Of Gods and Men

[Howard Schumann]

I agree with your positive assessment, as my review which you link to shows. This is a widely acclaimed film, and recently won the César for best French film of the year and had 11 César nominations. Winner of the Best Foreign Language Film award from the National Board of Review. I saw it as part of the New York Film Festival, so my review is in the Festival Coverage section of Filmleaf for NYFF 2010. It went into US limited theatrical release in Landmark theaters February 25, 2011 and is now at eight theaters across the country. I admired greatly Beauvois' previous film [I]Le Petit LieutenantI] (2005), which others paid little attention to here, though it was given awards in France.

Congratulations on your review being so widely recognized. It is quite good. By the way, you didn't link to my review of Incendies. Was that an oversight?

[Chris Knipp]

I see no indication that my review is "widely recognized," but I did link to yours of Incendies already: look again.

[Howard Schumann]

I see no indication that my review is "widely recognized," but I did link to yours of Incendies already: look again.

Oh, sorry. I was in a hurry and misread your post. Anyway, it deserves to be widely recognized. Thanks for the link to Incendies. I didn't see it the first time I looked.

[Chris Knipp]

That's okay.

[oscar jubis]

I enjoyed reading your reviews, guys.Thanks. A good film and yet, I find myself trying to put into words precisely why I like it less than the Cannes award and critical consensus indicate. Maybe the fact that only two characterizations are sufficiently developed: the monks played by Michael Lonsdale and Lambert Wilson (a Resnais regular). Maybe that the film pays no mind to the colonial aspect of the monks' presence (the actual Christian was a soldier during the Argelian War of Independence). Maybe the film just didn't ultimately give me enough to think about... just maybe. Glad I saw it, I mean it, but not enough there to intrigue me, or delight me, or challenge me like a great movie should.

[Chris Knipp]

I can sympathize with your response, though I don't entirely share it. This is not one of my favorite movies. It may be that we are both out of sympathy for the sympathy shown for these Christian monks planted in a Muslim country during a time of conflict and refusing to get out of the way. Why is that so noble of them? However I think the film has more depth than your remarks give it credit for, and the couple of rounded characters are rich enough to make up for lack of detail in the others.