Wednesday, May 31, 2023

ABBE PIERRE - A CENTURY OF DEVOTION (2023) Cannes 2023


70 years in the life of Henri Groues, a Catholic priest who became beloved figure in France before his death in 2007. 

Until this film I never ran across Groues or his story. It is the story of a man who knew he had to follow the life of a man of god but found bumps along the way (he was asked to leave the monestary because be was deemed too fragile for the life, he lead a band of the resistance that fought the Nazi's and took Jewish refugees to safety) before he found his calling trying to help the homeless and the poor. It's a moving tale about a man's search for meaning and a path way to God.

The film that has been made of his life is a grand epic of the sort no one does any more. Its on my list of best looking films of 2023.  No one shoots a film like this any more. Its a film that gives as grand vistas in some moments and puts us up and close at others. Technically this is one of the true treasures of the film year. Look at the shots, the high shots, the close shots, the colors, the sunsets and sunrises, the way the sense of wonder the film generates with each image. I am in awe. I want to see this film on a big screen just so the images can reduce me to tears seeing them bigger than life and ten times more beautiful.

As amazing as the film is technically, the narrative is not up to the visuals. Don't think that that means it's bad, rather it's not up to the god like visuals.  While the film tells the story, it tries to tell too much of it.  Its covering 70 years in too short of a time. I don't blame the filmmakers but Groues, lead one hell of a life and achieved way too much. This should have been at least an hour longer or a mini series.

Regardless of quibbling about the script, you have to see this- nay- you NEED to see this on the big screen. This is the sort of film that made generations fall in love with the movies.

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