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floatingleafNow, about this Greek film I saw last Tuesday. Black Field. Which turned out to be something a little different than what I expected. *amused chuckle* The funny thing is, I picked mostly gay movies to see - except for this one. Not even so much on purpose - I just picked the ones that sounded most interesting to me, and they happened to be gay-themed. Imagine that. *snort* So I was thinking to myself, Well, at least I will be able to say I watched one non-gay film during this festival. And then I checked out the link to the film's website, and there was a review, and before I was half-way through it, I started laughing hysterically, because yeah. To quote the director, Vardis Marinakis, who attended the screening, this is a spoiler that has totally leaked, so I am going to reveal it - and I daresay some of my potential readers might actually be MORE interested in seeing the film once I do.:D
So, the plot premise is that a young nun falls in love with a wounded soldier who takes refuge in her convent. This is happening in 1654, when Greece was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. Young Greek boys were routinely taken away from their families and recruited into the Turkish army. Some mothers desperately wanted their sons to avoid this fate - so they would dress them up as girls and hide them in convents. It's a proven historical fact - though it's difficult to say how often this happened (to quote the director again, they had no statistics back then... LOL). Anyway... you can see by now where this is going. Our young nun is a boy. No one knows about this, except the abbess. And the deception is made all the easier by the fact that the role is played by a woman. Interestingly enough, she seems rather plain as a girl, in her modest braid and nun's robes - but later in the film, as the character tries to come to terms with his male identity, her face becomes quite strikingly attractive in a distinctly androgynous way (or it could be just my perception - I have a thing for gender-confused individuals, LOL). But back to the storyline: there is a price on the soldier's head, so once his wounds are healed, the girl/boy helps him escape. The soldier is also attracted to her, so he makes no objection when she runs off with him. However, during their first night alone together in the woods, the truth is revealed. The soldier doesn't hide his disappointment - he rejects the boy's advances and walks off on his own. But the boy follows. He has nowhere else to go, after all. The soldier swims across a stream and calls from the other side: "Stop following me! I don't like boys." The boy doesn't listen. He wades right into the water and tries to get across - but he cannot swim. The soldier jumps in and drags him out. From that moment on, the dynamic between them changes. The soldier becomes a mentor - he tries to transform the boy into a man. He cuts his braid off, teaches him to build a fire, to fish, to fight. The boy tries his best to fit into this new role, burying his sexual longings, and the soldier begins to appreciate his quiet determination. They find new respect for each other, which slowly morphs into deep attachment. It may seem they couldn't be more different on the surface - but it so happens that under his rough exterior, the soldier is also a very quiet, gentle man. He knows their roles could easily have been reversed. He watches the boy embrace his new identity, and his own preconceptions start changing too. It is very subtle, this shifting dynamic between them, and done practically without any dialogue - they are submerged in a dreamlike, surreal world of their own isolation, deep in the wild, in a nearly-mythical forest, almost like a garden of Eden. As if the rest of the world didn't exist. We never find out how long they can survive like this, or what happens if they can't. That's not what the film is about. The historical setting is merely a vehicle to explore this particular relationship, to make it plausible. It's a film about sexual awakening, about gender confusion and questioning cultural stereotypes. The protagonist is gradually transformed from an ascetic nun, prone to self-harm, into a wild nature-child, uninhibited in his acceptance of the sensual. And because I know the tastes and predilections of the few regular readers of this journal, I shall not refrain from the final spoiler: yes, there is a sex scene. Between the boy and the soldier. Not very graphic, visually, since they are both wearing their clothes (we never see a naked full-body shot of the boy - probably because he is played by a woman), but quite lengthy and vocal in an uninhibited, animalistic way. But also very tender. And completely believable. It cements both characters' symbolic transformation. There is plenty of symbolism in this movie that I could talk about forever... but since I have practically revealed the entire plotline, I am going to leave the rest of it alone.:) It is beautifully filmed, very slow-paced and kind of magical. Not your typical historical action/adventure type of flick at all. I think some people in the audience were disappointed - I could see a young guy in the next row playing with his iPhone the entire time (WTF?... since you bothered paying for the ticket, you might just as well have the decency to at least pretend you're watching). But I loved it. And, apparently, so did the elderly straight couple next to me, who looked, for lack of a better word, very suburban. I half-expected them to walk out, scandalized, way before the film was over - but they stayed till the very end, and even had some questions for the director. Talk about defying cultural stereotypes.;)
