him down), has still not finished removing that pile of coal.
A final coal comment – I noticed that the abbot, Fr. Filaret, attempts to take on the same obedience for a while, but finds himself unable to do it. The film seems to highlight that Fr. Anatoly has to relieve Fr. Filaret of the wheelbarrow load. On the surface it seems that Fr. Anatoly is simply more fit for the work and used to it, but I think they’re telling us that each one has to offer up his own failures in constant repentance. I can’t do it like another, in part because my sin is unique and, from a centric perspective, greater than that of anyone else (as Fr. Hopko says, we are each the greatest of sinners, because we don’t compare ourselves to each other – we just know).
I think the whole movie is full of these symbols, so I may need to watch it again before we start loaning it to friends.
By the way, I don’t know how much of the movie is based on real people or real events, but I’m tempted to see Fr. Anatoly as a composite of two characters in Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov. He seems part (like one third) Elder Zosima, and part the “deranged” monk Fr. Ferapont who people are afraid of at the monastery. I might be totally off on this, but Fr. Anatoly was criticized for similar things that Elder Zosima was, and exhibited clairvoyance in very similar ways (the woman whose dead husband turned out to really be alive was similar to one who Elder Zosima counseled), and the “demons everywhere in the room” scene is similar to Fr. Ferapont’s ravings in Karamazov. I hadn’t respected the monk Ferepont, but will have to go back sometime after seeing Ostrov to see if he was in the part of a Holy Fool.
My sponsor in the Orthodox faith, Seraphim, responded thus:
Your reaction pretty much paralleled my own. The exchange between Fr. Anatoly and the Abbot after the soft boots and blanket had been dealt with is telling. The Abbot said that he saw now he was a man of few virtues and many faults…or something like that…then like a staretz Fr. Anotoly rejoins “virtues”?, mine stink. Then there is the instant role switch where the abbot rises to the occasion as abbot and replies, “keep smelling them and you will be saved”. This whole sequence seems to echo a saying of St. Issac the Syrian, that the soul who loves comfort can no more aspire to spiritual things than wet wood can catch fire. And Fr. Anotoly’s life was nothing else unless it was comfortlessness and fire.
It was also very interesting to see Fr. Anotoly proclaim aloud his great sinfulness in the bell tower…and yet it was with an air of complete hope and even joy. It was very…paschal in its way.
With regard to the coal imagery, did you notice that as the film progressed more and more often the coal was shown under a blanket of white snow.
One thing I was curious about in this film was the source of the intimate and insightful detail into the conduct of a deeply spiritual life and as someone at or near being a holy fool. Was the unaborted child who would be a golden child, the golden boy who was healed, and the author of the script the same person…someone who had living knowledge of someone like Fr. Anatoly? I know it was fairly common for Russian writers to just barely novelize experiences from their own lives in the last century…and I wonder if something similar happened here.
Anyway, I’m very glad you liked it. As Fr. John of St. Michaels says it is just about as close to a cinematic icon as one can get.
My response was:
Thanks Seraphim. I want to go back and see it again after your comments. I had noticed the snow on the coal, but hadn’t thought about the progression. There are a number of significant messages woven into the whole story.
If I remember right, the monk who doesn’t like Fr. Anatoly, after Fr. Anatoly fails to appreciate the coffin he had made for him, something like “I’ve made sacrifices for a number of people like you, without benefit” – I have to go back and see how he worded it. This seemed to answer very exactly Anatoly’s earlier question to him about why Cain killed Abel.
Like you, I wondered how the leading actor was able to portray the life of a holy man, including mannerisms and attitude, etc. I thought maybe he studied some men at various monasteries for awhile, but later came across the IMDB reference that suggests that the actor lives a life something like that himself. Maybe it’s a combination of personal experience and emulation, but I really like your theory.
