What was the significance of the ring she pocketed when she left home? Just that she didn't want to completely cut her family ties? It wasn't a wedding or engagement ring was it? I presume when she talked about being married to someone in heaven she meant god and not an ex-husband or did I miss something?
shareThe book is clearer on this: when she leaves home, she leaves her engagement ring behind with a note reading: "to Jean". This is the Jean that her father refers to when he visitis her and says "Jean never married". What she took with her was a gold fountain pen Jean had given her, and later when the mistress of postualnts says "tonight a basket will go around, deposit in it anything that represents a tie to the past (or something to that effect)" it is the pen that Gabreille puts in the basket.
Also, in the book, Elugoo asks her if the sisters are married, he interprets her answer ("brides of Christ") as meaning that they are all married to the same man. Later when she says "my husband is in heaven" he interprets this as meaning she is a widow.
The question about why Gabrielle enters the religious life is a complex one, which the movie only scratches the surface of. Prior to the last half of the 20th century, it was common for Roman Catholic women who wanted to avoid marriage and persue a meaningful career such as teaching, nursing or medicene, to enter convents. Remeber it wasn't that long ago that a single woman who chose to remain single was looked on as odd. Of course most women who entered religious orders did so out of a sense of callling, but for many the desire to serve others and persue certain fields was a part of this calling.
Sr. Luke's last conversation with Mthr. Emmanuelle alludes ot this: "You entered the convent to become a nun, not to become a nurse. Your love of the religious life must come before your love of medicine". The novel, by Katherine Hulme, makes this tension clearer. It also makes her feeling of call to the religious life clearer.
All in all, though somewhat dated, this movie gives a good look at religious life w/o being overly sentimental or syruppy.
Thank you for helping me understand the film. As a thirtysomething I'd forgotten that the ways of the world were much different not so long ago.
shareI didn't think the film did a good job in showing the religious life. It made it seem far FAR too grim - and that one must be robotic to comply with the Order. To smile, to laugh, to say "I like ice cream" or to say "I miss you" or to acknowledge that one did live before one entered the convent -- simply aren't things that the vast majority of religious or lay orders proscribe.
The movie showed Hepburn leaving her father to go with the other women as if she were going off to be executed.
I really felt that the author must have shown things as FAR harder and stricter than they were - because she wanted to justify and rationalize why she had left the convent. However, I've not read the book - and you have. What do you think?
trpdean, what you say may indeed be true of *most* religious orders, particularly today. But I believe "The Nun's Story" was an accurate depiction of the Sisters of Charity in that place and time (Belgium, pre-WWII). See the comment by Fr. Gabriel at
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/6302636779/ref=pd_sim_b_2/102-6279128-1902506?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance
(the amazon.com listing for the DVD) for more on this perspective.
Thanks for your comments everyone. I saw this film again for the first time in many years,a while back. One thing that I noticed was the story continually questioned the reason she became a nun. It particularly bothered me when the doctor in Africa asked her why she became a nun. That seemed to be a very rude and offensive thing to say to her. I take it (from the comments at this site) that the author of the story left the convent, and I know that Fred Zinneman was Jewish; and I can't help but wonder if this whole movie was done just to denigrate the Catholic Church and it's vocations as a way of life. Just a thought anyway...
Regards,
Steve
The movie was very true to the book, so if you have issues with the story, perhaps you best take them up with the author, Kathryn Hulme, than with Fred Zinneman. ;-) Hulme reportedly based the story on an actual Belgian former nun whom she met while working for a refugee association in Europe after WWII. See
http://www.dp-camp-wildflecken.de/kathryn-hulme.htm for more information.
I thought it was fairly clear from the start that Gabrielle van der Mal wasn't really cut out to be a nun. She wanted to be a nurse and to go to the Congo, and joining the convent was her path to achieving those goals -- though perhaps not consciously. Many of the nuns are shown as happy and fulfilled by their choice, but Gabrielle/Sr. Luke was not. She herself felt she struggled constantly, and in the end, the stuggle became too much. I don't see this outcome as critical or denigrating of the Catholic Church or of the order Gabrielle joined. People make mistakes, and this was a beautiful story about one of them.
