Movie Review: Bakhita: From Slave to Saint

Date: 2009

Director: Giacamo Campiotti

Summary: Bakhita has a good life in Sudan until she is captured by slave traders.  She grows to womanhood in captivity until her life changes again when Federico Marin – a Venetian merchant – brings her home to Italy.  Though legally free, Bakhita works as a slave in Marin’s household, suffering physical and verbal abuse from her “master” and superstitious hatred from the other villagers.  But she finds joy in Marin’s daughter, Aurora, and in the Christian faith she has never heard of before.  When Bakhita decides to claim the freedom she deserves – the freedom to shape her own life and to serve God as she chooses – she challenges her neighbors and her adopted family to open their hearts to God and to the dignity of all humanity.

Review: This film is based on the story of St. Josephine Bakhita, who lived during the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries and was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2000.  Though many of the basic facts of the saint’s life are present in the movie, the filmmakers were not attempting to make a biography and they took a considerable amount of creative license.  The result is a truly moving film that captures the heart of Bakhita’s story.

The movie addresses several meaningful themes.  The more prominent ones are racism and slavery, but there is a larger social justice aspect that involves a money-minded Marin and his struggling tenant farmers.  Just as powerful is the story of the parish priest, who finally finds his courage to be a true disciple of Christ when he chooses to fight for Bakhita.

Bakhita is the true center of the story, however.  One of the most remarkable features of her character is her sense of joy.  Even when she has no friends, no kind words from anyone, she is the only one singing.  She is the one who cares for Aurora out of love, and not duty.  She has a quiet confidence that seems impossible to shake.  She is so used to people abusing her that she is no longer afraid of it.  She doesn’t exactly accept that she’s a slave – since she does eventually fight for her freedom – but she is clearly unimpressed by threats.  When she hears the story of Christ’s sacrifice and love for the first time, she silently challenges the rest of us to see it as clearly and as simply, and to follow his example as powerfully as she did.

Note: The audio for this film is in Italian.  English subtitles are available. 

Movie Review: Brother Sun, Sister Moon

Date: 1972
Director: Franco Zeffirelli

Summary: Francis returns to his home of Assisi after contracting a fever in the army.  He experiences a religious conversion that inspires him to reject the lavish lifestyle of his family and attempt to draw closer to God through nature and poverty.    His newfound joy attracts many of the city's youth to him, but the powerful of Assisi resent the rebuke to their materialism and vow to stop Francis at any cost.

Review: Brother Sun, Sister Moon is a cinematic masterpiece that attempts to transfer to the viewers some of the quiet joy St. Francis experienced through God's presence in nature.  Gorgeous photography, sweeping scenes of fields of flowers and snowy mountains, moments of silence and moments of song all combine to present the story of St. Francis with a beauty so powerful that it can touch hearts even if some find it a little hokey.

I admit that when the film began, I did not react favorably.  Some factors such as costuming or even the soundtrack may prove jarring to a more modern audience.  We are, after all, accustomed to art that makes us forget it is art and invites us to live within its story line.  Here, however, the gaudy outfits never let viewers forget their nature as costumes and the soundtrack seems like it belongs on a flashback to the 60s CD.  Initially I had expected the type of music St. Francis might have heard, but clearly Zeffirelli's concerns lie less in maintaining historical accuracy than in using art to make a statement about his culture: the music draws parallels between St. Francis's love of nature and the environmental movement of the 60s.

I might have accepted these issues, but the portrayal of St. Francis also surprised me.  I have always imagined St. Francis as a fearless man of action, a man whose deciveness and passion shocked a nation.  This is after, all the man who tore off his clothes before the bishop and the town in order to announce his desire to live in poverty for the glory of the Lord.  Zeffirelli's interpretation, however, shows a quieter, more introspective man.  Perhaps he wanted audiences to feel like the inhabitants of Assisi.  Perhaps he wanted audiences to question, like the characters, whether St. Francis wasn't quite simply made.  Ultimately, however,  I think some of the problems I had with the portrayal lies in the impossibility of expressing or illustrating the presence of God.

