by Film Writer, Tremayne Miller for LifestyleMK
The Club
Directed by Pablo Larrin
In cinemas 25 March 2016
The Club, the new film by
Chilean director Pablo Larrain (No, Post Mortem) questions the whereabouts
of the priests who were taken to retirement houses in complete silence, ‘the
lost priests’ club.’
Apparently former clergy members, former priests
and religious operators provided clues as to what these houses were like, at
the same time it was discovered that an international congregation had been
founded in the United States called the Servants of the Paraclete.
Writers, Guillermo Calderon and Daniel
Villalobos and he were able to create a screenplay of precision that was
dangerous and extremely mysterious on the back of already having actors in
mind.
This is the fifth of Pablo’s film, Alfredo
Castro (Father Vidal) has starred in, and when he is asked how The Club
relates to today’s Chile, here’s what he has to say:
‘Chilean society has founded itself on a story of
power and submission.. Economical, social, political and religious powers,
.. ..powers that have inflicted great
violence in the shelter of silence.’
‘..The Club seems to me like a realistic
observation of political, social, and religious contingency, and above all, of
justice (or rather, the lack, thereof).Networks of power carry on, hidden in
the shadows and sheltered beneath the impunity that certain groups still
retain.
Roberto
Farias, who plays
Sandokan, represents a specific social class and place, and in turn a
particular religious experience. He recognizes faith as a functional thing, as
opposed to anything either philosophical or spiritual, whereby he was forced to
take part in sick pleasures by the priests who were meant to be protecting him.
Sandokan is, in effect, a man who is fed crumbs, then
left to fight over them with the pigeons.
Farias
approached
his character via concrete imagery, which became more vivid as he verbalised the
text.
Retired Nun, Antonia Zegers is adamant that
the purpose of her character isn’t how she relates to being the only woman in a
household of five men but more so, how she uses her set of circumstances to
escape from herself. ‘Each rule exempts her from herself, giving her the
opportunity of living through others, of avoiding contact.’
A.A.
Dowd of A.V.
Club describes this drama as bearing no ‘absolution’ or ‘portrait of
forgiveness’ for its sinners. Because he believes that Larrain is after
something a lot ‘trickier and harder to pin down. He, indeed, asks us ‘to share
real estate with these men, ‘whilst offering a ‘few windows into their heads or
hearts.’
A poignant
portrait, which leads us to question the sinful acts of individuals – their
motives, and if they indeed, hold any remorse for what they’ve done. For me, I
will always find a link between The Club and Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu film, Amores Perros (translation: Love’s
A Bitch), where what’s lacking in human emotion is found in the animals
featured, and in the case of The Club, in greyhound Ragu, whose
trepidant eyes immediately fixate, and fascinate me .
A Writer Contact I was to speak with after the
private screening of The Club told
me about the 2012 documentary Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God by Alex Gibney,
which details the first known protest against ‘clerical
sex abuse in the United States’ by four deaf men.
I would, therefore, like
to take this opportunity to provide you with a brief précis, having now seen
in:
Actors Jamey Sheridan, Chris
Cooper, Ethan Hawke and John
Slattery provide vocal translation of the deaf
interviewees.
The title derives from
the Latin "mea
maxima culpa", taken from the Confiteor.. It
translates to English as "My most grievous fault".
The film follows Alex Gibney as he examines
the abuse of power in the Catholic Church but through the stories of the four deaf men —
Terry Kohut, Gary Smith, Pat Kuehn and Arthur Budzinski. All of whom set out to
expose the priest who abused them during the mid-1960s. Each brought forth the
first ever known case of public protest against clerical sex abuse, which later
developed into the sex scandal case known as the Lawrence Murphy case. Their case manages to make its way through Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, to the churches in Ireland, and to the highest office of the
Vatican.
The film premiered at the 2012 Toronto
International Film Festival, on September 9, 2012, with a later release date of November 16th,
and a worldwide premier on HBO on February 4, 2013.
Film Writer and Critic, Tremayne Miller writes for Hey U Guys http://www.heyuguys.com/, and you can hear her review feature this Saturday on LifestyleMK, 12 - 2 on Secklow Sounds.