Thanks for your response. Admittedly, it has been some time since I saw this film. I just remember that the film seemed to question her commitment from the very beginning. The harshness of the training seemed to be overemphasized too, making it seem almost like a Marine boot camp. At the time this movie was made, the West had not come to terms with the Holocaust yet, and I think a lot of Jews considered the Catholic Church as an accesory in remaining silent. Since then, we know a lot more about what happened in those times.
It just seems to be a subtle criticism of the church, and it's way of life. Now it's a source of sentimentality and nostalgia, since very few women want to become nuns anymore. In these hedonistic times, very few people can consider devoting their lives to service of others. All those devoted nurses, teachers,nad social workers are gone forever...(but fondly remembered by some of us).
Regards,
Steve
<< In these hedonistic times, very few people can consider devoting their lives to service of others. >>
I know people who grew up in large families in war-ravaged Europe. Many children went into holy orders at very young ages -- I know of one who was shuttled off to a monastery when he was barely 10. It was a way to feed mouths when prospects for one's very survival were bleak.
Also, I agree that the film questioned Gabrielle's commitment from the very beginning. It was a fascinating character study, IMO, of someone who was determined through sheer will to overcome her basic nature -- and who ultimately realized she could not.
Thanks for your comments as well!
Thanks for your comments as well, Trentina. Just a lot of B.S. on my part actually, but good stimulation for the mind!
Best regards,
Steve
I've enjoyed reading your comments in this thread. I just got the DVD and am watching the movie from the beginning, (which apparently I never had before) I am definitely glad I got the movie, it's worth rewatching.
¤¤ Shared dreams are shared smiles ¤¤
" didn't think the film did a good job in showing the religious life. It made it seem far FAR too grim - and that one must be robotic to comply with the Order. To smile, to laugh, to say "I like ice cream" or to say "I miss you" or to acknowledge that one did live before one entered the convent -- simply aren't things that the vast majority of religious or lay orders proscribe.
The movie showed Hepburn leaving her father to go with the other women as if she were going off to be executed."
You have to have either been around then, or experienced life in a religious order. I have. I think it actually did a very good job of presenting this.
Entering the order back in the 1920's was different of course, but I still believe those entering the convent were portrayed in a whole array of emotions, mostly excitement mixed with melancholy and calm happiness. Very much the same that I felt when my parents dropped me off at the seminary at the age of 19.
Yes, religious life was indeed much stricter then. What most religious orders in the past 30 years 'proscribe' is very different.... though 'cloistered' orders still maintain some of this.
Thank you for your comments Eddyskiva. Are you a nun or former nun? It would be interesting to hear any other comments you have...
Regards,
Steve
I grew up as a Catholic during the pre-Vatican II days. Yes, things actually WERE that grim and hard for the religious - well it probably also depended on your order. Things have changed 180 degrees since Vatican II - too much to my taste. Things are far too lax now for religious and lay people. But that's true in our society in general now - there are no standards and no one is asked to sacrifice anything.
Very different world.
Cloistered orders are strict like the one Sister Luke was in. I don't think A Nun's Story depicts the Catholic church in a negative light at all. I was raised Catholic and still attend weekly mass, so maybe some of the things in the film made more sense to me. Obedience, chastity, poverty...these are still values practiced by those who belong to many catholic orders, including the Third Order of the Franciscans, an order for lay people who are neither priests nor nuns.
I don't think Sister Luke failed, or made a mistake, simply because she left the order. She was a fabulous nun, in my view. She left after her father was killed because I think the internal struggle she'd been carrying around, the one Doctor Fortunata detected, became very obvious to her, after her father was killed. She simply had much much more to do, than was possible in the confines of the order. But while she was in the order, she was so amazing. I see it simply as a new chapter in her life, when she worked in the resistance movement. What an amazing woman. No wonder a book was written about her.
