Paul Schrader is not everyone's cuppa. He's not usually my cuppa. And Ethan Hawke sure as shit ain't my cuppa. But First Reformed is one of the craziest, most involving and taxing films this year. You don't feel it coming, but when it hits, it hits hard.
It's very much a story and film by Schrader. It's about an angry man driven to do terrible things because of his perception of the world. Schrader's typically pious protagonist is here, indeed, a pastor (played by Hawke) of an empty, dying historical Dutch church in New York. It would seem that Pastor Toller's theological interests have had a part in the church's dwindling numbers of parishioners, and though his methods are unorthodox, he seeks to keep the church alive. He visits the nearby megachurch (called, blatantly, Abundant Life) to seek support from their pastor, played by a quiet and slightly menacing Cedric the Entertainer. Unfortunately, Abundant Life may not be rich in theological intrigue, but boasts wealth, youth, tradition, and its own history as a stop on the Underground Railroad. First Reformed just can't compete, which is why the larger church owns the smaller.
Just when I thought the film would be about Toller working to save his church and -- it is a Schrader film -- failing or possibly sacrificing himself to do so, we learn more about him. Turns out that Toller had encouraged his son to enlist in the military, only to have his son die in Iraq. Clearly struggling with this, Toller is approached by Mary (Amanda Seyfried), whose radical environmentalist husband needs counseling. Her husband wants her to get an abortion and seeks dangerous answers to stopping pollution and climate change. Upon their meeting, Toller is deeply influenced by the convictions of a man so passionate.
Guilt and fear, love and service brew together in this film into a holy mess of intellectualism. While there's not much to go on emotionally here, we are fed constant ideas of faith and desperation and pain and loss that haunt our minds far more than our hearts. Schrader has never been one for dynamic filmmaking nor movies that grapple our sensibilities. He films here in a monochromatic way, boxing us into a tight aspect ratio, lulling us into a sense of doldrums and boring passivity, before unveiling the horrors that come from deep theological curiosity, complacency, and the sudden spark that feeds radical fire.
Again, this won't be everyone's movie. But for people like me, who have an intense love-hate relationship with churches and want the good while agonizing over the bad, this movie rings terribly true. I found myself gasping at the blatant portraits of extremism being birthed in hallowed halls, clashing ideologies working to better the world and destroy our culture, and of course the tortured souls of those whose desires cannot be reconciled with beliefs before the very worst happens.
IMDb: First Reformed
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