Film Review: Into Great Silence

Are you an impatient person? Do you have a short attention span? Do you hate Gregorian chant? If you've answered yes to any of these questions, Houstonist warmly invites you to not go see Into Great Silence, as you will not enjoy it. We also recommend that you not consider entering an ascetic brotherhood, either.

Phillip Groning shot this documentary, now playing at the Angelika, after waiting sixteen years for permission to film the life of a Carthusian order monastery. The end result is a beautiful and enveloping view of the day-to-day existence of the monks at the Monastary of the Grande Chartreuse in the French Alps. Since these monks refrain from speaking for the majority of their lives, they've forsaken a world of distractions and banality for deep contemplation instead. Accordingly, Groning's very personal camerawork and unaccompanied miking of each shot allow the viewer to take in the elements of space, light, and nature in a way unlike most trips to the movies. The intent and the effect, of course, is to plop the audience in the middle of monastic life for 180 minutes.

And let us assure you: those were 180 long minutes. Houstonist absolutely loved the movie, don't get us wrong, but we certainly felt the length of it. Tempus non fugit here, so Into Great Silence relies heavily on the viewer's assent to entering this peaceful but rich anomaly of time and space. Think of this film as the exact sensory opposite of Pirates of the Carribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest. In fact, among the few signposts that Groning provides to remind us we were watching a movie were the recurring appearance of pithy meditative statements on the screen, ones often dealing with the spiritual consent to participate with a greater good. The readings are placed intermittently throughout the film in a manner reminiscent of the monks' liturgy of the hours segmenting the length of each day. Groning treats the monks well in the film, as he's neither going for hagiography nor condescension. Instead, he offers close-up portraits of each brother that plainly show their humanity. Over the course of the film, each monk stares into the filmmaker's camera with varying expressions of "Uh, so how long do you want us to look at this?"

So try and catch this movie if this sounds intriguing to you, but go with a full stomach, without your rowdy friends, and without too many of your concerns on your mind. Otherwise, go and fulfill your moral obligation to see Spiderman 3 if you haven't yet.