Every saint movie I have ever seen relies on silence to convey the presence of God within a person.  And why not?  God's presence is ineffable. However, when I think on the people in my life in whom I have distinctly felt the presence of God,  I don't recall them serenely staring off into the distance smiling to themselves or looking past me when I talk because they're just so in love with the Lord they can't see me.  I think that when a person is in tune with God, they become more present to those around them--not less so.  Thus, I had trouble accepting a portrayal of St. Francis in which he ignored people when they spoke to him.  I accepted him only when I saw the camaraderie he had with his brothers and the service he extended to the poor and afflicted.  St. Francis only became real when he connected with the world around him.

The heart of the film lies in that--lies in the presence of St. Francis in Italy.  He was a real man who walked on real soil and managed to transform the way people understood religion and spirituality.  He continues to inspire countless people today.  And why?  Because if an ordinary man like him could do something so extraordinary, it means that all of us have the potential to become saints.  Brother Sun, Sister Moon shines brightest when it shows St. Francis looking into the eyes of the people around him and reminding them that God desires them.

Movie Review: Les Misérables

Date: 2012

Director: Tom Hooper

Summary: After serving nineteen years of a prison sentence, Jean Valjean gains his freedom, but the papers he carries identify him as a criminal and he cannot find enough work to survive.  Bitter and angry, he determines to live like the criminal people think he is, but a chance encounter transforms his life.  Now a man of God, Valjean adopts the orphan of a dying woman and raises her as his own.  A student revolution, however, brews in the streets of Paris and soon nothing will be the same.

Review: Tom Hooper’s Les Misérables gained a lot of early buzz because the actors sang live on camera, rather than prerecording their songs.  This technique provides to the film a realism sometimes lacking in screen musicals.  Awareness of lip-syncing does not detract from the story; the characters seem to live and breathe onscreen.  However, the actors still had to compete with all the singers who have portrayed the characters of Les Misérables throughout the years.  Colm Wilkinson, for example, has made the role of Jean Valjean his own—how would Hugh Jackman compare?  Although some of the performances were not as strong as they might have been, overall the cast provides an emotionally charged rendition of Les Misérables.

Anne Hathaway stands out from the rest of the cast with her stirring portrayal of Fantine, the woman forced to sell her body order to provide for her young daughter.  Her rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” generated early talk of an Oscar nomination; rather than belt out the song, Hathaway chose to sing it with a broken voice, reflecting how emotionally and psychologically bruised her character feels.  Both this song and her death scene, in which Fantine hallucinates the presence of her daughter Cosette, brought tears to my eyes.  Hathaway has a gorgeous voice and it was a pure delight to listen to her sing.

My only complaint about Fantine lies with the costuming.  She initially dresses in pink, even though everyone else in her workplace wears more somber attire.  Presumably the costume designer wanted Fantine to look conspicuous so audiences could pick her out, but Fantine should thematically function as simply another face in the crowd.  She also had gorgeous hair, unlike every other woman in the room.  The effect made it seem as though Fantine must have more money than the rest of the workers, which is simply not true, as subsequent events will prove. 

The rest of the characters seemed to wear more appropriate costuming—most notably Éponine, who at one point dresses as a boy.  I have only seen concert versions of the musical, in which audiences must accept that wearing a long coat makes a girl indistinguishable from a male.  In the film, Éponine actually binds her breasts and hides her hair under her cap, presenting a much more realistic disguise.  I also really liked her dresses; though poor, Éponine knows how to accentuate with a nice belt.

Though Samantha Barks, being relatively unknown compared to the rest of the cast, received little attention before the release of the film, her portrayal of Éponine is my favorite.  She performed the role in the 25^th anniversary concert and made it her own.  She brings to the character a charming wistfulness that makes her story all the more poignant.  It seems remarkable that one who has seen so much poverty and so much wrong could maintain the hopeful outlook she has on life.  She also retains a beautiful soul, sacrificing her own feelings for the man she loves.  Hooper’s version unfortunately changes this part, however—Éponine no longer delivers Marius’s letter to Cosette, but makes a different sacrifice, one that I would argue is infinitely less moving and even suggests a certain despair.  Regardless of what her character does, however, Samantha Barks shines.  I really hope that this film proves her big break and that audiences will see—and hear—a lot more of her in the future.

