572 Léon Morin, Priest

[Matt]

Out of print, effective March 31, 2013.

[mfunk9786]

Been wanting to see this one but have been dragging my feet, looks like it's practically flying off of Amazon (several ones listed around $20 at the time of the announcement are gone, and the price, even used, has gone up to the high $20s). Managed to snag a like new one from eBay for $22 shipped. Buy now or forever hold your peace, folks - looks like there aren't too many of these floating around to begin with.

[TMDaines]

Has anyone seen Melville's original 3 hour version or the 130 minute festival version? I really liked the way the film began, but felt more unsatisfied as it progressed?

Can anyone clarify the history of the various cuts to this film? I had set aside 130m to watch this, after noticing that was the length listed on IMDb. I was therefore a bit surprised when the Criterion Blu-ray finished just over 10m early.

Is it true that Léon Morin, Priest originally ran for over three hours?

Yes, it ran for three hours and thirteen minutes, and I cut it down to two hours and eight.

I see in the interview in the Rialto pressbook that it originally had a length 3h 13m and was cut down to 2h 8m by the director. This same interview is in the Blu-ray booklet but Criterion have chosen to cut half of this sentence out, so it reads, "and I cut it down [...]." I see many of the listings online refer it to being 130m long and I can't find any explanation of why the version on home video is even shorter. As there's no discussion of it here, I'm presuming the version we have is kosher but could anyone clarify the situation for me?

[TMDaines]

Does nobody have anything to add? We have a knowledgeable group here, so I was hoping someone would be able to shed some light on the discrepency.

[Fred Holywell]

Interesting... I hadn't realized there was a running time discrepancy. Various online sources list 130, 118, 117 and 115 minutes, but nothing about what happened to that 130 min. version. I can only venture to guess that Melville made additional cuts (as Visconti did with "The Leopard" and Lean with "Doctor Zhivago") after the film's premiere, bringing the running time down to the current 117 minutes. As I said, an interesting situation; I'll keep my eye out for more info on the topic.

[TMDaines]

Many of the sources listing the film with a runtime of 130m are arthouses too. It's strange why the Rialto pressbook gives an undoctored interview, but the Crit booklet is edited. A footnote would have been useful to explain the situation. As it stands, its almost as if the recent theatrical print was longer, but I obviously find that harder to believe.

I'm wondering: how long are the deleted scenes on the Blu-ray? I don't believe that there was twelve minutes there.

[Fred Holywell]

Here are a few quotes from reviews of the recent re-release. Seems the print shown then was 117, not 130 minutes, long.

Keith Uhlich, "Time Out N.Y.", April 16–22, 2009:

The director himself crafted this release version from a barely seen three-hour-plus cut that reportedly filled in more of the wartime details. The result is that Morin and Barny’s conversations attain a metaphorically celestial resonance—the fate of the world seems to hang on every word.

Kenneth Turan, "L.A. Times", August 14, 2009:

"Léon Morin" was originally envisioned -- and shot -- by Melville as a section of a larger tapestry, part of, in the director's words, "a great fresco of the Occupation." But, Melville said in an interview, "suddenly, the only aspect that continued to interest me was this story of an unfulfilled love affair between Morin and Barny," and he cut an hour out of the film and focused what was left on that.

Scott Foundas, "The Village Voice", April 14, 2009:

Shot mostly on Melville's own Paris soundstage by the great Henri Decaë, the film would eventually be edited by the director–against the protestations of the producers!–from a three-hour rough cut to this two-hour release version.

[Fred Holywell]

I'm wondering: how long are the deleted scenes on the Blu-ray? I don't believe that there was twelve minutes there.

The two deleted scenes on the Blu-ray only total five minutes.

This is from Blu-ray.com:

Deleted Scenes - Jean-Pierre Melville's initial cut of Leon Morin, Priest ran over three hours. When he decided to focus on the relationship between Barny and Morin, however, he eliminated many of the scenes depicting life during wartime. Included on this disc are two such scenes.

-- Scene 1. In French, with optional English subtitles. (2 min, 1080p).
-- Scene 2. In French, with optional English subtitles. (3 min, 1080p).

