Customer Reviews

Ordet [VHS]

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one of the most spiritual and uplifting films of all time. It is shot in the same, sparce, beautiful manner that Carl Dreyer employs in so many of his films. There are long lingering camera shots that allow us to look at a person as we might in real life...not like many Hollywood films where the camera angle jumps about every other second.

The story is a kind of Danish "Romeo and Juliet" about two families divided by religion. However, "Ordet" never becomes a tragedy, because of a miracle. Do you believe in miracles? How about the miracle of forgiveness and how it heals human relationships? This is a film to teach us all about that.

This film deserves 10 stars. Both in direction & the cinematography we are dealing with one of the greatest masters in the history of cinema, Carl Theodor Dreyer, a cinematic giant. Every film by Dreyer is a masterwork, but my favorite of all his films is ORDET (meaning The Word in Danish). This film might also have been titled THE MIRACLE. The acting is perfect, understated, naturalistic, without any thespian hystrionics or typical soupy music to pump up the scenes. Religious delusion can be viewed by some as great faith, and great faith can be viewed by others as religious delusion, & this film asks you which of these two views is what is happening. What is a miracle? Is it something special that only Christ or God or a Buddha can effect, or is it something which can happen at any time going against the laws of nature? This film opens such questions. The black and white imagery is not a lessening of the effect, but a heightening of the effect, for if this film had been in colour it would have lost something essential from its strong mysterious message. This film deals with bigotry and religious prejudice, as well as forgiveness and trust, but it never preaches, instead it opens the heart of the view to the profound mystery of Life & Death. It has the perfect inexorability of fate like a play by Euripides or Sophocles. On DVD or on tape, this is a film which anyone who loves the art of film must have. This is one of those films you cannot do without in your personal film library. I also recommend DAY OF WRATH and JOAN OF ARC by Carl Dreyer.

"It was Soren Kierkegaard." Mikkel Borgen

It's refreshing to view a film that not only has religous faith as its subject, but also has the insight to grasp the crux of belief and the fervour it generates. 'Ordet' displays faith and all its flaws, but in the end, you may find your faith revived, or you may just find faith. 'Ordet' is that powerful.

The plot rehashes the 'Romeo and Juliet' archetype, with two lovers bordering fundumental fences. Their fathers don't see eye to eye on religious views. There are a few other major characters, most notable being the reincarnation of Jesus.

While all the characters are quite round and easy to sympathize with, their rudimentary fuction is to allow Dreyer to ponder faith and its paradoxes. The film is basically all talk with very little action, which may be one of Dreyer's points. The characters argue about what constitutes faith, but you get the feeling that they find opposing arguments hollow. Only in the film's final scenes does any real "action" occur, when everyone stops arguing and turns the other cheek.

Perhaps only Dreyer's own 'The Passion of Joan of Arc' is a stronger meditation on the subject of faith. Whatever your denomination, 'Ordet' probably covers you. The film's strength lies in its presentation of religous ideals, and the conflicts which can arise from those ideals. Religious faith, like any other ideal, has the tendency to make people stubborn, in that only one ideal can exist. At the end of the film, Dreyer also seems to believe that only one ideal exists, one that requires a tremendous leap of faith.

This movie is a classic and one of the best movies that I have ever seen. And I'm talking about a movie in Danish with English subtitles, something that my husband would usually not watch. But we did watch it one late night on TCM and we both knew that we needed to own this piece of art.
This movie works on several levels. At the core of its heart are themes of love, loss, confusion, doubt, anger, reconciliation, and ultimately, redemption. You may have seen these qualities portrayed in film before, but you've not seen them portrayed like this. Dreyer's approach is to introduce us to characters so fully developed that we completely identify with each of them and what their differing views represent. He then throws us into a situation where we feel there can only be one outcome, and whether or not we agree with the conclusion, we exit having been forever challenged and potentially changed.

'The Word/Ordet' provides various testimonies regarding religious faith though I reckon the wrestling that occurs is, of itself, made unintentionally comical by contemporary demands for versimultude. Particularly the possessed son and the stiffened fathers of the families are so stilted that their grinding earnesty had me chuckling on the couch. The cinematography is excellent. The slow wandering camera is particularly evocative of the group portraiture and interiors from C17th Dutch painting. The few moments when Dreyer takes us out of his anti-sceptic interiors possess a refined sensuality. The script is challenging and will retain its relevance into the forseeable future. But those men, I suspect, whose own interiority we gain no access to, will recede.

"Ordet" is one of those incredible foreign films that are such a startling contrast to the films of Hollywood that they make you think of all the possibilities inherent in the medium of film that most moviegoers miss out on. It is, in fact, one of the greatest religious movies ever made. "Ordet" means "The Word," and "Ordet" can be viewed an exposition of what "The Word" (Jesus Christ) is supposed to mean to individuals and their lives.

