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I have had a certain borrowed DVD laying around for at least six months now, “Chocolat” to be precise. Tonight I finally watched it, despite (or because of?) my exam preparation stress. The subject interested me, I like chocolate very much. The movie has a brilliant cast, displays an extraordinary level of craftsmanship and offers beautiful images, besides asking important questions. However, I also want to point to a basic problem. First a brief overview: A woman, Vianne, and her daughter move to a conservative, catholic French village, where she opens a chocolaterie during lent (season of fasting). She also does not attend church, where the mayor greets each and every churchgoer individually. Vianne’s freedom (or rebellion?) is a provocation for the mayor, and when a traveling group of gipsies reaches the village the conflict climaxes.

So, basically it’s about religion and fasting, self-control and enjoying life. Later, fundamental values of society are addressed and questioned. It is exactly this questioning of values that can only be the beginning of a deeper dealing with these issues, to which I want to give a small contribution here. Take, for example, fasting: What is the motive that causes someone to fast? Is it tradition year after year, or the desire to have less weight, or voluntary surrender of rights in order to show God how earnest we are in our request? I see a problem where many words have gotten such a negative meaning now that their original intent has almost vanished. For instance, self-control sounds to our ears like renunciation and prudishness, while Galations 5:23 calls it a fruit of the Holy Spirit, along with such desirable things as love, joy, and faithfulness.

I was particularly touched by the way Vianne cared about the unaddressed problems of her neighbors and tried to solve them with both empathy and resolve. Luc, the son of the mayor’s secretary, very much reminded me of myself in the way he drew pictures so quietly by himself while not really being sure of his abilities. Vianne’s drivenness, which she inherited from her Mayan mother, struck me as strange at first, but was resolved quite nicely in the end (which I will not describe here, of course).

At some point, the gipsies arrive in the village, or rather outside the village, since they stay on their boats at the river bank. The mayor feels his village in danger and has the following leaflet distributed:

Boycott Immorality! Our beloved village rests upon a solid foundation of FAMILY, CHURCH, and COMMUNITY. To keep Lansquenet safe and tranquil, we must close our doors to outsiders whose only tradition is SELF-GRATIFICATION, whose only creed is godlessness, and whose only possible effect is the moral contamination of our village. WE MUST GIVE THESE OUTSIDERS NO QUARTER! We must make them unwelcome in our homes, on our streets, and in our places of business. Thank you for your cooperation. Lansquenet Town Council

While the movie attacks the xenophobic reaction and (allegedly) old-fashioned morals of the villagers, it simultaneously drags good and fundamental values down to the ground. What is so bad about having family, church and community as a foundation? (Even the word “fundamental” is almost taboo today due to the “fundamentalists.”) And vice versa: What is so good about immoral behavior? Of course, the territorial attitude of Lansquenet’s mayor is horrible and also discredits the good values he is identified with. (Unfortunately, many Christians react the same way when they happen to be confronted with “the world;” see 1. Corinthians 5:9ff.) Here the movie does not differentiate enough.

Similar observations can be made of the scene where the violent café owner, after the mayor has tried to re-educate him, asks his wife for forgiveness with the words: “God has made me a new man!” This, of course, is not true, since a) it was the mayor and not God, and b) the change involved only the exterior, not the inner man. Religion tries to change man from the outside to the inside through rules and rituals, but genuine life changes begin in the heart – with repentance, which is confession of one’s own sins and asking for forgiveness – and will then become visible on the outside as well. (See for instance Mark 7:1–23.)

There is much more to write, but I will call it a day. Which leaves me to say that I was especially impressed by the acting of Judi Bench and Alfred Molina. And that the beautiful village’s real name is Flavigny sur Ozerain, should you happen to be in the area.

This entry was posted on Friday, February 3rd, 2006 at 11:59 pm and is filed under Faith, Journal, Movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.