[Drucker]

I watched this today, as I'm trying to watch (and re-watch) some Melville films in anticipation of the first Film Club discussion and while I liked this film, it's probably something I'm going to need to watch again to fully appreciate.

At first the film was so different to me than the Melville I'm familiar with, with lots of relatively quick cuts and short scenes. Throughout the first twenty or so minutes, I couldn't quite get a grip on what the tone of the film would be. After watching Souffele yesterday, I was struck by the need for freedom in Melville's films. Like a gangster on the run or an accomplice being watched by the police, the characters in Priest are obviously stuck by the occupation and the Italian (and eventually) German soldiers.

But as the film went on, I couldn't shake the notion that control, not freedom, was the key to the film. Clearly, early on, the mother feels a need to control her kids (I can't think of any specifics, and I wish I'd written them down as I took notes on the film. But when the daughter first says that she learned about God, the mother seems horrified). The mother, herself, has the following reaction when she is quickly pushed aside when visiting the priest and another person is present:
"I've never seen somebody so indifferent to what one might say." To me, concern over what one might think about oneself manifests itself in taking a strong amount of control in terms of what one says or does. Strict control of actions is a pretty good way to control how one views you. Control runs through the film as the Nazis seek to clamp down on their control of the village (unsatisfied with the job the Italians are doing), and the women in the office taking control of their identity so as not to appear Jewish.

In every Melville film, every step is perfectly calculated. Heists are carefully planned, escapes are carefully planned, and in this film, the appearances by the characters are carefully planned, and when something harms their perfect plans, the characters show it. When the mother (Barny) first decides to confront the priest who is, she assumes, a peasant, she feels she has the upper hand in her little charade. But Leon is her match, and indeed, seems to be the match of all women who come his way (though not men, it would appear, as he cannot convince Marion's husband to reconsider). Every woman approaches Leon a different way, but he stands his ground. He is the one in control, and helps to explain why he keeps calmest throughout the film. This is broken when Barny asks if Leon would marry her, and he is visibly upset in a new way.
"One morning, the city awoke free." Finally the people of the city are free. They are again in control.

[zedz]

But as the film went on, I couldn't shake the notion that control, not freedom, was the key to the film. . .

In every Melville film, every step is perfectly calculated.

This is an interesting observation about Melville. Some people talk about his characters being 'fated' but I think this is simplistic. It seems to me that it's more like Melville works with scenarios which limit his characters' choices - there are usually only a few clearly defined courses of action possible because of immediate circumstances (e.g. the characters can't go to the cops; they have to maintain silence; they can't delay a decision) - but within those constraints, he respects the decision-making process and give full weight to the consequences of whatever decision is made. So even when his worlds seem extremely stylized, I find his characters' behaviour relatable and compelling.

[Mr Sausage]

But as the film went on, I couldn't shake the notion that control, not freedom, was the key to the film. . .

In every Melville film, every step is perfectly calculated.

This is an interesting observation about Melville. Some people talk about his characters being 'fated' but I think this is simplistic. It seems to me that it's more like Melville works with scenarios which limit his characters' choices - there are usually only a few clearly defined courses of action possible because of immediate circumstances (e.g. the characters can't go to the cops; they have to maintain silence; they can't delay a decision) - but within those constraints, he respects the decision-making process and give full weight to the consequences of whatever decision is made. So even when his worlds seem extremely stylized, I find his characters' behaviour relatable and compelling.

Glad to hear you say this as I talked a lot about this in the post I wrote for our upcoming film club discussion. Good to know I'm not alone in thinking Melville's films are designed to force his characters to make impossible choices. They're films of constriction. There is for sure a fatalistic atmosphere about many of them, but the characters aren't totally trapped by circumstance. It's also their own limitations and the rigidity of their adopted codes that force their hands.

[Drucker]

They're films of constriction. There is for sure a fatalistic atmosphere about many of them, but the characters aren't totally trapped by circumstance. It's also their own limitations and the rigidity of their adopted codes that force their hands.

Agree with the above points, Also worth pointing out is how character's circumstances are defined by their antagonist or other surrounding characters (enemy? not sure the word I'm looking for). In the gangster films, you often have an equally skilled police officer (who, better yet, sympathizes with our hero). Once the cop shows his hand, it can guide the protagonists actions. And of course, as Gu points out in Souffle, it can be bad luck just as much as it is fate for the heroes in Melville's films.

