Agora (Film Review)
Remember when a few months ago I ranted a bit about how movies about female historic characters put these women's love lives in the centre and treated whatever they were actually famous for - art, fashion, aviation, politics, etc. - as an addendum? Well, good news. Agora, which incidentally I would called Alexandria - it brings that ancient metropolis to glorious visual and character life like no other film or tv show I've ever seen - but which does focus on the philosopher Hypatia, does not do that. I had both hopes and fears for this film based on the trailer; the hopes were fulfilled, the fears proved unfounded, and the overall result is fantastic. And very refreshing, though I doubt the film will be a hit precisely because of all the avoided clichés. It deserves to be, though.
To start with the exterior, the film has gorgeous visuals. There is virtually nothing left of the old Alexandria except for a column and findings now stored in museums, so it must all have been done with computer technology, but I didn't think of that while watching. I was too busy admiring the colours on buildings and statues, and the way everything is steadily more drained of them as Christianity takes over the city. Also the way nothing looks new; the city of the Ptolomies was already many centuries old when Hypatia lived and died.
Secondly, this is a film which makes its characters highly individualistic and distinctive and bothers to flesh them out instead of relying on the audience accepting their presence because hey, it's a historical. In addition to Hypatia herself, about whom more in a minute, there are her students, mainly Orestes (later the prefect) and Synesius (a Christian, later a bishop, though not in Alexandria), her slave Davus, later a recruit among the Paraboli (= cross between fighting thugs and charity helpers among the Christians), the man who recruits him, Ammonius, and the bishop of Alexandria, Cyril. The volatile situation between pagans, Christians and Jews - Alexandria was famous for its riots even before the Christians arrived on the scene - is as tangible from the get go as the beauty of the city and the passion for learning among many of the characters, none more than Hypatia. Perhaps this is one of the biggest achievements: philosophic and scientific research and debate is hard to get across as interesting in the limited space allowed in a movie; what Hypatia loves and creates isn't visual the way, say, paintings would be. And yet the film doesn't just claim she's brilliant, with a questioning mind and a passion for knowledge that is her driving force in life: it shows us this to be the case, through her interactions with everyone else. Hypatia and her students even debate possible solutions to the question as to why there are seasons if Aristarchos is right and the earth circles around the sun instead of the reverse mid-siege of the library. She never stops wondering.
At the same time, the film keeps her human. Given her eventual fate, I was wondering how they'd avoid showing her as too good to be true to be believed. As it turns out, this is where Davus comes in handy. Some advance publicity made me fear we'd get a film mainly about a love triangle - between Hypatia, Davus and Orestes - with some philosophy thrown in. Not so, and not just because while both Orestes and Davus are in love with Hypatia, she isn't romantically interested in either of them. No, they actually fulfill functions in her story that are important for characterisation. While Hypatia turns Orestes down in a drastic fashion, she manages to stay friends with him afterwards; he's a social equal. Davus is her property. She likes him, but, oh miracle in a film about the ancient world, the sympathetic characters aren't automatically enlightened about the injustice and horror of slavery. Hypatia is kind to Davus (and her other slaves), but doesn't even register he might have feelings (good or bad) about her; he's a slave. Standing up for her students to the authorities, trying to let the shared love for knowledge keep them together instead of the increasingly fanatic partisanship drive them apart go hand in hand with her using casual phrases like "otherwise, we might as well be slaves" without noticing the impact they have on Davus and other slaves attending.
The other characters are similarly three-dimensional. Another trap the film avoids is to present any groups as all good or all evil. Violence is used by all sides. The same stone-throwing Christians who club down people with other beliefs and will in the end participate in Hypatia's gruesome fate feed the poor and are ready to risk their lives helping people out of burning buildings. (Davus' storyline often reminded me of current-day fundamentalist terrorists; there is a dissatisfaction, to put it mildly, with his current status in life on the one hand, plus emotional and sexual frustration, and on the other the attraction of a comradery, ready answers and a black and white world view, and power and respect where previously he was powerless.) Orestes, who starts out as your avarage spoiled noble, turns out to have both loyalty (not just to Hypatia, but to his frenemy among the students) and pragmatism, and is not without courage, though in the end, he just hasn't enough; not a bad man, but a weak one. Synesius, who as opposed to the ruthless Cyril genuinenly shares Hypatia's joy of knowledge and both likes and respects her commits perhaps the most devastating betrayal of the film because he does so without hate but for conviction. Ammonius is so strong a believer that he's ready to walk through fire, so fierce a hater that he drags others in it, and enjoys feeding and beating up people with the same zest. They are all very very human, and I never had trouble believing in their reality.
(The only time my suspension of disbelief broke down came during a Jewish/Christian argument when a Rabbi pointed out that Jesus had been a Jew. True, but I doubt a fourth century AD Rabbi would have seen this as a good thing. One line definitely intended for the current day audience and not believable in an ancient world context.)
