In many ways, A Hidden Life continues Malick’s preoccupation with individuals who transcend social norms. As with others (Thomas Merton, for example), Jägerstätter is a source of inspiration. This passage alone would be enough to stimulate Malick into making a film. I cannot believe that, just because one has a wife and children, a man is free to offend God.” God gives so much strength that it is possible to bear any suffering. with my hands in chains, I find that much better than if my will were in chains. In a letter written shortly before execution in 1943, he says “If I must write. He epitomises the Suffering Servant: “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth” (Isaiah 53.7). What struck me was Jägerstätter’s passivity, faced with brutality. The film argues that nothing is hidden that shall not (eventually) be made known (cf. The title derives from George Eliot’s Middlemarch, acknowledging “the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs”. It wasn’t until 2007 that the Roman Catholic Church sanctioned his beatification as a martyr. They exemplify an unfortunate difference, at least on this occasion, between religion (Catholicism, National Socialism) and faith. They don’t confront the truth.They just ignore it.” Jägerstätter’s parish priest, bishop, and interrogators all suggest that his sacrifice will benefit nobody. A workman restoring the church’s wall-paintings predicts: “A darker time is coming, and men will be more clever. Franziska endures hostility within the community.įew seem to recognise evil when they see it. Jägerstätter is incarcerated for refusing to swear obedience to Hitler. He undergoes basic training, while his wife, Franziska (Valerie Pachner), struggles to tend family and crops. The new regime just won’t let Jägerstätter alone. A disrupted Edenic existence has typified Malick’s films ever since Days of Heaven (1978). “I thought we’d built our nest high up,” he says but it is still not lofty enough to avoid Nazi clutches.Īugust Diehl plays Jägerstätter, a devoted Christian, cultivating land physically nearer heaven than earth. 12A) depicts Franz Jägerstätter unwittingly facing the consequences of Austria’s 1938 annexation to Germany.
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