[knives]

Which bounces to an other important aspect of the films which is that they want to believe they can make control. The characters of these films seem split between those that believe in luck, good or bad, and those that believe through their choices they can be 'fated' to what they want to be. Of course, and I guess this shows the perversity of how the characters are fated, that fate is shown to be the same as the luck with happenstance forcing choices to be made when an alternative choice seems to the characters like the one they should be fated for. For me this is at its most extreme in Army of Shadows with the running of the bullets. Fate is to die an honorable death; choice is to run to safety.

[colinr0380]

I haven't seen Leon Morin yet but that same sense of fate is treated with considerable irony in the high-rolling ending to Bob Le Flambeur.

[hearthesilence]

Another instance where translation makes a difference.

SpoilerShow

I just saw an excellent 35mm print of this projected today at MoMA. In the scene where Léon Morin (Jean-Paul Belmondo) flippantly tells Barny (Emmanuelle Riva) that she needs a husband, Barny angrily responds by telling him that she uses (i.e. masturbates with) a wooden stick. Morin then tells her that she should be careful because it could hurt. She snaps back that she's "not tender."

In some DVD translations like the one used here, they soften this up. (In the link's case, she says she's "not scared" of hurting herself. Doesn't come across the same way.)

[Mr Sausage]

DISCUSSION ENDS MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 26th

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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

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[swo17]

Well this is my favorite Melville film, though more for the relationship that develops between Belmondo and Riva's characters than for any occupation elements. And yet the occupation is a specter that haunts the entire film. Would Barny have felt the need to explore outside of her comfort zone if not for the world slowly falling apart around her? Would Morin even have been stationed there? In the end, these adults are responsible for their own actions (though arguably Morin destroys her without ever doing any one wrong thing, so much as just by being who he is) but it certainly doesn't help when the deck is stacked against you.

[ando]

Well this is my favorite Melville film, though more for the relationship that develops between Belmondo and Riva's characters than for any occupation elements. And yet the occupation is a specter that haunts the entire film. Would Barny have felt the need to explore outside of her comfort zone if not for the world slowly falling apart around her?

That last point is precisely what I wanted to explore (forgive me, it will be another day or two before my first viewing). How exactly, or as far as Melville is able to convey, does the occupation throw into relief the main character's self awareness; in other words, to what extent does the occupation suddenly change how they view themselves and those around them? Are they fiercely resistant (an easy and obvious stand to take as a soldier) or are they amenable to change and/or does the occupation elicit any sort of compassion? Do they uncover a ruthlessness of which they were unaware?

One of the best cinematic examinations of this kind is Ingmar Bergman's Shame (1968), which I wished I could have included among the choices for this round of discussions. There he zeroes in on the psyches of the two main characters in this very situation with unforgiving intensity that these questions come directly to the fore in a way that I hope Melville is able to consider.

[swo17]

Shame is much more explicitly about the war. For the most part, it's more of a background element here. But it's enough of a presence that it demands, even if only subconsciously, that the city's residents reevaluate their place in this world, just as one would need to acclimate and adjust to survive on another planet. In Barny's case in this film, she takes this opportunity to turn to religion, but in nothing like the way that that phrase would normally connote.

[gcgiles1dollarbin]

By chance, I viewed Peter Glenville’s version of Tennessee Williams’ Summer and Smoke just before watching this, so the theme of partially unwitting/indifferent male seductors came to the foreground of my understanding of each film. In each case, we have men ensconced in societally admired professions who blithely abuse (in my opinion) their authorities in order to manipulate vulnerable women. Morin does nothing dogmatically wrong, but as Gary Indiana notes in the booklet essay, he is nonetheless working out sexual power relations in his dealings with the town’s women, knowing particularly that he won’t be there permanently and can therefore experiment on them with relative impunity. He may couch his manipulativeness in the form of religious education or spiritual awakening (as Barny attempts to do more innocently with her sublimated longing), but he is somewhat monstrous by virtue of his vexed paternal position, especially in the way he almost unconsciously and peremptorily marshals each woman. (What complicates this, of course, is the fact that a meaningful theological discourse emerges from a problematic relationship, perhaps reflecting the nature of all theological discourse.)

