David Clarkson- Film as Midrash

February 18, 2016

Krzysztof Kieslowski's hermeneutic style of making films is demonstrated in his series, The Decalogue. To start, these two films were relatively hard to watch because of the immense violence and tragedy that was demonstrated in the two films, which were written in defense of two of the ten commandments: Thou shall have no other Gods before Me, and Thou shall not kill. The happenings were real life events that could occur, and do occur everyday. In the first film, the father sees the computer and calculations as the God of his life. All his decisions are based on rationality and reason. There is nothing he does out of pure faith or emotion, as everything is calculated and comfortable to him. Things change quickly for the worse for him, as his son falls through the "frozen" lake to his death, after his calculations deemed it was safe for his son to go skating. The trust the father had put into calculation and reason completely breaks into shambles, as his beloved son is now dead because of his failure. To me, the message the director is making is clear- It is detrimental to put other Gods before the one true God. Some questions I had were, did the man sitting by the fire kill his son? Or did he just fail to save him? And what about the computer, was God speaking to him or mocking him through the device?

In the second film we experience and extremely violent murder carried out by a troubled young man. There is not doubt that this young man was wrestling with his life, as he seemed like a lost outcast to society. Scarred by the part he played in the death of his sister, the young man has had a troubled and complicated past. Clearly, he is planning to do something, something that he believes he HAS to do. Soon, we are able to begin to piece together his plan, and soon enough he strangles and beats a random taxi driver to death. This murder leads to his death, as he is hanged for his actions. Again, to me the message the director is attempting to make is clear: Killing a human will only lead you to death and despair. Some questions I had were, Why didn't he try to run and hide after murdering the taxi driver? How and Why did he believe that this action would rectify his past shortcomings?