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Few directors have a visual style as recognizable as Terrence Malick; his frolicking characters, low angles, pious voiceover and fields of wheat are easily parodied, but seldom replicated with the same emotional effect. The Tree of Life, his 2011 film about his own childhood (and… well, the birth of the universe), is considered by many to be his definitive work, not to mention one of the best films of the past decade. After a handful of “low key” entries that failed to leave the same impact, his recent World War II conscientious objector story, A Hidden Life (read our review) — a tale of judgement and morality, based on Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter — ranks among the most potent works in his decades-long oeuvre.
The story, on paper, is simple. Franz (played by August Diehl of Inglourious Basterds) is a happy man and a religious man, living contently with his wife and three daughters in Sankt Radegund, a village 70 miles from Munich. Everything changes when Hitler invades Poland, and able-bodied men like Franz are called up to serve. Franz’s devout Catholicism, however, prevents him from falling in line, so he’s put on trial by the Nazis and eventually executed. Though where Malick finds his three-hour story is in prayers and quiet whispers, and in his unique visual perspective:
A Hidden Life feels like it’s being told from the point of view of an omniscient child.
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Malick and the Omniscient Child
Malick often uses low angles and wide lenses to elongate space. The Tree of Life, shot by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, especially benefits from this approach, as a story of a middle-aged man in modern day, Jack (Sean Penn), looking back at his childhood in the 1950s. As the camera gazes up at Jessica Chastain and Brad Pitt as Jack’s parents, it does so from the perspective of a child, with each parent’s features, and their presence in Jack’s life, exaggerated, as Jack wrestles between his mother’s nurturing comfort and his father’s tough love. Shots from knee-height aren’t uncommon in Malick’s recent work, and The Tree of Life plays, at times, like the director reflecting on defining moments from his childhood.
A Hidden Life, shot by Jörg Widmer, speaks the same visual language, though its implications are staggeringly different. The camera gazes similarly at Franz and his wife Fani (Valerie Pachner), but it does so regardless of their daughters’ presence. This childlike gaze, as the Steadicam floats through space, feels like that of an innocent, passive observer, bearing witness to moments of moral conundrum wherein Franz is torn in two. If he leaves to fight an unjust war against innocent people, he loses his soul in the eyes of God; if he stays behind, his family will suffer the wrath of increasingly vicious neighbors swept up in wartime propaganda.
At times, the camera reveres Franz and Fani, capturing the breadth of their love as they ride over fields via motorcycle and dance till their feet hurt. Other times, the camera quivers with fear and uncertainty, as Franz is called up to war, and he’s forced to wrestle with what he stands for. It peers in on secret conversations between Franz and other townspeople, like the mayor (Karl Markovics), who hides his violent intentions behind concern for Franz — the frame, in these scenes, cuts off the tops of characters’ heads, like it’s only allowed to look so high — and in rare moments where morality is corrupted, and in dire need of protection, the camera merges with Franz’s point of view, like when he’s beaten by a prison guard for the simple act of sharing food.
To punish kindness, in Malick’s film, is to punish the very idea of God. The camera shakes violently and falls to the ground, as if reflecting a universe in chaos — but it returns to a state of equilibrium and calm each time Franz, or someone else, acts kindly.
In A Hidden Life, God — or morality — is conceived and nurtured by people. Like Franz’s own children, it’s something to be cared for, and molded into a version of good. This presence, like Malick’s camera, is a phantom that interrogates through the mere act of observing. When Franz stops to look at a statue of Christ and reflect on his decision, the camera stops with him. When he brings his concerns to a hesitant pastor, Ferdinand Fürthauer (Tobias Moretti) — a man duty-bound to his country who, like the Mayor, pushes Franz to go to war using the excuse of his family —the camera lingers on Fürthauer, who glances briefly at the lens, as if momentarily caught in a lie.
Whether by accident or intent, Moretti’s brief glance at the camera is a powerful moment, one Malick and his editors (Rehman Nizar Ali, Joe Gleason and Sebastian Jones) were right to include. Another happy maybe-accident occurs late in the film, when Franz’s neighbor Miller (Johannes Krisch), one of the only people still looking out for Fani in Franz’s absence, stands in his dark shed, as sunlight enters it from off-screen. A large portion of the shed is in shadow — light and dark battle constantly in every interior space — but a small circle of light seems to reflect off the lens and onto Miller, barely noticeable until he moves around and the light falls on the dark wall behind him.
