Adam Paquette - Decalogue

In this series, midrash is very prevalent. It forces the reader or viewer to struggle and try to make personal and subjective meaning out of the works. The film does a fantastic job of applying the decalogue to today's world, in a more modern and dated context. Such as not worshipping other gods (math/measurements) before the one true God. Or thou shall not kill, a man predetermined he was going to murder someone and ended up getting killed himself for the crime. While watching this, one had to follow and pick up on these actions in order to make meaning out of the visuals the movie supplied. 


I believe that the films did a great job of connecting the gap of understanding the 10 commandments. These visuals allowed for more up to date examples of where the commandments fit in. These commandments were created thousands of years ago so the context in which they would apply needed to be updated for us to understand. Some may not see math or measurement as a god but in actuality, it is when one puts a higher value on it than on the one true God. Another god does not have to be a Greek god or anything of that nature. 


The first decalogue movie did a great job of relating feeling to meaning. The father had just lost his son and he was enraged and filled with guilt. He ran to the church and flipped the table out of frustration and then held a block of ice to his head. I saw this as the turning point for the father to go back to the church and only worship God. In addition, it showed Mary crying, from the wax that the dad had thrown. We can relate both Mary and the dad crying because they both lost their son, this was a very emotional scene. In the second movie, the murder was telling his lawyer that he did not want to die and that he wanted his mom to bury him in the grave with his sister and father. This was such a sad and moving scene because it shows a different side of the guy who murdered the taxi driver. This goes to show how people do not want to get killed but if they know they will, they will want to go out a good person. For both of these, the movies allow for the viewers to express feeling from these visuals and it allows them to create deeper meaning from them.


I feel as though both films did a fantastic job of contextualizing the decalogue and allowing for others to integrate it into their lives. I especially thought it was prevalent in the first movie. It goes to show that one must never praise technology, ideologies, math, other gods, etc... In today's world, it is really easy to get distracted by technology such as smartphones, computers, and TV. However, one must always limit their use of technology and allow time to only worship the Lord. 

Comments

  1. Religion and Film 2021February 18, 2021 at 2:00 PM

    I think you did a great job about why it is important to update examples of how the commandments still apply today. Moreover, you are completely right when you say worshipping is not reserved for the various Gods, humans always worship something. This something takes many forms like technology (as this movie pointed out) but also political parties, sports, economics, etc..

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