"Ordet" centers primarily on the Borgen family, especially the elderly father (Morten), who has to contend with questions concerning the true nature of Christianity. One of his sons (John, or Johannes) has gone crazy through too much theological study and speaks with the words and authority of Jesus Christ throughout the film. What are the family members to make of one who is crazy, but crazy like a living prophet in their midst? Another son, Anders, desires to marry someone from a group in the community with a different view of Christianity (as well as part of a family with whom Morten is feuding). A third son, Mikkel, is without faith, although he's married to a woman full of faith and who is in many ways, along with John, the spiritual center of the film (Inger).

Morten wrestles not only with disappointments in his sons but also with his own lack of faith to some degree. He has genuine faith throughout, but often doubts and often has little zeal for God. In fact, the theme of lukewarm Christianity versus a stronger, more faithful Christianity is a major theme throughout "Ordet."

Throughout the movie, spiritual questions and truth are conveyed in a way that Hollywood has seemed incapable of producing, even in an earlier era. The black and white is not only beautiful but also entirely appropriate for the condition of the church and culture in Denmark. While the slow pace and lack of dramatic cues (such as insistent music or quick cuts) will seem boring to most American moviegoers, "Ordet" allows for a more leisurely and thoughtful examination of the meaning of life than almost any American movie. Throughout, "Ordet" is a powerful film that challenges but also edifies the viewer.

Dreyer's masterful control of the film extends to his wonderful choice of casting. This is especially true for Birgitte Federspiel, who played Inger, the daughter-in-law, who helps hold things in the family together and who is at the center of the events of the movie. When Dreyer hired her, she was already pregnant in real life, which adds authenticity to the film. What's more, Dreyer sent a sound technician out to record the actual sounds of Federspiel's own labor and delivery to use in the film!

Favorite line: When there is a discussion of how John (Johannes) went mad, the parson is told by Mikkel:
"No. Something happened."
"Was it... a love affair?" the parson asks.
The answer is priceless: "No, no. It was Søren Kierkegaard."

This is especially humorous to me, since my father loves Kierkegaard and has written a book on him! Actually, after viewing Ordet and witnessing how dismal the Christianity there could be, one begins to understand what Kierkegaard was trying to say.

"Ordet" and Dreyer's "The Passion of Joan of Arc" rank as two of the greatest religious movies ever made.

Ordet (Carl Theodor Dreyer, 1955)

I've been working my way through the hundred best films of all time, as reported by the extensive collection of critical surveys compiled at They Shoot Pictures, Don't They?. And for the most part, I've found those films to be, if not all great, at least very good. Every once in a while, though, I come upon one where either I'm just not getting what all the fuss is about, or the film's aged so badly--and one wonders how relevant it was in the first place--that it simply doesn't hold up however many years later it is now. I'm not sure into which of those two categories Ordet falls, but it's definitely one of them.

Ordet focuses on a Swedish family in the early part of this century, all of whom are suffering various religious neuroses; one brother is an agnostic, one believes he's Jesus, and a third has fallen for the daughter of a fundamentalist whose beliefs are considered dangerous by the clan patriarch. From this point of view, the film is arguably even more relevant today than it was when it debuted fifty years ago. The problem with it is that Dreyer seems to have forgotten everything he learned about pace and tension while directing such immortal movies as The Passion of Joan of Arc and Vampyr. Ordet just kind of wanders along, seeing its point in the distance but in no hurry to get us to it; this wouldn't be a bad thing if the characters were a bit more interesting, but to a one, they play to their roles, never doing anything to make us wonder if they're more than cardboard cutouts. I have to disagree with the vast body of critics on this one; of the Dreyer films I've seen, Ordet ranks quite comfortably at the bottom of the pile, and it's one I won't be returning to any time soon. **

This great film from Danish director Carl Dreyer is about a family in which the eldest son's wife, Inger, is about to give birth to their third child. The second son, Johannes, has gone mad from studying Kierkegaard too intensely and now believes himself to be the living Christ. The third son, Anders, is in love with a tailor's daughter, but has been forbidden to marry her on the grounds that he doesn't come from a religious family. Presiding over all this is the patriarch, Morten Borgen, whose rendering by actor Henrik Malberg is surely one of the greatest portrayals of old age on film. Though slow moving, the film offers several surprises that raise the story to the level of parable. Well acted throughout and beautifully photographed in a way that makes light itself a character in the unfolding drama. Most highly recommended.

After watching this movie last night on TMC (2AM), i am so glad i did. This Movie will have you soul searching about your faith, and the idea of organized religion. Even though it has english sub-titles it did not take away from the emotional roller-coaster it sent me on. And then to think about the priest that wrote the movie in 1932 Denmark, before the war and then was later executed by the Gustapo because of his outward protest against German occupation during the war.
The Ending made me question why we are not doing the same miracles Jesus did over 2000 years ago, he said we could if only we have faith.
I really enjoyed this movie,