Danièle Huillet & Jean-Marie Straub – Moses und Aron (1975)

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   1. here
      https://worldscinema.org/2018/02/daniele-huillet-jean-marie-straub-moses-und-aron-1975-2/

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   1. fixed..

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3. Possibly my favorite film of theirs. I would love to see “Der Tod des Empedokles”

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4. “Moses and Aaron” by Jean-Marie Straub and
   Daniele Huillet is
   based on Arnold Schoenberg‘s opera, and a film at the same time unites with
   Schoenberg’s unique music in its depiction of Biblical events of the history of
   the Jewish people, and makes it the object of cinematographic analysis. The
   film is a double (critical) deconstruction – of the relationships between Moses
   and Aaron as political leaders and the Jewish people whom they lead into the future,
   and, on the other hand – of Schoenberg’s tendency to monumentalize and
   aggrandize these relationships by the music. Throughout
   the film Straub and Huillet examine the psychological roots of Old-Testamental
   theological imagination – the proclivity of people to interpret their socio-political
   motivations as a result of their special rapport with God. Mobilizing their
   visual imagery as instrument of analysis the directors show Moses as a
   paradigmatic case of a traditional totalitarian leader who uses despotic
   ideology to rule over the population, and they represent Aaron as a neo-totalitarian
   ruler, creator of a political system based on worshiping the Golden Calf. In
   “Moses and Aaron” we see the depiction of two totalitarian systems – one based
   on direct power and deploying pompous ideological imagination to help people to
   liberate themselves from their humiliated condition and to lead them towards
   national glory, and the other is financial totalitarianism when a real leader
   of the masses is the Golden Calf who instead of commanding the obedience seduces
   people into consumerist orgies.
   The conflict between Moses and Aaron becomes that of two equally
   totalitarian but differing systems that those who lived through the second part
   of 20th century had a chance to observe in the clash between Soviet
   Russia (a typical incarnation of traditional totalitarianism) and democracies of
   the West (which today, in 21st century, with their austerity
   programs for the populations become more and more resembling the despotic rule
   of the Golden Calf). The sacrifices to the Golden calf shown in the film in a rather
   elaborate way remind us today’s austerity programs in action and the growing
   unemployment, pauperization and cultural illiteracy as a result.
   The chorus
   through which people’s fears, hopes and contradictory moods express itself, is
   especially unforgettable as mediation between orchestra and the dramatic action
   and stays with us after watching the film not less than Moses’ character,
   Aaron’s mind and the intensity of Schoenberg music. Those
   today, who don’t just take life as it happens but try to grasp the meaning of existential
   situations and political events, will take from this film a lot of fertile impressions
   that’ll help them to better understand our historical past and the present. The
   film shows that history repeats and rejuvenates itself, and we better
   understand more about it not to be its victims but its participants. By Victor Enyutin

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