Coluna Claquete – January, 13th 2012
Movies of the Week: “Agora” and “Love at the Top”
The holiday of Magi allowed to watch some of movies that I still have waiting to check, so I could reduce my debt.Two films, however, caused me a major impact, each by their motives, and inspired me to share them with my readers: “Agora” and “Love At The Top”.
The film “Agora” is a spanish production directed by Alejandro Amenabar, but that came to market as a major Hollywood production, with English dubbing and the presence of famous American stars such as Rachel Weisz, who plays the protagonist, the philosopher and mathematician Hypatia.
The story appears on the screen presents some poorly known events that have taken place, in early days of Christianity, in the city of Alexandria in Egypt, which was an important center of science, bringing together scientists from many different nationalities.
The historical moment, however, was delicate, with the reversal of the position of Christianity, that changed of a religion persecuted and condemned to a situation of power in 392 a.C., when Emperor Theodosius fought paganism by forbidding their worship and proclaiming Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire.
Hypatia (Rachel Weisz) preferred to devote himself to science and philosophy, considering that these disputes were “matters of troublemakers and slaves”. His father and great mentor, Theon (Michael Lonsdale) stimulated her to pursue her studies.
Some of his former students would come to occupy positions of prominence, as Orestes (Oscar Isaac), who became the mayor of Alexandria, and Synesius (Rupert Evans), who was consecrated Bishop of Cyrene.
The religious conflict dominated the end of the fifth century in Alexandria, and culminated in the invasion of the temple of Serapis, which is shown in the film – wrongly – as the invasion and destruction of the Library and Museum of Alexandria. The famous library has suffered numerous fires throughout its existence, several of them during the various military campaigns that have invaded the city.
Despite this and other poetic freedoms, the film focuses on the figure of Hypatia, a woman far ahead of his time, who distinguished himself in mathematics, astronomy, physics and was also responsible for the Neoplatonic school of philosophy, at a time women were little more than housewives and child producers.
Hypatia, in its turn, told as a woman of great beauty, declined numerous requests for marriage, assuring that she was married with the Truth. The film shows her as object of passion of Orestes and also her ex-slave Davus (Max Minghella), to whom she had granted freedom.
In the year 390, Bishop Theophilus, sworn enemy of paganism, ordered the destruction of Greek temples, including the wonderful library, with its entire contents of “heretics” books.His nephew and heir Ciril would continue his work, turning Hypatia the great enemy of the Church.
Much criticized by the Christian communities around the world, the film has a great importance in showing the dark side of religion when mixed with politics, an equation where the result is fanaticism. The proof is that the film had distribution difficulties in the United States because of pressure from religious groups.
It would be nice if the events portrayed in “Agora” belonged only to History, but when we see the Arab countries dominated by religious fundamentalism, or even the pernicious influence that conservative groups have in American politics, we realize that this dark side is still alive and present even today.
The film’s title, “Agora” means the main square in the constitution of the polis, the greek city of classical antiquity.It is there that the greek citizen met with another peoples to buy things at the fair, where political discussions took place and the people’s courts: it was therefore the space of citizenship.
The other film I have chosen to present has, to me, a delicious touch of nostalgia.The film “Love At The Top”, 1974, directed by Michel Deville, whose script is based on the novel by Roger Blondel, shows the adventures of a social climber, played masterfully by frenchman Jean-Louis Trintignant.
The cast brings a remarkable number of notables, including the austrian Romy Schneider, who became famous with the series “Sissi”, the english Jane Birkin, who starred in a scandal with the recording of “Je t’aime, moi non plus “, with her husband Serge Gainsbourg, and the brazilian Florinda Balkan.
The film tells the story of Nicolas Mallet (Jean-Louis Trintignant), a humble bank clerk who lived a routine life without expectations, but that wakes the attention of a friend, Fabre (Jean-Pierre Cassel), after committing a minor transgression when he dates the call girl Marie-Paule (Jane Birkin).
Fabre was a frustrated writer who survived was giving private lessons and had his works continually been rejected by publishers. He begins to lead the life of Nicholas, planning the steps with coldness and cynicism, helping him to get ahead, regardless of whether the means were ethical or honest.
The first charge for Nicolas was to seduce Roberte (Rommy Schneider), the wife of a professor friend of Fabre. She is one of the many women who passed through the hands (and bed) of Nicolas.
The angelic Marie-Paule serves as the first impulse to Nicolas when she turns lover of Lourceuil (Georges Wilson), a wealthy businessman with political ambitions. Later, others will be used by Nicholas in his journey, the main one being the powerful and elusive Flora (Florinda Balkan).
The most remarkable feature of this script is how as a history of apparent cynicism and ambition is built upon characters whose motivations border on naivete. It is delightful the explanation of Nicholas, when he says he “wants to be very rich to be able to have sex with many women”.
Most tragic, however, is what moves Fabre, the great mastermind of Nicolas’ social escalade.His motivations refer to the time of poor student, when all his money was spent buying aspirin, just to talk to the beautiful daughter of a pharmacist.
Considered daring for its time, we see that the story shown in “Love At The Top” is almost naive and even amateur, considering the cases of greed and cruelty of the real “climbers” in their social ascent nowadays.
This is a rare opportunity to see an excellent movie, well done script, wonderful cast, soundtrack of quality, and impeccable direction, qualities that show that to make a masterpiece does not need a millionaire budget.For me, one of the highlights of the film is a chance to see three of the most important muses of the 70’s in the same film.
A curious fact is the original name of the movie “Le Mouton Enragé”, something like the angry sheep, is a french expression which was the nickname for a french politician Nicolas de Condorcet. The brazilian title, “Escalada ao Poder” was closer to the movie’s content than the american one, “Love at the Top”.
The bad news for the cinephiles, is that this film was not released on DVD in Brazil. To watch this movie, only importing the DVD – without subtitles, or opting for the P2P network, which is still quite difficult.