I think Melville is in league with this interpretation, given the convenient hatchet/kitchen knife business that mediates some of the pair’s interactions; there is violence just beneath the surface of their relationship, just as there is violence surrounding them during the occupation. And that final shot of Morin at the head of the stairs, when viewed through this interpretation, becomes a bit sinister.

The artificial staging of Morin’s quick shoves and grabs also underscores the confined violence. (Formally, it reminds me of Bresson’s weirdly utilitarian sequences of escape and theft, as if he were making how-to demonstrations for aspiring escape artists and thieves in addition to advancing stories.) Through the almost schematic and abrupt way they are filmed, they appear more calculated on Morin’s part. He strangely pushes Barny away from the other parishioner with just as much inexorable authority as he guides her into his threadbare rectory.

Finally, I feel that Melville is playing devil’s advocate against trite narratives and typing derived from the legends of occupation. He is not playing fair so much as he is frustrating expectations: the anti-Semitic collaborator becomes a reliable friend; the apparently meek Jewish intellectual defies his victimhood and reinvents himself as an adventurer; the American military saviors are potential rapists, confused with the Nazis; and, of course, the chaste Catholic priest manipulates women through the nearly tacit acknowledgment of sexual attraction.

Fantastic film, btw, and it's too bad that it's OP.

[ando]

I think Melville is in league with this interpretation, given the convenient hatchet/kitchen knife business that mediates some of the pair’s interactions; there is violence just beneath the surface of their relationship, just as there is violence surrounding them during the occupation. And that final shot of Morin at the head of the stairs, when viewed through this interpretation, becomes a bit sinister.

Yes, yes. This is (one of the things) I wanted to consider with the spectre of the occupation in the foreground and/or background of the narrative; not necessarily malevolence itself but the basis of relatonships with respect to the occupation. Is the occupation presented as a kind of mirror of these relationships or is it a springboard for a deeper examination of human relationship, in general. I'll get to Léon Morin, specifically, in a moment but by way of cinematic comparison - there is a moment (also featuring stairs) in Tarkovsky's Andre Rublev during the Mongol siege of the cathedral when the monk, Rublev, after watching one of the marauders attempt to rape Rublev's "holy fool" companion, bludgens the attacker to (seeming) death in defense of her. Now, this is a holy man who has taken vows and lives by scripture, but who has commited the most cardinal sin. It's intetesting to observe how this example of a literal occupation spawns behavior that transcends any ethical consideration on the part of the protagonist. In fact, their actions under the circumstanced belie any previous formulated character trait that one might expect of them under normal circumstances. Granted, with a monk or priest it's easier to make assumptions about character and/or human behavior than an ordinary civilian or layman but it precisely these assumptions, I believe, that these filmmakers are asking us to consider.

What, actually, lies at the heart of Rublev's attatchment to the holy fool that he would kill a man to, what, preserve her presumed virginity? And what's her virginity to him? I think similar inquiries could probably be made of Morin (watching it tonight).

[ando]

Rather like God's pimp, isn't he, this Morin? Forgive the gauche expression but it fits the character - in fact, the supposed contradictions in the priest's character aren't terribly convincing with an actor like Jean-Paul Belmondo. The seducer and rake are clear to see but the theologian and saint are difficult to believe. You get the feeling watching the intellectual sparring between the two main characters that were Melville to request an improvisation that Emmanuelle (ironic, Emmanuel being another name for Jesus) Riva would wipe the floor with Belmondo. Barny's power over Morin is obviously as equally potent as he over her, but the film will not consider this and it's where, I feel, it's rather one-sided.. For there (apparently) are details in the original novel that Melville deliberately kept out of the film. Fair enough; it's his film but by not allowing the audience even a glimpse into Morin's inner life we are left with something of a caricature of a man; albeit, a priest, but one whose profession enlarges the humanity of others and denies or refuses a vital part of his own. In fact, his refusal almost descends (in the case of Barny) into literal violence as the women seduced by him are objects of what has turned into self loathing. This may have been shocking and revelatory in the early sixties (apparently laudible by the Catholic Church at the time) but that kind of behavior is relatively transparent today.