Anna
Thanks for your replies everyone. I also grew up as a Catholic in the pre-Vatican II times. One of the things that is obvious from the perspective of time, is how "organic" societies were in the olden days. People were simply born, raised, and molded into characters that fit the society mores of the times. How else can you explain "Christians" marching off to war to kill other people? Society's standards overuled people's own internal morality standards. The "fatherland's rules" were more important than God's.
One of the reasons that our society's standards have changed so much, is that those two terrible world wars told us this: follow your nation's rulers orders, be a good obedient servant, compromise your religious standards, and you may well end up being "cannon fodder" at the hands of a bunch of egoistic maniacs! Millions of families saw their sons & husbands sacrificed for this foolishness, so why bother anymore?
Interesting that Europe is considered to be rather decadent today (and shrinking in it's native populations), but it is at peace. How much more decadent was it to send millions of young men to their deaths in a foolish war of conquest? Even the U.S. became rather brutal toward the end of WWII, and firebombed millions of Japanese civilians, and "nuked" two cities. I'm sure that some of the returning B-29 pilots went to Sunday Mass later.
"No more of this stupid foolishness" was the people's answer...by not following all the old rigid rules that led us to this chaos! We may be decadent in a different way now, but at least we are not blowing each other up! Might have more to say later...
Regards,
RSGRE
'The movie showed Hepburn leaving her father to go with the other women as if she were going off to be executed.'
i agree. i didn't get the feeling that they wanted to become nuns in that bit. and the query by the doc was not out of order, it was a simple question requiring an answer
'I think a lot of Jews considered the Catholic Church as an accesory in remaining silent'
its not a matter of thinking it was, it WAS a matter of truth. so many times the church has come up against others and try to decimate them, claiming that persecuation of others was the truth. to be frank, the church signed a pact with hitler to be silent during the war so they WERE collaborating with the nazis on that. the answer of those times is not 'i didn't DO anything.' it is the answer of 'i DIDN'T do anything.' the church may not have done wrong by joining in with the nazis but they did wrong by staying back and not stopping them. as the vatican gave their records to the nazis and stayed silent, they WERE accesories to murder. simple as that. i have no fondness for the vatican in ww2 in the least. if the film is a critism of it, i don't see that it is a problem. it certainly isn't very radical
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OOOOH MATRON!
It wasn't a ring but a pen her former bf/ fiance(?) gave to her. There was a note she had written that said "Please return these to Jean." If the pen wasnt a gift from Jean then she was bringing something with her to the convent that was not allowed. She was not supposed to bring anything with her that would remind her of her past life.
shareThe book explains the difficulty Sister Luke had in explaining the celibacy vow to the native assistants in the hospital in the Congo.
Nuns wear wedding rings because they are "brides of Christ." Of course, in the film, they showed the postulants all being "married to Christ" when they were presented in the church before the archbishop in white dresses with bridal veils. Many orders have their postulants in bridal regalia at the induction rite, and they are given their rings when they take their first vows.
She found it easier to explain that she was not married in the present because her husband was in heaven, and that she had made him a solemn promise never to marry another. The native worker in question was able to understand the idea of a solemn promise and the idea that her husband was no longer on earth, so she let it go at that. Getting him to understand that she was a "Bride of Christ," would have meant that he would have had to understand Jesus as the son of God, his death and resurrection, and even a monotheistic concept of God. He wasn't yet at the point where he could comprehend one God, incarnate in Christ, let alone Christ's death and resurrection, and then nuns being symbolically married to Christ with a vow of celibacy.
I think it was a gold pen, not a ring.....
shareIf I am remembering the book right, she had been engaged to Jean (& very in love), but her father refused to allow the marriage because there was insanity in Jean's family. As a doctor he was concerned that this might be genetic & passed on to any children...she decides she will not ever love another & instead will dedicate herself to God & the pursuit of nursing. And yeah, it was the little pen she takes with her, & eventually gives up at the convent.
The process of getting there is the quality of being there