Of Gods and Men (Xavier Beauvois, 2010)

[John Cope]

A rather fascinating assessment of the film's surprising box office success in France and its prospects in Britain.

[thirtyframesasecond]

I saw this at the London Film Festival. It was very good indeed; quite conventional and tasteful, the kind of middlebrow qualities that critics like, but done so well that it's hard not to be moved, even if you're not religious.

[Emilio]

Yes, a beautiful film. Very well acted all around.

[James Mills]

While undeniably memorable and emotional, I was admittedly disappointed with this film. While the second act was riveting and the entire film is acted with veritable humanity, the characters lack any differentiable development until the second act. This wouldn't have been a problem for me if the first act had any plot progressions, but it instead chooses to remain on the everyday mundane activities of the monk and the townsfolk. I understand that this is to emphasize their peaceful livelihoods and the sacrifices they have made in moving here from their native France, but this sanctification also telegraphs the ending. More importantly, by the end of the film the forty or so minutes of praying really started to feel arbitrary for me.

I think my biggest fault of Of Gods and Men was the fact that it really felt a promotional film for colonialism. If America made a film claiming that minorities needed WASPs (wait, it did, only more subtly in The Blind Side), I think there would be a significant and well merited uproar. In this film, Algerians literally tell these Frenchmen that they will fall without them. These colonizers are glorified throughout every shot, doing and saying the utmost noble decisions imaginable. I have to wonder if this had any influence on it winning the Grand Prix at Cannes, though I am more curious as to why I haven't seen this area criticized more in reviews.

[James Mills]

Since no other critic has mentioned the above matter, I wrote a research paper on postcolonial consumption with Of Gods and Men as the exemplary subject. For those that might care:

In his article “Re-presenting the National Past: Nostalgia and Pastiche in the Heritage Film,” Andrew Higson writes “The heritage films work as pastiches, each period of the national past reduced through a process of reiteration to an effortlessly reproducible, and attractively consumable, connotative style.” (Higson, “Re-presenting the National Past: Nostalgia and Pastiche in the Heritage Film,” pg 112). This particular defining of the heritage film serves as an apt starting point for this essay, alluding to the voluminous range of poetic licensing that is granted to such a genre. When an audience consumes something as nebulously dense as history, especially their own nation’s, liberties are afforded to ensure the audience is entertained through its viewing. History itself can become compromised in this exchange, however, as a target audience may not always be receptive to the less desirable documentations of their nation’s past.

Nevertheless, Western film critics are rarely fastidious in their inspections of these depictions of history; at least not in comparison to their more incisive critiques of most blockbuster biopics. This may be due to the fact that heritage films are crafted with a delicately calculated emphasis of neo-realism to suggest a greater historical accuracy. They are essentially art cinema, a higher-browed culture of film that is critically celebrated. Perhaps more importantly, Higson’s description of the heritage film’s target audience reads like a stereotypical criteria for critics in general: “These are the sort of films that are invited to festivals and that win prizes… Their audience is primarily middle-class and significantly older than the mainstream film audience, and they appeal to a film culture closely allied to English literary culture and to the canons of good taste.” (Higson, “Re-presenting the National Past: Nostalgia and Pastiche in the Heritage Film,” pg 110).

It is unsurprising then that Of Gods and Men (2010) recently won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival, the second most prestigious award of the ceremony. The film reenacts the lives of the seven French Trappist monks from the monastery of Tibhirine, Algeria that were kidnapped and beheaded in 1996. In this regard, the film is pristinely French in its entirety. Although shot in Meknes, Morocco, primarily at the Benedectine monastery of Tioumliline, it is a French production that gained most of its financing after revelatory information regarding the Algerian army’s possible involvement in the monks’ murders incited further public and media interest in the story (Lemercier, “Beauvoir focuses on monks of Tibhirine in Des Hommes et des Dieux”). In this sense, the film presents itself to be interpreted as a French collaboration in reverence and celebration of these particular fallen natives.

There are greater implications within this film’s text, however. It is difficult to ignore the historical context in which these murders took place when Of Gods and Men is so predicated in its realist roots, yet the film entirely omits any such contextualization. The words “Algerian Civil War” (which was being fought on Algerian soil during the timeframe of this actual event) are mysteriously absent, as are the explanations and reasonings of its inception. This is especially curious considering France’s postcolonial involvement with the Algerian government is largely what lead to the original guerilla warfare of 1992 after the FIS (Islamic Salvation Front) accused them of being unpatriotic, pro-French, and financially corrupt (“Bloody Years”, Algerian Civil War Documentary). To call the Algerian Civil War simply a “holy war” would be to deny many of the broader geopolitical intangibles that were significantly at hand, yet the film largely suggests this was the case by glibly associating religious terrorism with every mention of the rebels. By victimizing France’s involvement and repudiating the Algerian Civil War to merely a religious conflict of interests, Of Gods and Men nostalgically recalls the lives and deaths of the seven Tibhirine monks to chauvinistically symbolize French postcolonialism.