The more interesting observation for me is how the occupation serves as a visual and/ or thematic conduit for the violence inherent in the main protagonist's relationship. Barny, throughout the film, seems oblivious to the deeper implications of the German occupation, regarding it mostly as an inconvenient disturbance when, for many of the people around her, it's of upmost concern. However, it does mirror Barny's inner disturbance with respect to her relationship with Morin, of which she is equally as oblivious to what her initial dalliances with him will ultimately convey about her own emotional/psychological condition. I love the juxtaposition of scenes, for instance, of her sexual pass at Morin and the mindless crossing of the German roadblock. They both elicit startling, nearly violent reactions from Morin, who suddenly recoils, knocking over his chair and the German guard, who grabs his rifle, ready to take a shot at the oblivious and flagrantly bold Barny, respectively. The latter scene is one of the more humorous in an otherwise humorless film as Barny is legitimately flummoxed by the frustrated German guard who can't understand why she couldn't heed the roadblock sign written in French! Then she the proceeds to skip off down the path like some wayward adolescent leaving an audience to wonder if it's an act or if she's legitimately balmy. I can only imagine it to be a Melville touch, though I haven't read the source novel (his description of Beatrice Beck's reaction to the film in The Supplements section of the dvd conveys extremis - and it's left ambiguous as to what kind!).

[gcgiles1dollarbin]

Barny is a widow of a Jewish Communist and she has alliances with Resistance fighters (evident from the baptism scene), so I think we can safely guess what terrible things she has experienced at the hands of fascism and the Nazis, let alone what her attitude toward both is. For me, Morin is a larger cipher, even though we know he is sympathetic toward the Resistance, entered seminary as a boy, had a stern mother, etc. The weirdness of tone you are observing—either through the surprising moments of lightness and humor, or the peculiar casting of affable movie star Belmondo—is part of Melville’s exploration of the unexpected cruelties and kindnesses underneath this apparently Manichean world dictated by the obvious outrages of the second world war. While the threat to Barny’s children is palpable, for example, one of the sweetest and most fleeting characterizations is the German officer who lovingly befriends Barny’s daughter. As viewers, we expect the other shoe to drop and await some terrible consequence resulting from this relationship, but it simply comes and goes, not unlike most quotidian experiences. Perhaps Melville is setting the miraculous complications and surprises of the everyday against the clear-cut boundaries drawn by historiography, not in order to contradict historical narratives, but simply to indicate lives being resolutely lived in spite of the horrors of war. For me, then, to look at Barny and Morin’s relationship as some kind of reflection of the outer ring of occupation may not be the best key to meaning in this film.

I think the underlying violence in their interactions is unsettling because it demonstrates how personal bonds are ultimately sacrificed for the sake of enforcing the dogmatic power imbalance of a hegemonic institution. Morin is, by virtue of his agency, almost doomed to manipulate others. The fact that he is also intellectually open-minded, physically attractive, and willing to protect enemies of the state only goes to show that patriarchal power can reach through all of that and still insist on its dominance. In one reading, this is the kind of fatalism that infuses most occupation narratives; but in another reading, this could also be the personal tragedy of Barny confusing the intractable institution for the charismatic individual. I find the latter reading more fascinating, because it runs roughshod over the sacrificial humble-servant-of-God characters we get in the gamut of WWII movies, from Roma città aperta to The Cross of Lorraine.

[Sloper]

I love Melville, but I do find elements of this film a bit problematic. I’m not crazy about its fragmented structure, or its tendency to fade to black before a conversation has finished (or even got going). The idea, I think, is to give the story a sort of timeless feel, making it hard for us to get a handle on the sequence of events, or the flow of the narrative – this relates to swo’s comment about the occupation altering reality, as though these people have been shifted not just out of Paris but out of space and time altogether. The film keeps blinking in and out of consciousness, showing us little fragments of action or conversation, and it’s not always clear why a particular fragment is there, or how it contributes to the overall picture (the old woman’s reminiscence about her thwarted love affair, for instance). In this respect, Léon Morin is very similar to Melville’s other two Resistance films, which adopt a similarly fragmented structure, and in which nothing of any real consequence happens (not that the deaths in Army of Shadows are inconsequential, but a key idea in that film is the heroic futility of the characters’ actions). There’s a sense that occupied France is in a state of suspended animation, which is in itself a gesture of resistance, like the sign in the shop window saying no shoes will be sold until the town is liberated. And yes, it’s interesting how carefree Barny seems about the situation, despite her concerned expression when she sees the Nazis marching in. Riva plays Barny as a sort of humorous dilettante, pronouncing her words with strange emphases, as though she were conscious of ‘playing a part’ – it’s a type of acting I associate with Rivette, and not at all with Melville. The occupation becomes an intense intellectual, emotional, spiritual and moral crucible in which she can experiment tentatively with new ideas, feelings, beliefs and transgressions. The editing style enhances this sense of tentative, halting experimentation, but in dramatic terms I do think it’s a flaw. For me, Melville works best in long sequences, and that’s certainly true in this film, where the best bits are the lengthy confessions and debates between Barny and Léon.