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Miller, a man embittered by Austria’s predicament in the conflict, still holds on to his version of good in times of crisis. The villagers are called upon to contribute to the war efforts, leaving them with little, and no one in Radegund wants to trade with Fani, so Miller buys her bread from her, and pays her in more food than it’s worth, and more than he can afford. It’s a small act of kindness — one Fani pays forward by giving a desperate woman vegetables from her garden — but an act upon which the sun inadvertently shines, refracted by the lens, and by an ethereal presence that, in this moment, is safeguarded by Miller’s actions.
A Stark Contrast Between Good and Evil
The nature of the wide lens is such that closeups need to be filmed quite near to the actors’ faces — often just a few inches — leading to an intriguing dichotomy between what lies in front of the actors (and characters) and what lies behind them. Much of the film is set against wide open backdrops which, thanks to the aforementioned lenses, remain in focus at the same time as the actors. Just as the performers are faced with an apparatus that captures their truth, the characters are confronted as if by a spectre questioning their intentions, with all that they live and fight for in sharp focus behind them. Their mountains. Their village. Nature. The stakes of this war could not be clearer. The first word that comes to mind when looking at Radegund is Paradise — and what is Paradise without righteous inhabitants?
In capturing Radegund’s natural beauty on a vivid, widescreen frame, Malick provides devastating contrast with the historical 4:3, black & white footage he inserts of Hitler and his Reich, their trains and their warplanes, a much narrower window which feels blinkered by comparison. The wide lens, like the omniscient child, sees all — and it sees more than evil men who seek to destroy.
The crux of the story, embodied by juxtapositions between the natural and the mechanical, and battles between light and dark, is whether Franz’s actions will matter at all. Various characters sent to convince him to swear loyalty to Hitler lay it out plainly: His solitary protest will have no immediate, tangible impact, and will only make room for someone far more willing to kill for the Reich. However, the way Malick captures the past, its details, and even its villains tells a different story. If Franz’s actions don’t matter, there would be no need for Malick’s many montages of faceless prison guards trying to convince him to change his stance. The film takes its name from George Eliot’s book Middlemarch, in which he says: “For the good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”
The Past Looking Back at Us
Where The Tree of Life was Malick looking back at the past, A Hidden Life is the past looking back at us; something, perhaps God, observing us, as violent extremism takes hold once more, asking us what unhistoric sacrifices we might make in order to preserve history. Malick seems to comment on his search through the character of Ohlendorf (Johan Leysen), the chapel painter from whom Franz seeks advice. His mission is to use art — specifically, art about Christ’s suffering — to remind people of the horrors he fought, rather than painting a palatable, peaceful Christ with a halo to comfort them. “Someday I’ll paint a true Christ,” Ohlendorf says, searching the past for some fundamental, unspoken truth about how to be righteous.
It’s sadly fitting that two great actors in the film, Michael Nyqvist and Bruno Ganz, passed before its release, but their presence makes the story feel all the more like a plea from a bygone era. Nyqvist plays a bishop to whom Franz appeals, but his own fears of being outed as an objector prevent him from helping; Franz’s fate can, in theory, be traced to the bishop’s actions, or lack thereof. Meanwhile Ganz, who fittingly played Hitler in Downfall, plays a Nazi judge who sentences Franz. Both characters are participants in an evil machine (passively, and actively), but Malick’s interest lies not in their actions as they’re perceived in the present, but in how history might judge them — and has.
Both men fear judgement — Ganz’s character, recognizing Franz’s spirit, asks him: “Do you judge me?” — but neither is willing to act on whatever morality, whatever regrets, whatever rebellious spirit might lie beneath their masks. Their faces are rankled by guilt. Nyqvist’s bishop simply walks towards a window to avoids Franz’s gaze. Ganz’s judge sits down and stares at his aged hands, accepting the weight of his actions and his place in history. Their judgement is worse than Franz’s, or even God’s; they’re left to judge themselves.
Judgement is, ultimately, what A Hidden Life is about. It’s about being judged by a higher power, whether an external deity or something deep within ourselves, and the ways in which we mold this power. We create it in our own image, corrupt it, influence it, like a child that learns from its surroundings — and Malick’s camera embodies those parts of ourselves, and our beliefs, most in need of nurturing.
