Silent Light / Stellet Licht (Film)

DVD Cover for Silent Light, Scene of Marianne About to Visit Esther. (Canada released DVD cover picture)
Image: Courtesy of Victor Wiebe.

Introduction

Silent Light: original Spanish title: Luz Silenciosa; Low German (Plautdietsch) language title Stellet Licht, is a colour, 35 mm Mexican film, distributed by Palisades Tartan, released 22 May 2007, 136 minutes long. It was directed, written and produced by Carlos Reygadas and also released in DVD. It was filmed in the Mennonite colony in Cuauhtémoc, Chihuahua State, northern Mexico. It has subtitles in English, French, Spanish and other languages. All the actors are nonprofessional and Mennonite with only the Canadian novelist Miriam Toews being well known. Toews, with a strong Kleine Gemeinde Mennonite background used her knowledge as a successful author and experience in acting in Silent Light to structure film making into her 2011 novel Irma Voth (Toronto, Knopf Canada). The IMDB database (https://www.imdb.com) in 2023 notes Silent Light has won 30 international film awards including winning the 2007 Cannes Film Festival Jury Prize and in Mexico winning the 2008 Golden Ariel awarded best picture in Mexico. In addition New York Times lists Silent Light and one of "The 25 Best Films of the 21st Century So Far".

The director, Carlos Reygadas, is a very prominent and internationally recognized Mexican filmmaker. Silent Light was his fourth film. His films are concerned with a metaphysical dimension and feature spiritual journeys into the inner worlds of his main characters, through which themes of love, suffering, death, and life's meaning are explored. Film critics comment that Silent Light shows several similarities to the 1955 film Ordet by Danish director Carl Dreyer.

The Setting

Stellet Nicht is a somber and thoughtful film about a good man, Johan (played by Cornelio Wall Fehr) transfixed by love to a business woman, Marianne, (María Pankratz) which causes him to betray his faithful and loving wife, Esther (Miriam Toews). All three are unhappy and in pain. This is a thought provoking film with real Mennonites but not a happy one though it is beautifully filmed. The word "Mennonite" is never mentioned, there is no preaching or church services or pious displays and the characters seem to act from their hearts and not simply their teachings. The dialogue is clear and rather unemotional and the use of Plautdietsch can sound a little crude translated into English. There is no musical sound tract. The settings of home, farm, family and costumes seem very authentic as Mexican Mennonite, including the blond, blue eyed happy children. Reygadas style of filming is slow, gentle with long beautiful sequences as an example the opening scene begins in silence, is about six minutes of a tracking shot of starry sky becoming a beautiful bright noisy rural sunrise and it closes with a similar twilight merging into the night silence. However, moving from scene to scene can be puzzling. The scene of Johan confessing infidelity to his father is set in winter in Mexico with an amazing snow covering on the farm and this is followed with a scene of Esther driving a corn harvesting tractor. In reality there would have been eight- or nine-months time elapsed between the two scenes. As a warning the film shows an eloquent filming of the last sexual encounter between Johan and Marianne with high and close up camera angles. Silent Light shuns away from frontal nudity and sexual explicitness but the emphasis is on the sins of the flesh. The filmmaker, Reygadas has a reputation of making art films that are expressionistic with emotionally charged stories as is this one. Giving the world a film that depicts Mexico as place of Mennonites speaking Low Germans with deeply held Christian values that they try to keep yet not as zealots gives viewers a complex understanding of conservative Mennonites, Mexico and of the value of film.

Plot

After the opening sunrise we see Johan, Esther, and their children sit silently at breakfast prayer. Then most of the family leave except for Johan who stops the wall clock and begins crying. Next Johan goes to a friend to get a repaired tractor part and tells him that he is having an affair with a woman by the name of Marianne and he makes it clear that his wife knows about this affair. Johan leaves after an interesting circular drive, meets Marianne in afield and they kiss. This is followed by the family playing in a riverbank pool with the parents washing a child and Esther unhappy. Next its winter and John discussed his affair with his father who warns him that it "is the work of the enemy" followed by the corn harvesting. Marianne and John now meet for sex and Marianne expresses concern for Esther. Johan’s children watch TV in a van.

Johan and Esther are driving in a heavy rain down a rural road and Esther confronts Johan over Marianne then flees the car and begins crying then beside a tree she dies. Johan is devastated. A doctor later ascribes it to “Coronary Trama.” At home Esther is put in a coffin, the extended family and friends meet and sing. Marianne arrives and alone visits Esther. There she very slowly kisses Esther on the lips, and drops a tear on her cheek. After some time, Esther opens her eyes. Their young daughters visit their mother, Esther and tells Johan "Mum wants to see him." Marianne leaves silently. The sunset scene ends the film.

Bibliography

Ebert, Roger, "The Agony of True Love" 18 March 2009, [Review of Silent Light]. https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/silent-light-2009

"Irma Voth". Wikipedia. https: //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irma_Voth

Janzen, Rebecca. “Small Signs of Pluralism in Mexico: Identification Cards and Other Images of the Low German Mennonites.” 2016 C. Henry Smith Peace Lecture at Bluffton College. https://canadianmennonite.org/stories/janzen-explores-mennonite-representation-mexican-culture. [In this lecture Janzen comments that: "Silent Light inaccurately portrays Low German Mennonite dress, customs and ways."]

Johnson, Reed. “Carlos Reygadas’ films search for authenticity beyond reality.” Los Angeles Times. 24 April 2009: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-silent24-2009apr24-story.html

Johnson, William. “Between Daylight and Darkness: Forever and Silent Light.” Film Quarterly. Spring 2008; vol. 61, no.3, pp. 18-23.

Manickam, Sam. “The Other Mexico through the Eyes of Carlos Reygadas [on Silent Light].” Journal of the Center for Mennonite Writing (January 2013). https://mennonitewriting.org/journal/5/1/other-mexico-through-cinematic-eyes-carlos-reygada/

New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/09/movies/the-25-best-films-of-the-21st-century.html

Author(s)	Victor G Wiebe
Date Published	November 2023

Cite This Article

MLA style

Wiebe, Victor G. "Silent Light / Stellet Licht (Film)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. November 2023. Web. 24 Nov 2024. https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Silent_Light_/_Stellet_Licht_(Film)&oldid=177869.

APA style

Wiebe, Victor G. (November 2023). Silent Light / Stellet Licht (Film). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 24 November 2024, from https://gameo.org/index.php?title=Silent_Light_/_Stellet_Licht_(Film)&oldid=177869.

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