I also have mixed feelings about Belmondo’s performance, mainly because he comes across as another of Melville’s impotent, narcissistic samurai-gangsters, who in this case just happens to know how to respond to difficult theological questions. This is a variation on the professionalism that defines Melville’s men, but for me it doesn’t quite ring true. The essence of this character is, as Barny says, the contradiction between his spiritual elevation and his erotic power, but I just don’t believe in his spirituality or piety – it seems like a pose, not something deeply felt. I agree that the film’s refusal to give us access to his inner life, and his refusal to acknowledge any feelings, of any kind, that he might have for Barny, hampers the drama at the centre of the story. I keep thinking of Jef Costello in Le samouraï looking pointedly away from the woman who tries to catch his eye at the traffic lights and behaving like a slab of granite with his adoring quasi-girlfriend, or Corey in Le cercle rouge chucking his ex’s photo in the bin.

It’s really fascinating that Léon Morin begins with Barny’s crush on her boss, Sabine, whose all-conquering stare has a kind of Delon/Belmondo-ish fixity, whom Barny compares to a samurai, and whom she also describes as possessing a ‘virilité délicatement feminisée’. Later, Sabine’s power and beauty will be demolished by the news of her brother’s arrest by the Gestapo – you could compare this to the seemingly indestructible Mathilde’s weakness over her daughter in Army of Shadows. Léon Morin is a more authentic samurai, because he’s a man, his loneliness is absolute, he acknowledges no emotional ties to other people, and he is truly unbreakable. Like Sabine, he has an erotic ‘brush’ with Barny which may or may not be deliberate, but I think the film suggests that Sabine reciprocates more than he does when she stares back at Barny, and perhaps also when she leans over her, which is a clue to her comparative weakness.

At the moment when Barny tries to grab Léon, the BFI edition translates his response as follows: ‘You’re not Mademoiselle Sabine. It’s already over, luckily.’ I think that, like other translations on this release, this one might not be right. From what I can tell, Léon says ‘Ce n’est plus Mademoiselle Sabine à présent. A la bonne heure, ça va déjà mieux.’ I think he’s saying, with bitter irony, something like ‘You’re no longer in love with Sabine – about time, and you’re already improving [i.e. you have made some moral progress by falling in love with a man rather than a woman]’. Perhaps the Criterion subtitles clarify this? Anyway, it’s interesting that Léon refers back to Barny’s lesbian crush, inviting a comparison between the two kinds of infatuation.

In Melville’s films you have these taciturn, ultra-masculine, ultra-heterosexual men, who nonetheless renounce, reject and sometimes beat and kill women (or, in Léon Morin’s case, push and grab them in a casually abusive manner), and whose strongest bonds are always with other men (but this is an exceptional case where the samurai is surrounded by emotional, impressionable women, and there aren’t really any other men around); then there are men like Werner von Ebrennac in Le silence de la mer (who turns up in this film saying ‘Not nice, not nice!’ to the insulting kid), or like some of the antagonists in the other films, who are given stereotypically effeminate qualities, who talk too much, are weak-willed, and come across as aesthetes and dilettantes; and then there are the women, often seemingly admirable and strong, but in the end weak and untrustworthy, sometimes because of their uncontrollable emotions. I’m generalising a bit and would need to re-watch more of Melville’s films to sum these categories up appropriately, but I just wanted to flag up what seems like a really complex set of Melvillean motifs coalescing in Léon Morin. In some ways I think Melville just perpetuates a lot of sexist stereotypes, but he also does really fascinating things with them, and is always interested in the underlying impotence of these monumental men, and perhaps in their sexual confusion or repression.