If the changes made to Éponine were not well-advised, those made to Marius certainly were.  Eddie Redmayne’s interpretation of the character brings him to life in a way I have never envisioned.  No longer merely a boy hopelessly mooning over a girl he bumped into on the street, Marius shows himself a dedicated revolutionary full of fire and prepared to make sacrifices so that he does not live off the work of others.  Perhaps for the first time, I really liked Marius.  His interactions with the rest of the students are especially nice.  They share a great camaraderie and I could really believe Aaron Tveit as a friend of the boys—not merely a manic revolutionary.

The rest of the cast did well, but I felt that their performances were not as strong as the others’.  Even though Hugh Jackman has received a Golden Globe nomination for best actor, I just do not like him as Jean Valjean when I compare him to singers like Colm Wilkinson and Alfie Boe.  Russell Crowe as Javert seems too emotionless to me.  Perhaps he meant to interpret the character in that way—it would be an appropriate reflection of Javert’s too strict devotion to duty—but I find it hard to believe a man could sustain a manhunt for something like eighteen or nineteen years without feeling some passion.  Amanda Seyfried as Cosette perhaps had a disadvantage from the start as her character has little development and functions mainly as a convenient love interest.  She does little to bring more personality to the role, however, and her voice in the beginning seems weak, though her performance improves by the end. 

To criticize the singing of Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen as the Thénardiers may be unjust.  Baron Cohen sings well, so far as I know, but I do not feel that he brings anything special to the role.  Bonham Carter seems a little weak on the vocals at times, but whether she intends to sound that way remains unclear.  Mostly likely the two were not chosen for their singing, but to bring a certain comedic over-theatricality to their roles.  I suppose they were successful in that, but their outlandish costumes and the illogicality of their business operations distracted me from their performances most of the time.

My final criticism of the film deals not with performances, but with the background on which they were set.  Hooper provides some lovely and some realistic settings for his characters; my favorites are the bishop’s house and the convent, where audiences can see some beautiful Christian art.  However, the film is too self-aware of its own epic potential and when Hooper tries to zoom out to give a large-scale depiction of France, the CGI becomes unbelievable.  The story of suffering individuals is a large and epic story in itself; if the film had focused on that, instead of trying to impress viewers with its own magnitude, it would have been more successful.

Despite some weak performances, however, the film as a whole proves a strong version of a classic musical.  Memorable and stirring performance are given by many of the actors, and the screen brings France to life in a way that the stage cannot.  Beauty, suffering, passion, and pride combine to present a story that will always be relevant: a story about the transformative power of love.

Content Note: Les Misérables deals with a lot of heavy themes, including the toll poverty, imprisonment, and unjust laws have on people.  One character turns to prostitution to survive and the film includes some sexual activity.  Violence is also depicted, as part of the story is set during the Paris Uprising of 1832.

Movie Review: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Date: 2012

Director: Peter Jackson

Summary: When the wizard Gandalf knocks on his door, the very unadventurous Bilbo Baggins finds himself on a journey to reclaim the stolen gold of a band of Dwarves.  The first in a trilogy.

Review: Despite the changes Peter Jackson’s film made to the source material, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey managed to hit nearly all the right notes.  It deftly balanced the demands to create a work emotionally consistent with the previous Lord of the Rings trilogy while creating something new and exciting.  A cast composed of both old and new characters helped to bridge the trilogies, as did the return to many familiar (and beautiful) landscapes.  Seeing the Shire again felt like coming home after a decade.  The visual appeal of the film as well as the many talented actors involved made An Unexpected Journey into an exciting and heartwarming adventure.  Still, an exploration of the changes made can still prove a worthwhile endeavor.

Although Jackson made major character changes to Faramir, Treebeard, and Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the characters of The Hobbit remain largely as Tolkien wrote them.  The most notable change was probably made to the Dwarves as a whole.  For most of the story, Tolkien depicts the Dwarves as more concerned about themselves and their gold than about Bilbo—or anyone else.  As a result, they can come across as stubborn, petty, and even a tad callous at times, despite the author’s assurance that they really would help Bilbo if he needed it.  Furthermore, the group as a whole seems almost completely unprepared for the quest on which they embark.  They have no long-term plan that will enable them to retrieve their gold and they consistently fail to make short-term plans, resulting in their continued imminent demise.  The Dwarves as a whole thus tend to look a bit ridiculous—or at least they end up in ridiculous situations.