So, the plot premise is that a young nun falls in love with a wounded soldier who takes refuge in her convent. This is happening in 1654, when Greece was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. Young Greek boys were routinely taken away from their families and recruited into the Turkish army. Some mothers desperately wanted their sons to avoid this fate - so they would dress them up as girls and hide them in convents. It's a proven historical fact - though it's difficult to say how often this happened (to quote the director again, they had no statistics back then... LOL). Anyway... you can see by now where this is going. Our young nun is a boy. No one knows about this, except the abbess. And the deception is made all the easier by the fact that the role is played by a woman. Interestingly enough, she seems rather plain as a girl, in her modest braid and nun's robes - but later in the film, as the character tries to come to terms with his male identity, her face becomes quite strikingly attractive in a distinctly androgynous way (or it could be just my perception - I have a thing for gender-confused individuals, LOL). But back to the storyline: there is a price on the soldier's head, so once his wounds are healed, the girl/boy helps him escape. The soldier is also attracted to her, so he makes no objection when she runs off with him. However, during their first night alone together in the woods, the truth is revealed. The soldier doesn't hide his disappointment - he rejects the boy's advances and walks off on his own. But the boy follows. He has nowhere else to go, after all. The soldier swims across a stream and calls from the other side: "Stop following me! I don't like boys." The boy doesn't listen. He wades right into the water and tries to get across - but he cannot swim. The soldier jumps in and drags him out. From that moment on, the dynamic between them changes. The soldier becomes a mentor - he tries to transform the boy into a man. He cuts his braid off, teaches him to build a fire, to fish, to fight. The boy tries his best to fit into this new role, burying his sexual longings, and the soldier begins to appreciate his quiet determination. They find new respect for each other, which slowly morphs into deep attachment. It may seem they couldn't be more different on the surface - but it so happens that under his rough exterior, the soldier is also a very quiet, gentle man. He knows their roles could easily have been reversed. He watches the boy embrace his new identity, and his own preconceptions start changing too. It is very subtle, this shifting dynamic between them, and done practically without any dialogue - they are submerged in a dreamlike, surreal world of their own isolation, deep in the wild, in a nearly-mythical forest, almost like a garden of Eden. As if the rest of the world didn't exist. We never find out how long they can survive like this, or what happens if they can't. That's not what the film is about. The historical setting is merely a vehicle to explore this particular relationship, to make it plausible. It's a film about sexual awakening, about gender confusion and questioning cultural stereotypes. The protagonist is gradually transformed from an ascetic nun, prone to self-harm, into a wild nature-child, uninhibited in his acceptance of the sensual. And because I know the tastes and predilections of the few regular readers of this journal, I shall not refrain from the final spoiler: yes, there is a sex scene. Between the boy and the soldier. Not very graphic, visually, since they are both wearing their clothes (we never see a naked full-body shot of the boy - probably because he is played by a woman), but quite lengthy and vocal in an uninhibited, animalistic way. But also very tender. And completely believable. It cements both characters' symbolic transformation. There is plenty of symbolism in this movie that I could talk about forever... but since I have practically revealed the entire plotline, I am going to leave the rest of it alone.:) It is beautifully filmed, very slow-paced and kind of magical. Not your typical historical action/adventure type of flick at all. I think some people in the audience were disappointed - I could see a young guy in the next row playing with his iPhone the entire time (WTF?... since you bothered paying for the ticket, you might just as well have the decency to at least pretend you're watching). But I loved it. And, apparently, so did the elderly straight couple next to me, who looked, for lack of a better word, very suburban. I half-expected them to walk out, scandalized, way before the film was over - but they stayed till the very end, and even had some questions for the director. Talk about defying cultural stereotypes.;)
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