Melville’s love of William Wyler is very evident in this film, in the careful blocking and subtle camera movements. One particularly clever bit: about half an hour in, when Léon and Barny are discussing the nature of God, we see the two characters exchange positions. First Léon is leaning against the door in the foreground and Barny is at the desk in the background; then, quite organically, they swap over. At the moment when Barny takes up Léon’s former position at the door, she remarks that an atheist would be able to come up with arguments just as strong as Léon’s to convince her of the opposite point of view, and we have literally just seen an atheist substituted for Léon.

But this movement of the characters suggests something else. These two can never meet or make contact, but only move in a kind of orbit in relation to each other. Perhaps it’s more appropriate to say that Léon is the one orbiting around Barny, who staggers about in confusion, because she is like the dot to his circle, the creature (he constantly addresses women as though they were animals) longing for contact with the untouchable God. And it’s at this moment that Léon admits that their talk is indeed futile, that the reality of God is incommunicable. Barny, coming closer to the camera and looking towards it (while Léon stands with his arms folded at the desk), is horrified by his suggestion that it shouldn’t matter to her whether God exists or not, as this was always the question that most preoccupied her as a child.

The choreography in this scene says so much about the way these two are toying with each other, going back and forth in their intellectual debates without ever making contact, but also about Barny’s growing desire for Léon, the way she not only substitutes herself for him but substitutes him for God, and the way that he persists in keeping her at a distance. The culmination of this comes at the end, when her final question is about whether the house of God can accommodate points of view that are not only different but also contradictory – she sees Léon as a contradictory figure, so this is really a question about him, as much as it is a question about God, and therefore indicates the extent to which Léon has become a sort of god to her.

I also like the way Melville plays with the imagery associated with the confessional. Take the screen between Léon and Barny: in the first confession, several shots remove this and show us the characters from the side (from both sides, in fact, setting up the back-and-forth dynamic that will define these arguments), making it look as though there is no barrier between them. Barny forms an unexpectedly intimate connection with someone she was just planning to troll, from a safe distance. But despite forming this emotional bond, she can never actually get through to Léon, and the screen will always be there – I think we are always conscious of it in the subsequent confessions, aware that these two are inescapably cut off from each other, she always behind the screen that defines her as a lay sinner (notice that when we see her and Christine discussing Léon’s incredible power, for almost the entire shot they are obscured by a large veil positioned in front of the camera, because this is where they are from Léon’s perspective), he always behind a screen that defines him as holy and elevated. After that first confession, Barny staggers away as though wounded, while Léon remains enshrined in the confessional; at the end of the film, she staggers again, this time perhaps more deeply and permanently broken, while he, after saying ‘Dieu vous garde’ (God watch over you), watches over her from the top of the staircase like some glowing icon, before retreating back into his room. The room at the end seems so exaggeratedly bare, with the wind blasting through and the objects strewn about the floor, that it reminds me of the uninhabitable nunnery in Black Narcissus, so it’s as if in that final movement Léon has already shut himself away in that distant rural mission, far from the worldly distractions Barny wallows in down below.

[swo17]

I think the underlying violence in their interactions is unsettling because it demonstrates how personal bonds are ultimately sacrificed for the sake of enforcing the dogmatic power imbalance of a hegemonic institution. Morin is, by virtue of his agency, almost doomed to manipulate others. The fact that he is also intellectually open-minded, physically attractive, and willing to protect enemies of the state only goes to show that patriarchal power can reach through all of that and still insist on its dominance. In one reading, this is the kind of fatalism that infuses most occupation narratives; but in another reading, this could also be the personal tragedy of Barny confusing the intractable institution for the charismatic individual. I find the latter reading more fascinating, because it runs roughshod over the sacrificial humble-servant-of-God characters we get in the gamut of WWII movies, from Roma città aperta to The Cross of Lorraine.

Good points. I think it may actually be the case that these two people's biggest crime is just being beautiful and drawn to (but unavailable to) each other.