Jackson notes the lighter tone of The Hobbit and takes care to add humor to his story, though his jokes tend to rely on a crude sort of humor rather than the sophisticated underlying irony of Tolkien’s story.  He cannot use this irony, however, because of the fundamental changes made to the Dwarves: his Dwarves are warriors, noble, strong, loyal, and willing to fight. Unlike the Dwarves of Tolkien’s story, they do not find themselves in trouble because they make foolish decisions.  Rather, they enter almost every fight swinging their swords with triumphant music swelling behind them, and find themselves in trouble simply because they are outnumbered or outmaneuvered.  Jackson really wants audiences to feel for these Dwarves and to cheer them on.  Thus, he does not risk making them look foolish.

This change arguably makes sense from a narrative standpoint, as do the changes made to Bilbo’s character.  The changes to Bilbo may seem subtle, but they are important.  Jackson’s Bilbo takes more of an initiative on his journey from the very beginning, when he runs out his front door on his own volition, rather than on the prompting of Gandalf.  He also takes over some of Gandalf’s roles in various situations when attempting to rescue the Dwarves.  Whereas Tolkien’s Bilbo will not really come into his own until he fights the giant spiders, Jackson’s Bilbo consistently does small things to assert his importance to the group.  Again, Jackson wants to prove to audiences that they should care about this Hobbit.

Arguably, however, Jackson would not have needed to give Bilbo larger roles at the beginning of the story if he had stuck to Tolkien’s story.  Jackson’s current contributions to The Hobbit are mostly composed of extended (and, I would suggest, unnecessary) fight scenes.  These bloated the movie to such an extent that Jackson could not reach the stopping point I might have suggested if he produced only two films: the Mirkwood spiders.  If Jackson had could have shown this scene at the end of movie one, he could have adhered to Tolkien’s more subtle character arc.  Bilbo would have begun the film a fearful Baggins, but ended it with two important victories: escaping the goblin caves by himself and using Sting for the first time.  Because this proved impossible with a three-film structure, Jackson had to invent Bilbo’s introduction to combat—a rather confusing fight with random orcs (one of whom should, in Tolkien’s timeline, already be dead). 

Why Jackson added the extended fight scenes as well as the vengeful stalker orc Azog I cannot fathom.  The book does not lack for action.  Indeed, it is composed of a series of episodes that form a narrative of non-stop hair-breadth escapes for the Dwarves and Bilbo.  It is possible to have excitement without the violence of combat.  These changes still worked for the story that Jackson made, but I feel I have to protest them on the grounds that they were only added because of some belief that Jackson could tell a better story than Tolkien.

Even so, the film did a lot of things right.  The cast was extraordinary, especially Martin Freeman, Andy Serkis, and Richard Armitage.  The landscapes were gorgeous and I would have paid money just to have a camera tour of Middle-earth without showing and Dwarves or Hobbits or Elves at all.  Most importantly, however, the film kept the message at the heart of the story: the lesson that “small” acts and “small” people are not small at all.  Gandalf summed it up eloquently in the film, responding to Galadriel’s question: “Why the Halfling?”:

Saruman believes it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found.  I have found it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay…small acts of kindness and love.  Why Bilbo Baggins?  That’s because I am afraid and it gives me courage.

Simply beautiful.

Les Misérables in Concert: The 25th Anniversary

Date: 2010

Cast: Alfie Boe (Jean Valjean)

Norm Lewis (Javert)

Lea Salonga (Fantine)

Nick Jonas (Marius)

Katie Hall (Cosette)

Samantha Barks (Éponine)

Matt Lucas (Thénardier)

Jenny Galloway (Madame Thénardier)

Ramin Karimloo (Enjorlas)

Earl Carpenter (the Bishop of Digne)

Summary: After serving nineteen years of a prison sentence, Jean Valjean breaks parole so that he can find work and survive.  Initially he determines to act like the convict society treats him as, but the kindness of a bishop inspires him to seek redemption for his crimes and live a better life.  As the years pass, he adopts the daughter of a dying woman and raises her as his own.  He hopes to protect her from the outside world, but a revolution is brewing in the streets of Paris.   

Review: Claude-Michel Schönberg and Alain Boublil’s musical adaption of the classic novel by Victor Hugo is an unforgettable experience that brings listeners through a range of emotions from the thrill of revolution to the sorrow of unrequited love.  The story is at once both sweeping and intimate, deftly balancing a scathing social commentary with personal looks at the lives of individuals being shaped by the history taking place around them.  Uplifting, inspiring, beautiful—Les Misérables bears no comparison with other musicals.