A number of key events amongst the 1990’s helped “the ascendancy of heritage cinema to mainstream dominance in French production at the expense of popular genres such as comedy and the polar,” one of which being the bombings of Paris by Algerian rebels in 1995 and 1996 (Powrie, “Heritage, history and 'new realism': French cinema in the 1990s”). These attacks are telling of the malignant sentiments of the Algerian rebels towards France during the Algerian Civil War. In no way does this justify the murders of the monks, but it is important to note that this was not an isolated incident (as the film would lead one to believe). Much like its prevailing postcolonial influences in Senegal, French geopolitical connections to Algeria had been prevalent since Algeria had first gained its independence from France in 1962. This perpetuating French influence had exacerbated the FIS’s mistrust of their Algerian government and, like the documented French cajoling and bribing of other African post-independence politicians (Szeftel. “Clientelism, Corruption, & Catastrophe”), the presumed corruptness that can oftentimes accompany such postcolonial relationships.

The first act of the film not only establishes a complete denial to these mounting tensions, but to any French relationship with Algeria at all. Torpidly paced repetitions of deeply focused long takes portray the monks endlessly laboring to help the Tibhirine community, emphasizing a sense of selflessness in their actions and the sacrifices they have made. It is interesting that nearly every argument in favor of colonialism is hinted at between their interactions with the town; the monks applying the only medical services of the village (and apparently for free), advancing the city’s vegetation, teaching them to write letters and practice photography, helping their commerce by establishing markets for distribution and trade with outside establishments, even teaching them the “true” nature of love while denouncing the town’s cultural marriages. Apparently all is well under their “watch,” as they are portrayed as protectors of a quiet town that is void of any involvement with the country’s struggles and relationships with France; protectors from the “corrupt government and army” and the “religious terrorists,” as the priests themselves call them. They are thus revered by the town, invited to the homes of its citizens and sat in the front (ostensibly ahead of the other indigenous guests) for dinners and parties.

This portrayal of Tibhirine does not completely coincide with the research of John W. Kiser, author of the story’s biography The Monks of Tibhirine: Faith, Love, and Terror in Algeria. He writes that “The city still radiated with an atmosphere of colonial insouciance. Its central square was surrounded by chalky ocre-colored arcades, lined with the government,” and notes that “Contempt was the essence of colonial mentality, which ultimately led to Algeria’s war.” (Kiser, The Monks of Tibhirine: Faith, Love, and Terror in Algeria, pg 9, 15). Even if the audience is to overlook the film’s inaccurate portrayal of Tibhirine’s atmosphere during this period, the most obvious question still remains: if these monks are here autonomously without any postcolonial intentions, what exactly are their intentions? They acceptingly read the Koran with the townsfolk and never try to impose their own religion on the land, so are we to believe that they are only here for the sole purpose of “helping” these Algerians?

Dina Sherzer describes this process as “The notions of gift, refusal, dignity, and independence can take on a particular meaning in the context of postcolonial economy and Western ‘assistance’ to the colonized”. (Sherzer, Cinema, Colonialism, Postcolonialism…, pg 186). This patronizing notion of the indigenous peoples necessitating assistance is a recurring theme throughout Of Gods and Men and, as Sherzer stresses, postcolonial cinema in general. Midway through the film, Christian, the council leader of the monks, didactically states “This village grew up within this monastery.” This is amidst his argument as to why the monks cannot leave the village, implying that they are incapable of sufficiently caring for themselves without the aid of the monks. Another monk immediately corroborates the sentiment, exasperating that “Leaving doesn’t make sense, we didn’t come here for our own interests!”. The townsfolk seem to fervently agree, as one (nameless and purposeless, like every other member of the town) overstates the matter when she pleads to the monks that “We’re the birds, you’re the branch; if you go, we’ll lose our footing!”.

The Rebels’ ambitions seem even more ambiguous than the priests’. The first words in reference to the Rebels come from the source dialogue of a TV screen that the town watches, claiming that “another baby has been murdered by the religious onslaughts of terrorists.” Where the monks are introduced by saving the life of an infantile boy in the opening scene of the film (with their passions towards saving children being again referenced multiple times throughout Of Gods and Men), the rebels are introduced as terrorist killers of the Algerian infants for reasons unknown. It would appear that the film is creating an early dichotomy of good versus evil by eliciting the visceral emotions that humans naturally associate with the well-beings of children.

