Daily Archives: April 12, 2016

Ida: The Jewish Nun

Film review

From the beginning of Ida, religion is central to the film’s development: the first scenes are mostly close-ups on various religious symbols in the convent, like crosses, a statue of Jesus, or the nuns’ habits. The audience understands within the first five minutes of the film that religion has been the main factor in shaping the life of Anna, the protagonist. She is a novice nun who was abandoned at the convent as an infant, and is about to take her vows. The viewer discovers quickly that Anna is in fact a Jewish girl named Ida and, alongside her, we learn that almost her entire family was killed during the Second World War. Her only living relative is her aunt Wanda, from whom she learns her family’s tragic history. Wanda appears to be a direct rejection of the vows of piety, chastity and poverty Ida is preparing to take: she is a heavy drinker, a chain smoker, and has frequent sexual encounters with strangers. This tension proves central to Ida’s development: there are two paths that she can take: she can go back to the convent and take her vows or she can stay with her aunt and live a life filled with earthly pleasures and disappointments. She learns throughout the film what life outside the convent may entail: love (which she learns through her romantic and sexual interaction with Lis, a man that she and Wanda meet on the road), loss (through her family history and the death of her aunt), tragedy, and maybe even redemption.

The tension between her two options is made clear throughout the film, as the main focus is placed on Wanda and Ida. The rest of the characters have very few lines and don’t make frequent or lengthy appearances; Wanda and Ida spend the majority of the film in proximity to each other. In these scenes, the two protagonists are portrayed as diametrically opposed. Ida is completely innocent and does not know about life outside of the convent; she has been protected her whole life from reality. Her innocence may slowly fade throughout the film, but she does not lose her faith. Wanda, on the other hand, has seen so much tragedy and violence that she has lost all faith, though it is clear that she used to be a “true believer” in the communist cause. In fact, the reason she was not killed during the war like the rest of her family is because she was part of the anti-Nazi resistance. In order to cope with her guilt and loss of faith, she numbs herself constantly with alcohol and sex to help distance herself from her terrible past and grim reality. Though Wanda may gain some degree of hope—and even faith—from her time with Ida, her suicide toward the end of the movie makes it clear that she could not survive her grief.

This contrast between the two protagonists is emphasized during a scene in which Ida states that she wants to go find where her family is buried. At this point Wanda asks Ida, “what if you go there and discover there is no God?” She knows that this experience will be disturbing and may shake Ida’s belief system—her religion and her faith, which are the basis of her entire identity. Then, Wanda smiles and says, in an almost patronizing tone, “I know, God is everywhere”. Here, the viewer understands that believing in God, and keeping her faith, will be a way for Ida to be able to cope with learning about her family’s past.

However, the director, Paweł Pawlikowski, did not make this film to convey any particular religious message or even to represent religion in a favorable way. It is made clear that religion is often used as an excuse for silence or as a way to cover up heinous crimes: we learn that the priest who lived in the same town (Piaska) as Ida’s parents during the war claims to not know anything about them. We also see learn that the Skibas—the family who hid then killed Ida and Wanda’s family during the war—are deeply Christian. When Ida is in their home discovering the truth about her family, she stands in a doorway, where there is a large cross the wall above her head, and when Ida first arrives at the house, she is asked to bless the family’s crying baby. These two instances make clear the social privileges that Ida has because she is a nun. Moreover, she was not killed as an infant because she was able to pass for a gentile. As such, religion is represented in a very complicated and nuanced way, which allows the viewer to see some of the elements that are not given much attention or detail in the movie, like politics.

Religion is used as a conduit for the viewer to be able to understand the multiple political elements that complicate the plot and movie background, since the political context is not made entirely clear: the war is only referred to briefly in the movie, and even then there are only allusions to things that happened to Ida’s family during that time. The audience understands the historical context through references to religion and/or religious identity—chosen or inherited, which allows the filmmakers to not clarify in depth the movie’s historical or political context.