Although the 10^th anniversary singers received the nickname the “Dream Cast,” the members of the 25^th anniversary cast make the roles their own.  The three-dimensionality of the characters gives the cast a lot with which they can work, so that Katie Hall manages to bring even to Cosette something that resembles a personality.  In this version, Cosette still functions mainly as a pretty face around whom the other characters revolve, but Hall suggests something almost rebellious in her as she confronts Jean Valjean about his past.  Furthermore, audiences can believe in her love for Marius, sudden as it is.  The other cast members match or even exceed her stellar performance.

Alfie Boe as Jean Valjean actually made me forget Colm Wilkinson.  He lives the role, moving from bitter anger to repentance to petition, and making it all seem natural.  His voice is beautiful and his rendition of “Bring Him Home” as touching as any fan of Les Mis could wish.  He seems genuinely humbled by the enthusiastic reception of this signature solo (the concert is filmed live) and that touch of humanity brings him closer to audiences.  It is a small acknowledgement that he recognizes how beloved the role is to audiences and that he is really there to share with them the experience of Les Mis, and to celebrate it.

Lea Salonga as Fantine is my definitive version of that role.  The emotion she brings to the part gives me chills.  She shone as Éponine in the 10^th anniversary concert, but she has so much more experience now, and it shows. When I watch her, I believe Fantine is real.

Samantha Barks takes on the role of Éponine this time around, and I cannot envision more perfect casting.  Her interpretation of the character has a certain wistful quality that proves absolutely heartbreaking.  The balance of strength and tenderness that her character exhibits leaves me in amazement every time.  Though she has not received much coverage for her appearance in the upcoming film, she is the cast member whom I most want to see.

Only Nick Jonas really disappoints me in this production.  He can sing, but he never makes me believe he really cares about any of the other characters or, indeed, about his own.  I like to think that Marius actually possesses interesting qualities—after all, why else does he plot with revolutionaries—but his inclusion in the musical currently seems inspired by the idea that Cosette, being beautiful, must fall in love with someone.

The phenomenal casting of the 25th anniversary concert brings me back to this version time and again.  Many of these cast members have given what have become for me the definitive portrayals of their characters.  I look forward to the imminent release of the film version of Les Mis, but I know that I will never stop loving this wonderful production.

Movie Review: The Molly Maguires

Date: 1970

Director: Martin Ritt

Summary: Life is hard in the anthracite coal region of 19th-century Pennsylvania, especially for the Irish workers who seem trapped in a hopeless cycle of poverty and dangerous work.  But one group of men – a secret society of Irish Catholics known as the Molly Maguires – has decided to fight back.  Using covert acts of sabotage and assassination, the Mollies terrorize the coal operators and the police who they feel have wronged them for so long.  But now there is an informer among their ranks, and he may prove more dangerous to the Mollies than any coal operator has ever been.

Review:  The Molly Maguires is an interesting movie, from a Catholic perspective, for at least two reasons.  First, it tells a part of our collective history.  And second, it introduces the theme of social justice while showing what can happen in its absence.

Though the story of the Molly Maguires has been part legend from the start and continues to be shrouded in mystery, there is truth in that story that is worth being told.  In the second half of the 19^th century, many Irish Americans lived and worked in coal patch towns.  Poverty and violence were a constant reality and, in the decades following the Civil War, Pennsylvania’s anthracite coal region found itself in the national spotlight when a series of assassinations and other violent acts against coal authorities were attributed to a secret society of Catholic Irishmen.  Detectives got involved, and in the end several men hanged for it.

The movie, necessarily, states as fact some things that might not be true.  It names the Mollies and their motives while fully analyzing the perspective of the man – an Irish Catholic himself – who agreed to find the Mollies and set them up for arrest and execution.  Though the writer and director had to take some creative license with history, they reach to the core of some very real themes that are as relevant today as they were in the 1870s.  Viewers are led to sympathize with the grievances of the Mollies, but they cannot endorse murder as an appropriate response.  They struggle with one character’s comment that this fight is like a war, and have to wonder if the rules of war could apply to this situation, with some “soldiers” drawn reluctantly into battle by the simple nature of their job title or ethnicity.  They have to look at the character of McParlan – the informer – and decide if he is more or less guilty than the Mollies.  Is he justified to turn in the assassins?  What if he admits that he does it not in the name of justice, but because it is his chosen way to find a better position in society?  Is anyone in the story wholly innocent?  Is anyone entirely guilty?  If there is a blameless course of action, what can it be?