These are the types of labels that the viewer must attach to the “villains” to produce any characteristics at all for them, as no other defining characteristics are explained. Just as the townsfolk are entirely portrayed as either blindly reverent (of the French monks) or in a blind panic, the Rebels are always depicted as ruthless murderers, void of any agenda outside of terroristic impositions of their own religion. They are individually nameless with undifferentiable personalities, also similar to the townsfolk. The Rebels are never called by their factional titles, the Islamic Salvation Front or the Armed Islamic Group, nor their factions’ acronyms (the FIS and GIA, respectively). They are not even called “the Rebels”, but rather simply referred to as “they,” such as “they killed again!” or “when will they stop!?”.
It is also noteworthy that their faces are usually hidden behind cloths and darkened in the shadows, as if purposely omitting their faces and any sentimentality or curiosity that such personal reveals may incite. This is especially the case during the final shot, where the monks are dragged up a hill to their beheadings amidst a snowstorm while the faces of the presumed killers who lead them are never shown. Stripping the opposition of any general humanistic traits is perhaps intended to distract the viewer from any abstractions of thought that may involve the actual ambitions and emotions of the villains. This kind of insight could threaten the black and white boundaries of the pre-established dichotomy, of good versus evil that the film has taken measures upon measures to calculatingly apply to its foundation.

But while “they” are reaffirmed as cold blooded murderers with the film’s iconic final shot, the monks are instead solidified as French heroes and given the ultimate sanctification in the film’s resolution: the sacrifice of their own lives. Prefaced by a swelling melodramatic dinner scene that is blatantly reminiscent of Leonardo da Vinci’s “The Last Supper”, it is obvious that the monks are aware of their foreshadowing deaths in the following scene. Though no historical documentation can support this notion, the film implies that the monks of Tibhirine were explicitly knowledgeable of their forthcoming murders, thus suggestive of the ultimate sacrifice and a full circle of selflessness and devotion for a city and country they are not even citizens of. To accent this idea, a dramatic voiceover of Christian ominously echoes as they trudge through the snow to their final resting place: “I want my community to know that my life was given to God and to this country. People will think of this country and Islam, but they are not the same. They are body and soul.”

It is up for debate as to whether or not Xavier Beauvois, director and co writer of the film, purposely intended the film’s postcolonial conduct that has been inspected in this essay. A line from a supposedly corrupt government official midway through the film suggests that the film is at least somewhat self conscious of the matter, as he states “Say what you will, but I blame French colonization which organized plundering.” As many film professors and critics stress, however, a filmmaker’s intentions are merely subsidiaries of the actual readings and interpretations that derive from its consumption. It is easy for Westerners to view Of Gods and Men as simply a biopic that demonstrates the capacity of the individual in the battle of good versus evil because this reinforces notions of meritocracy and free will that are predicated in capitalism and imperialism. But perhaps such surface level interpretations encourage international stereotypes and xenophobia, as well as further distancing the perspective differences of cultures. These types of outcomes may be pernicious to the idealized prospects of multiculturalism and ultimately world peace, thus more historicized and bilateral recountings of international conflict may be cinematically necessary for further progressions in these sensitive subjects.

Works Cited

“Algerian Civil War Documentary”. Bloody Years. WorldNews, CNN. March 11, 2010.

Higson, Andrew. “Re-presenting the National Past: Nostalgia and Pastiche in the Heritage Film”. British Cinema, Past and Present. New York: Routledge, 2000. pg 110, 112

Kiser, John W, The Monks of Tibhirine: Faith, Love, and Terror in Algeria. New York: Macmillan, 2003. pg 9, 15

Lemercier, Fabien. “Beauvoir focuses on monks of Tibhirine in Des Hommes et des Dieux”. Cineuropa News. Dec 11, 2009

Powrie, Phil. “Heritage, history and 'new realism': French cinema in the 1990s” Modern and Contemporary France. Vol 6, Issue 4. 1998. pg 479-491

Sherzer, Dina. Cinema, Colonialism, Postcolonialism: perspectives from the French and francophone world. Austin TX: University of Texas Press, 1996. pg 186

Szeftel, Morris. “Clientelism, Corruption, & Catastrophe”. Review of African Political Economy. Vol. 27, No. 85. Sept, 2000.

[Justinaschwarz]

362,671 tickets were sold during the first five days of the French theatrical run. This can be compared to the director's last film, The Young Lieutenant, which had 197,783 admissions after the same number of days in 2005. Of Gods and Men went on to top the French box office for four consecutive weeks. After the fifth week it dropped to number three, having been overtaken by Despicable Me and You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, which both premiered that week. It had received 3,202,645 admissions in France

[James Mills]

I wish I could get my essay out to those involved with the making of this film. I think it's important that we don't blindly encourage this unilateral type of histrionic nostalgia when depicting "non-fiction." I have still yet to find a single published review that indicts or even questions the actions I have accused Of Gods and Men being accountable for, and that's very discouraging. I can't say it's equally surprising though, as these are the reasons xenophobia and racism are still prevalent in Western cinema and its culture as a corollary; a hard pill to swallow for the aristocratic nature of art cinema directors and critics.

If anyone could help me further publicize this, I'd be very appreciative. I think our community needs it.