As the screenwriter of ‘Taxi Driver’ and ‘Raging Bull’, Paul Schrader helped write American film history. However, the films in which he wrote and directed are less known. In the 44 years of its creation, however, one film stands out: “First Reformed,” in which Ethan Hawke plays a priest who falls increasingly into despair. The masterfully staged drama is available for little money on all major streaming platforms, including Amazon Prime Video.
That’s what ‘First Reformed’ is about
Since the day military priest Rev. Ernst Toller (Ethan Hawke) lost his son in the Iraq War, he turned away from the military. From that moment on, he leads a small church community in New York as a pastor. When he encounters the depressed Michael (Philip Ettinger) during church service one day, he takes care of him. In conversations as Michael increasingly despairs over the increasing destruction of the environment, Toller’s faith in God and humanity is sorely tested.
Little by little, Toller also begins to learn more about the impending environmental problems and finds himself in a no less desperate condition. Only Michael’s wife Mary (Amanda Seyfried), who is pregnant with a child, can offer him comfort. Impending health problems and increasing depression ultimately cause Toller to find himself in a vortex of hopelessness.
Broken men
Whether as a director or screenwriter, for example with masterpieces by Martin Scorsese “Cab driver‘ or ‘Bringing out the dead’, Paul Schrader’s weak spot is clearly visible. Broken men are always central to the American director, that also applies to ‘First Reformed’. The question that runs through the film applies to many of his works: Is there a way out for the sometimes more, sometimes less depressed men or has it already happened to these characters?
Schrader is reluctant to provide answers to such questions, as is the case in this distant and cold film. Ethan Hawke as a priest is superbly portrayed, because even he, as a representative of goodness and humanity, is not safe from the horrors of the world. As a man of hope, he also gradually loses touch with his principles, which is often painful to watch. As a result, ‘First Reformed’ has two strong points: a brilliant performance by Hawke and cinematic radicalism.
Disturbing and unique images
Schrader doesn’t stop at shocking the audience with a few, but rather with the more intense moments that come out of nowhere. The great thing about it: these stick in your memory and don’t let go easily. Fortunately, ‘First Reformed’ does not mean 120 minutes of depression and pessimism, but rather a portrait of an ambivalent – or in technical terms, cognitively dissonant – life.
Schrader used a cool yet very unique visual language for the production, which also fascinates our author Christopher Muth. The FS criticism includes: “In terms of staging, this film seems downright exotic in today’s cinema with its long, static shots (the camera hardly ever moves), the almost complete absence of film music, an anachronistic 4:3 screen format and its almost monochrome color scheme.”
Overall, the concept works wonderfully. On the one hand, the quiet production ensures that the sometimes disturbing images can develop their full effect. On the other hand, and this will probably be a consequence of it, a wonderful pull effect is created, which is brought to the heights in a cinematically unique planned sequence. These types of scenes have never been seen before and that can be applied to the entire film.