The audience also understands how deeply Roman Catholicism is intertwined with Polish national identity, as it is more frequently talked about than communism. In fact, there are only two obvious references to politics and the state: one, when Wanda is at work as a judge and two, at her funeral—where a government official reads an emotionless eulogy about “Comrade Wanda’s” great contributions to “making a new Poland.” These scenes both serve to help us understand the fundamental tragedy of Wanda’s life: she tells Ida that she had no idea what she had been fighting for during the war. It is clear that while Wanda once had faith in this system, she has lost it entirely. It is also crucial to explore why the film chooses to highlight religion, given the fact that it is based in Poland during the country’s communist era. Though Polish communism was inherently anti-religion, many of the film’s characters are deeply Catholic. This demonstrates that religion serves as a tool to create and maintain individual identity in a politically totalitarian country, just as faith provides Ida with a reprieve from the harrowing reality that she faces upon learning the truth about her family.

Ironically, it doesn’t appear as though the filmmakers are making any overall comment on religion or the role of religion in Ida’s life. It is simply provides a perspective to better understand her history and her life. This is indicative of the film itself, which uses cinematic simplicity to convey deeply complex themes and realities.

What I Think About When I Think About the City

Op-Ed
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Above ground in Prague

People in Europe are on average much more attractive than in the US. Well-groomed, fashionable, not overweight. Just comparing my T ride to the airport in Boston to walking around Munich today was eye-opening. Just saying, there are a lot of attractive German women……

An ex-boyfriend wrote this gem in a letter to me from Germany shortly after I dumped him. I usually tried read his letters with the passive eye of a long-suffering but loyal friend, but when a man who once wore orange sneakers with a tuxedo attempted to compare me unfavorably with my German counterparts, he managed to finally catch my attention. Even more irritating than the personal dig was his assumption that the difference in appearance between women on the T in Boston, and those promenading around downtown Munich was a consequence of nationality.

I could imagine what he was seeing in Munich, likely very similar to what I have seen in Paris and Moscow. Women my age in Paris seem to favor strappy sandals and strapless dresses, and in Moscow enormous fur coats and high-heeled boots are all the rage.  The glitz and glamour of these European metropolises is evident in the way women carry themselves as they walk along the Champs-Elysees, or across Red Square. Boston is no different. The maze of streets fanning out from Downtown Crossing and anchored by the Prudential Center to the west and the Charles River to the North is populated by a female elite just as chic as their European sisters.

But in any city, I enter another world as I push through the turnstile into a metro station. Here you see all the women: those who live their city lives behind the scenes, who staff the expensive boutiques, and scoop gelato or мороженое. They carry bags of groceries or chunky toddlers. Their customers don’t shun public transport either, but here they appear somehow diminished, slouching into their seats with sighs of relief, and perhaps slipping feet out of high heels to furtively rub their toes. Here the similarities overpower the divide between these two groups of women. At the end of the day, we are all worn-out and vaguely, habitually frustrated.

To be taken seriously in shops, restaurants and offices, those who can do so don a disguise and hide behind lipstick and hairspray. It’s more than good grooming and exercise; the culture of the city demands both fashion and glamour from the young female elite almost regardless of occupation. The ‘beauty premium’ is a name given by economists to the improved labor market outcomes of people considered attractive. It doesn’t only affect women, but expectations of women have evolved far beyond the baseline standard of appearance for men in identical positions. Women grasp at the beauty premium to gain a little bit more of an advantage in a world where women still do not compete with men on a level playing field.

It’s exhausting, frustrating and expensive. Women who have the money shell out about $15,000 in their lifetime on makeup alone, and this pales in comparison to expenditures on clothing, purses and shoes. Trips to the salon for complex haircuts and coloring gobble up both hours and dollars. It’s a luxury to be able to take time out of your schedule to utilize a gym membership, and healthy, good-quality food is pricy and time-consuming to prepare. The ‘pink tax’ inflates these expenses even further: women who choose to buy into the beauty premium get charged on average 13% more for products marketed to them than for identical items marketed to men. All over the world a subset of the women are left behind, lacking the resources for a cosmopolitan woman’s costume. In Boston, where half the population lives on less than $35,000 a year, it’s a big subset.

But anywhere in the world, the women on the subway are different creatures from the women strolling between the high rise buildings. When we go underground, those of us who have the resources to buy the appearance of a successful women let the image fade. Suddenly we are all the same again. As my ex-boyfriend observed, we are no longer well-groomed after the wind has disheveled our hair. We are no longer fashionable as we shed blazers and scarves in the heat of the bodies packed together in the train. We may not look or feel particularly fit after those doughnuts eaten to make up for missing lunch. Dismayed at the change, we look at the men who examine us as the metro carries us homeward. We close our eyes, and try to remember that we can do anything they can do, as long as we can figure out how to do it in high heels.