To which Seraphim replied,
Yes I would agree that the other monk’s statement does answer the question in a way about why cain killed abel. We feel unappreciated and voids of our heart seep full of resentment. We expect to be justified in our sacrifices. We expect our benefit…though we may call it another’s benefit and find only rejection and disappointment. We are unappreciated for all our striving to do all just right and yet it is another, perhaps one who does so little right that receives the gifts. It is as if God loving the one next to us leaves nothing for us. It is the recrimination of the elder brother against the prodigal come home. I loved you. I obeyed you. I served you and to what gain. I got not so much as a kid to hold a barbeque. But your wastral son who spent his inheritance in debauchery, who found his home among the swine…this one you honor with a feast and a fatted calf.
His was the lament of the spurned pharisee who said I see, I see and whose guilt remained. But even this calculator of unaccepted sacrifice found salvation through Fr. Anatoly…when he surrendered his own labor to serve not his own will but that of Fr. Anatoly “look, I’ll make it dirty as you like it”. Recall towards the end when he looks into the box Fr. Anatoly wants to be buried in…it is full of nets. Earlier in the movie Fr. Anatoly mentioned being entangled in his sins. In that box the priest came at last to understand the genuine humilty of Fr. Anatoly, and it is shortly after that we see him laboring in the snow to bear Fr. Anatoly’s cross. Live with a saint become a saint.
There is another important recurring image in the film I think. There is an icon of Christ that makes several appearances. It is in the temple. It is in Fr. Anatoly’s prayer closet (which is immaculate compared to his sleeping and working quarters), and it is the one cleaned with the white of an egg by the Abbot in the icon studio….and that is a subtext of this whole film…the cleansing and restoration of the sooty soul which is made in the image of Christ. The white is the lean part of the egg…and the soot of our souls is cleansed by accecis under sound spirital guidance. After the cleansing…the yolk is used to make fresh paint to restore any marred place….but that restoration comes after the image has first been made clean.
Having thought some more about it, I opined,
After Fr. Anatoly advises a woman against abortion, we assume that she followed through on his advice but we never find out.
After he advises the “widow” to go find her alive and ailing husband in France, we never learn if she did, or even if her husband is in fact alive.
After he prays for the young boy and tries to get his mother to allow him to stay another day for Divine Liturgy and communion, we don’t get to see if it happened, and whether the boy in fact is healed.
When the abbot’s residence catches fire as Fr. Anatoly foretold, we don’t find out whether he caused it himself.
(we do at least know that the exorcism was effective, and that Fr. Anatoly did know in advance when he would repose).
So in the end, we believe that Fr. Anatoly is a “holy man”, gifted by the Holy Spirit – but just like in life, there’s enough uncertainty to allow anyone to question it.
If you love Fr. Anatoly, you know he is a holy man. If you are against him, you have room to argue that he’s not genuine, or that there is no such thing in the first place. Did St. Nicholas really appear to the emperor in a dream? Did St. Seraphim shine in transfiguration? We love them, and we believe it to be so. And those who don’t love them have freedom to naysay. God always seems to orchestrate events such that it remains a matter of free will; no one is ever compelled or constrained by undeniable proofs.
An anonymous Todd added,
Would Anatoly have turned to God if he thought his friend was alive?
And I responded,
I hadn’t considered whether Anatoly would ever have turned to God if he knew his friend was alive – it’s a good question. What I did wonder, toward the end when he met the admiral and realized he was alive after all, whether that would change his spirituality, whether it would interrupt his life of repentence. The answer of course turned out to be no.
Then our friend the Reader David added this insight,
I think the answer turned out to be “no” because of the sort of cycle of tension and resolution that exists in repentance. We fast, in part, so that we can break our fast w/the Eucharist. We prepare so that we can enjoy. If this discipline is fruitful, we are then blessed by that borne cross so that we might bear more crosses. Fr. Anatoly labored with his sins in mind, then found resolution in Tikhon’s forgiveness. Having found resolution, he digs deeper into his soul’s coal.