Acting-wise, the international cast meshed beautifully. Fitting the location of the film, one could say. I just hope it won' t vanish from the cinemas too fast, and will come out on dvd, because one thing I'm sure of, despite the tragedy it ends in: I want to see it again.
To start with the exterior, the film has gorgeous visuals. There is virtually nothing left of the old Alexandria except for a column and findings now stored in museums, so it must all have been done with computer technology, but I didn't think of that while watching. I was too busy admiring the colours on buildings and statues, and the way everything is steadily more drained of them as Christianity takes over the city. Also the way nothing looks new; the city of the Ptolomies was already many centuries old when Hypatia lived and died.
Secondly, this is a film which makes its characters highly individualistic and distinctive and bothers to flesh them out instead of relying on the audience accepting their presence because hey, it's a historical. In addition to Hypatia herself, about whom more in a minute, there are her students, mainly Orestes (later the prefect) and Synesius (a Christian, later a bishop, though not in Alexandria), her slave Davus, later a recruit among the Paraboli (= cross between fighting thugs and charity helpers among the Christians), the man who recruits him, Ammonius, and the bishop of Alexandria, Cyril. The volatile situation between pagans, Christians and Jews - Alexandria was famous for its riots even before the Christians arrived on the scene - is as tangible from the get go as the beauty of the city and the passion for learning among many of the characters, none more than Hypatia. Perhaps this is one of the biggest achievements: philosophic and scientific research and debate is hard to get across as interesting in the limited space allowed in a movie; what Hypatia loves and creates isn't visual the way, say, paintings would be. And yet the film doesn't just claim she's brilliant, with a questioning mind and a passion for knowledge that is her driving force in life: it shows us this to be the case, through her interactions with everyone else. Hypatia and her students even debate possible solutions to the question as to why there are seasons if Aristarchos is right and the earth circles around the sun instead of the reverse mid-siege of the library. She never stops wondering.
At the same time, the film keeps her human. Given her eventual fate, I was wondering how they'd avoid showing her as too good to be true to be believed. As it turns out, this is where Davus comes in handy. Some advance publicity made me fear we'd get a film mainly about a love triangle - between Hypatia, Davus and Orestes - with some philosophy thrown in. Not so, and not just because while both Orestes and Davus are in love with Hypatia, she isn't romantically interested in either of them. No, they actually fulfill functions in her story that are important for characterisation. While Hypatia turns Orestes down in a drastic fashion, she manages to stay friends with him afterwards; he's a social equal. Davus is her property. She likes him, but, oh miracle in a film about the ancient world, the sympathetic characters aren't automatically enlightened about the injustice and horror of slavery. Hypatia is kind to Davus (and her other slaves), but doesn't even register he might have feelings (good or bad) about her; he's a slave. Standing up for her students to the authorities, trying to let the shared love for knowledge keep them together instead of the increasingly fanatic partisanship drive them apart go hand in hand with her using casual phrases like "otherwise, we might as well be slaves" without noticing the impact they have on Davus and other slaves attending.
The other characters are similarly three-dimensional. Another trap the film avoids is to present any groups as all good or all evil. Violence is used by all sides. The same stone-throwing Christians who club down people with other beliefs and will in the end participate in Hypatia's gruesome fate feed the poor and are ready to risk their lives helping people out of burning buildings. (Davus' storyline often reminded me of current-day fundamentalist terrorists; there is a dissatisfaction, to put it mildly, with his current status in life on the one hand, plus emotional and sexual frustration, and on the other the attraction of a comradery, ready answers and a black and white world view, and power and respect where previously he was powerless.) Orestes, who starts out as your avarage spoiled noble, turns out to have both loyalty (not just to Hypatia, but to his frenemy among the students) and pragmatism, and is not without courage, though in the end, he just hasn't enough; not a bad man, but a weak one. Synesius, who as opposed to the ruthless Cyril genuinenly shares Hypatia's joy of knowledge and both likes and respects her commits perhaps the most devastating betrayal of the film because he does so without hate but for conviction. Ammonius is so strong a believer that he's ready to walk through fire, so fierce a hater that he drags others in it, and enjoys feeding and beating up people with the same zest. They are all very very human, and I never had trouble believing in their reality.
(The only time my suspension of disbelief broke down came during a Jewish/Christian argument when a Rabbi pointed out that Jesus had been a Jew. True, but I doubt a fourth century AD Rabbi would have seen this as a good thing. One line definitely intended for the current day audience and not believable in an ancient world context.)
Acting-wise, the international cast meshed beautifully. Fitting the location of the film, one could say. I just hope it won' t vanish from the cinemas too fast, and will come out on dvd, because one thing I'm sure of, despite the tragedy it ends in: I want to see it again.