Though some historians find fault with the factual accuracy of the movie, it powerfully draws attention to the most relevant questions brought up by the Molly Maguire events.  The movie tells a good story, and it does it well.  Furthermore, its cast includes Richard Harris and Sean Connery, so Dumbledore and James Bond unite to share with us this important piece of American Catholic history.

Movie Review: Pope John Paul II

Date: 2005

Director: John Kent Harrison

John Paul II, an inspiring film starring Jon Voight and Cary Elwes, chronicles the life of the late Holy Father and his amazing journey from his struggles as a young adult and priest in Communist Poland to his astoundingly influential papacy.  While many Catholic movies that portray the lives of the saints tend to be of rather poor quality, John Paul II features tremendous acting talent, an excellent script, and a timeless story that will inspire generations to come.

Viewers who are unfamiliar with the life of John Paul II will be surprised to learn that the many struggles John Paul II endured in life served to advance his knowledge of God.  For example, his work in a quarry helped him come to an understanding about the ultimate purposes of work, that work is primarily a means by which a person finds his or her salvation.   When confronted with the malice of Communism, which he described as an “abyss of evil”, he decided that his best response could only be an “abyss of love”.  Thus, it was through the evils of Communism that John Paul II felt called to become a priest.  Once a priest, John Paul II spent much time with young people, and came to develop his theology of the body, or his understanding that sexuality is a reflection of the divine Trinity.  The teachings of John Paul II become much clearer upon learning the key events that comprise his life.

John Paul II is an excellent movie that depicts the journey of a man who, in attempting to follow God’s will and humanity’s universal call to love, becomes one of the most influential popes in history.  Jon Voight inarguably deserves his Emmy nomination for his powerful portrayal of one of the most inspiring individuals of our generation.  

Movie Review: The Diary of Imaculée

Date: 2006

Director: Peter LeDonne

Summary: In April of 1994, the president of Rwanda died when his plane was shot down in Kigali.  His tiny country – already suffering from built-up political and ethnic tension – immediately descended into civil war characterized by the genocide of 800,000 people.  In the small second bathroom of a sympathetic pastor, eight women hid for three months.  One of those women, twenty-four-year old Immaculée Ilibagiza, knew that many of her friends and most of her family were dying.  But she fought to hold on to her faith in God and in her own future, and lived to share her story with those who were willing to listen.

Review: Immaculée’s story is a powerful one.  While the violence of the genocide is horrifying, the world’s response to it sobering, and the young woman’s survival nothing short of miraculous, the most remarkable part of this tale is the faith Immaculée held on to as the world fell apart around her.  In the midst of fear and anger, she was heroically steadfast in her trust in God’s protection and eventually found the forgiveness she knew she would need to have a chance at peace after the violence.

The Diary of Immaculée is not the only medium Immaculée Ilibagiza has used to tell the story of the Rwandan genocide.  She – with the help of author Steve Erwin – has also written the 2006 memoir Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust.  And, in this reviewer’s opinion, you should read the book first.

The book tells the narrative of the Rwandan genocide in a way that can make sense to a reader who has no knowledge of that history, and it tells the narrative of Immaculée’s part in that story.  It describes her family and her friends and traces her spiritual struggle and growth as she fights to survive not just physically, but also emotionally and spiritually, as the violence escalates in the world outside her bathroom.  The film – a short 38-minute documentary – is a good companion to the book.  It shows the beautiful landscape of Rwanda, offers photographs of and interviews with the people described in the book, and traces Immaculée’s footsteps as she goes home to visit the sites of fond memories and nightmares.  But is does not have the same depth as the book, especially in terms of Immaculée’s spiritual journey, and the information conveyed is sometimes out of order and a little difficult to follow.  The film is powerful in its own right – because the images are moving and Immaculée’s voice makes her story more personal – but it is a film that is much more meaningful with its book companion than without it.