Skip to footer

'First Reformed' charts a young priest's slide into ecoterrorism

( R ) ( Monitor Movie Guide )

Many of Paul Schrader's signature films involve the agonies of faith and redemption.

|
A24 via AP
Ethan Hawke stars in 'First Reformed.'
  • By Peter Rainer

Paul Schrader, as he has discussed many times in interviews, was raised in the Calvinist Christian Reformed Church and didn’t see a movie until he was 17 years old. Many of his signature films, as either a screenwriter or writer-director (most conspicuously “Taxi Driver,” Raging Bull,” and “The Last Temptation of Christ,” all directed by Martin Scorsese), involve the agonies of faith and redemption, often culminating in an act of violence that is meant to be as spiritually cleansing as it is shocking.

“First Reformed,” which Schrader wrote and directed, is about Ernst Toller (Ethan Hawke, in a strong, spooked performance), a priest in a small Dutch Reformed parish in upstate New York who looks upon severe man-made climate change as the End of Days and slides into ecoterrorism. Schrader’s chief influence here, as in many of his other films, is the great French director Robert Bresson, especially his “Diary of a Country Priest.” But Bresson’s spare stylistics achieved a sublimity while Schrader’s, though intermittently powerful, too often feel schematic.
Grade B-

Rated R for some disturbing violent images.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'First Reformed' charts a young priest's slide into ecoterrorism
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Movies/2018/0518/First-Reformed-charts-a-young-priest-s-slide-into-ecoterrorism
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe