Art and National Identity - "The Christening" by Marcin Wrona

Art and National Identity: Use of National Symbols in “The Christening” by Marcin Wrona Aleksandra Biernacka, GSSR PAN An essay employs the tools of cultural theory with its analysis of the notions of the nation and nationalism, for examining a view on a current stage of the system of values in Poland at the beginning of the 21st century, as delineated by a chosen film: “The Christening” by Marcin Wrona. The author investigates the film’s extensive use of the national symbols: their form, sources and meanings, in order to check for their possible transformations, pointing out to a deeper social processes influencing people’s existential experiences. Numerous theorists of culture, observing meaningful movements in area of nations and nationalism taking place in the last decades of the 20th century, point to the rising significance of the phenomena in shaping the social and political reality of the 21st century. The nature of this influence is however in many ways different than in a course of the 19th and 20th centuries, when the concept of modern nation had been gradually shaped,1 as currently it is undergoing in a world of the globalizing strands of regional power blocks, transnational economic corporations, global telecommunication systems, massive migrations, and concerns connected with environmental pollution and diseases.2 These macro-scale modifications bring from the other side of a spectrum a revival of regional identities, who for a lack of another socially acceptable conceptualizations, voice their opposition toward transnational forces and their will to secure regional interests, in terms of national, unique community,3 and – additionally – are also accompanied by a struggle of a growing number of the migrant groups for their own political and cultural identity, built on a basis of their original country heritage combined with social reality of their new settlement.4 Although all these changes take shape at the crossroads of complex industrial, economic, political, and cultural phenomena,5 they are constituted and extended through social contact providing means and tools of expression and pursuing one’s goals.6 It is through the semantic systems of describing the world, its borders and relations between particular parts where people forge a knowledge and vision of their reality, what in consequence models their actions on every 1 See for example, among many others: Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (London: Verso, 1983); Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Blackwell Publ., 1994); Ernest Gellner, Culture, Identity and Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); Aleksander Gella, Development of Class Structure in Eastern Europe (Albany: SUNY Press, 1989). 2 Anthony D. Smith, National Identity (Penguin Books, 1991). 3 Eric Hobsbawm, Nation and Nationalism since 1780 (Cambridge: CUP 1990); Milton J. Esman (ed.), Ethnic Conflict in Industrialized Societies (Cornell University Press: Ithaca, 1977). 4 Nathan Glazer, Ethnic Dilemmas 1964-1982 (Harvard University Press, 1983); Kenneth Thompson, “Border Crossings and Diasporic Identities: Media Use and Leisure Practices of an Ethnic Minority” in: Qualitative Sociology (1, 2002) 25, no. 3: 409-418. 5 Ernest Gellner, op. cit.; Anthony Smith, op.cit. 6 Thomas H. Eriksen, Ethnicity and Nationalism (London: Pluto Press, 1993). 2 level.7 As such, various cultural artifacts, especially languages with their names, symbols and myths, as well as stereotypes, though not providing insight into all the phenomena directly, bring eloquent signs of a deeper processes.8 The popular culture, producing persistent and repetitively appearing sets of stereotypes that create order, justify differences, and define group’s borders,9 seems to be in this context an interesting field of analysis that could possibly become a probe of a current social situation. Such examinations are certainly often postulated by the theory of culture. Anthony Smith, elaborating on a possibility of forging a new, common European identity, stresses a need of analysis of the alternations in popular ethnic myths and symbols as well as value systems that could be the only basis of which the new cultural, pan-national identity may evolve from.10 Zdzisław Mach observes that radical political change results in changes in the symbolic system, either rapid and momentous or more gradual ones, rooted in historical tradition, mythology or religion.11 Frederic Barth, beside his point on necessity of studying the boundaries of groups in order to get to know their inner characteristics, perceives cultural forms not only as expressions of specific points of view, but more importantly as the carriers, testimonies to “effects of ecology - […] a more immediate […] reflections [of] the external circumstances to which actors must accommodate themselves.”12 It is especially intriguing in this framework to look at one of the recent Polish films – “Chrzest” (“The Christening”) by Marcin Wrona (2010). Its story line dwells upon a motif of 7 See especially Benedict Anderson, op. cit.; also Manning Nash, The Cauldron of Ethnicity in the Modern World (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press 1989). 8 Manning Nash, op.cit. 9 Thomas H. Eriksen, op. cit. 10 Anthony D. Smith, “National Identity and the Idea of European Unity” in: International Affairs (1992) 68.I: 55-76. 11 Zdzisław Mach, Symbols, Conflict, and Identity: Essays in Political Anthropology (Albany: SUNY Press. 1993). 12 Frederic Barth (ed.), Ethnic Groups and Boundaries (Bergen – Oslo: Univeristets Forlaget; London: George Allen and Unwin. 1969), 201. 3 returning to once vibrant, strong and coherent group of childhood friends, with stalwart ties of mutually felt brotherhood, that become criminals in a time of “opportunity,” in a moment of the Polish political transition. The situation now, upon one of the two heroes’ reappearance, is however changed – the bonds are weakened, and the group is no longer united, but divided by a grave hostility. In a course of one week, the characters have to make their choices that bear a weight of life and death, and – in case of these who survived – determine their future lots. The decisions they have to come with, involve the basic ethical questions of loyalty towards a friend, a group, and oneself, the system of values, and consequently – the vision of the world one is surrounded by. The final, rapid and savage murder of a brother by a brother, brings not only the catharsis in a film, but also could be seen as a serious criticism of the social reality. Since the change of political system, Polish cinema repetitively delineated social transition scanning the borders of acceptable behavior, a grey area of ethics, on a crossroads of economy, power and culturally formed notion of a decent man, solidarity and brotherhood. The films like “Psy” (“Pigs,” 1992) by Władysław Pasikowski and “Młode wilki” (“Fast Line,” 1995) by Jarosław Żamojda set a scene by drawing a picture of a country of no-law, where crime radiates a deceptive spell of an easy, prosperous life attracting numerous people who fall into a trap of a quick financial gain often at a price of crossing a line between good and evil. During the 1990s. these films have been followed by a number of a more or less known criminal, mostly popular-genre films, whose general mind-set conveyed similar diagnosis of the Polish state-intransition like “Nocne graffiti” by Maciej Dutkiewicz (1996), “Kiler” by Juliusz Machulski (1997), “Krugerandy” by Wojciech Nowak (1999), “Dług” by Krzysztof Krazue (1999), or “To ja, złodziej” by Jacek Bromski (2000). “The Christening” is now a resonant return to these 4 themes, after ten years during which the Polish cinema focused its interest and criticism on other areas of social activity and alternate visions of the world. 13 What makes this film exceptionally reverberant is not only its condensed, disciplined structure, ascetic visual form and suggestive, extraordinary acting, but the extensive use of the profound national symbols, springing from the romantic myths of sacrificing for a brother and family, of the code of honor requiring protecting community at every cost, and of the imaginary ingrained by the Catholic religion. The action begins, when Janek, released from the army, still in the gala uniform, comes to Warsaw in search of his long-time friend Michał, who once saved his life. Michał lives in a big, impressively equipped apartment, along with his wife, Magda, and a newborn son, neither of whom Janek was aware of. Michał welcomes Janek and offers him a job at his prosperous company, but Janek, instead of working eight hours a day, prefers to join Gruby, a local mafioso they all used to hang around with, and to take advantage of life. Soon Janek gets to know that Michał lives with a death sentence for betraying Gruby’s relative to the police – each day he has to pay a considerable amount of money if he wants to survive, and as long as he pays, he lives. Michał has only enough cash for the next six days; on the seventh day, he has planned the christening of his son, and is anxious to be present at the ceremony – afterwards he is prepared for everything. Janek is then faced with a choice: either to try to help Michał, with whom he has a honorary life-debt, or to follow the code of mafia according to which treason is punishable with 13 In this period, especially visible had been either investigations of family life and relationships between its members, suffused often with existential questions like Łukasz Barczyk’s Changes, Małgorzata Szumowska’s Happy Man, Marek Lechki’s My Town, or Andrzej Jakimowski’s Squint Your Eyes, and more socially engaged: Dorota Kędzierzawska’s Nothing, Artur Urbański’s Bellissima, Robert Gliński’s Hi, Tereska, Feliks Falk’s The Collector or Krzysztof Krauze’s Savior’s Square, and – on the other side – the consequent, gradual revival of historical films, for instance: Jerzy Hoffman’s With Fire and Sword, Filip Bajon’s The Spring to Come, Andrzej Wajda’s Katyń, or Jan Jakub Kolski’s attempts of re-examining the WW2 history in the Keep Away From the Window, Pornography, Aphonya and Honeybees, and Venice, and similar bid for revising the settled historiography in Wojciech Smarzowski’s Rose. 5 disdain, exclusion and death. The individual loyalty and solidarity with a friend counterpose to the loyalty with a group. But for him this is already the next ethical choice, as the first one is behind: a choice between secular code of honor, conveyed by the army, with all its significance in the Polish historical experience and code of the mafia with its cruel, indifferent and conscious opposition to the notion of socially acceptable demeanor, fed by greed and philosophy of survival of the fittest. Janek is not yet certain how to behave and tries various options, including escape, to refrain from taking sides. In the course of next days, the two systems of values fight with each other. The individual friendship and solidarity are being strengthened by the transcendental symbols, derived from Catholic religion: a picture of beautiful Magda with Michał’s son framed as Virgin Mary, the ceremony of christening in a church with Janek as the god father and a family gathered around, an oath “I reject all evil” pronounced at this occasion in a church. At the same time each of this sacred signs is being soiled by an inner shade of respectively lasciviousness, greed and hypocrisy that ooze from the outside. Janek’s inner ethical struggle is pointed out by fatalistic acceptance, inability for a further socially admissible resistance and readiness for sacrifice to protect family on a side of Michał, who consciously rejects the bare force as a mean not anymore congruent with a man he earlier decided he wants to become. The ambiguity of the religious symbols and rituals culminates further in a final scene, when Janek drowns Michał after a brutal, sudden and impulsive attack. It is his specific christening: on Janek’s individual level it is crossing over a line of humanity, on Michał’s individual level a rapid crushing of his idealistic efforts for securing decency, on a social level – a resounding question on validity of the system of values forged in the past circumstances that are no longer able to provide their followers a secure existence, in spite of the culturally transmitted assurances to do so. 6 The film’s tension arises hence out of a situation, in which the traditionally united, acting throughout the last two centuries of the Polish history in concord,14 strands of ethical codes: solidarity with a brother, a group and religion are put in conflict. They do not comply with each other, forcing to stand choices between individual gain and sacrificing for the other member of a group. It seems to point out to an unresolved incongruence of the Polish Roman Catholic ideals with its call for sacrifice, affirmation of the poor and promise of the better, outer life with the economical tensions of the rising capitalism, with its suggestive aura of comfort and prosperity. Such opposition between facts and values as presented in “The Christening” could, as it often happens, be a trait of actual lack of fit between the category systems15 in a current Polish society as it gradually starts to realize a need of reviving and modifying national imagery according to characteristic features of the new historical situation. The ambivalence in treatment of the religious symbols is however also a characteristic consequence of the society built on a principle of the economic growth, the long-observed processes of industrialization and modernization. The processes that due to the socialist, centrally planned economy functioning in Poland till 1989, and due to the political opposition of majority of the nation toward socialist ideas and order that was based on the Roman Catholic church as the only accessible institutional alternative for socialization, were not to this extent as in the Western world present in the country. The growth economy stimulates a need for constant innovation, which in turn necessitates occupational mobility, and hence universal literacy, high educational level, unification and continuity of cultural codes, as well as the idea of the basic equality among a community members.16 In such a reality of the constant flow between particular spheres of See Aleksander Gella, op. cit.; Zdzisław Mach, op.cit. Maryon McDonald, „The Construction of Difference: An Anthropological Approach to Stereotypes,” in: Sharon. McDonald (ed.), Inside European Identities (Oxford: Berg., 1993). 16 Ernest Gellner, Culture, Identity and Politics, op. cit. 14 15 7 social activity every solid and stable vision of the world, including religious eternal order, is sooner or later confronted with the changing experience and forced to modification of its certain, often crucial elements. As the institutionalized religions, especially the Roman Catholic church, tend to be rigid and firm structures, it results in discordant tensions between religious messages and everyday experiences and – consequently – in the rising distance of the popular opinion towards the religious doctrine and symbolism.17 The ambiguity in meanings of the film’s symbols derived from the basic spheres of the Polish national mythology: family, religion and military, brings additionally a question about the future of the nation. If it is a function of cultural carriers to secure continuity of tradition, binding individual and group lots,18 the film’s general play with notions of solidarity towards a group and oneself that at certain situations may be in conflict shows a world, in which hitherto stability of value systems is weakened, possibly – a world of the changing paradigms. This impression is only strengthened by realization of the fact that the national myths and a mass public culture form, aside with the historic territory, legal rights and economy, the base of every national identity, and that they are often used as a call for action to overcome obstacles. 19 A possible shift in the paradigm is not however to be rapid and far reaching, but slow and gradual. The sole use of the traditional symbols, their significant exposition and infusing in a net of multilayered interrelations plotting a structure of everyday life that the film attentively dwells upon, is itself a sign of a continuing vividness of these symbols and their importance as a means of discussion about the society. It is exactly through their employment that the film achieves a 17 Ibid. Manning Nash, op.cit. 19 Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, op. cit. 18 8 level of important statement, a criticism that attempts to draw attention to a disturbing element of social life. At the same time, the film shows a community completely homogenous, devoid of any signs of struggles described by theoreticians analyzing the situation of a turn of the 20th and 21st centuries in different nations. There are no signs of such global-scale phenomena as migration, regional nationalism, or the ethnic and gender tensions.20 The world of “The Christening” is an unitary environment in which the men relate directly to each other and the women are objects of transactions, comparable with material resources. Although theoretically independent, the females are one of the desired and rare assets over which the male competition revolves. They are set aside, with no knowledge on the events around, only anxiously sensing the growing problems – their questions though, are left unanswered. Similarly, all the active characters are of the same ethnicity and social background, and any internal differentiation of the group, except of hierarchical position in the mafia’s structure, is literally absent. The prevailing ordering of the characters according to point of view of the mafia hierarchy adds to the film’s social critique a shadow of suspicion that the whole society is intoxicated by the evil and overwhelming impact of criminal activities. The film focuses hence solely on the dilemmas arising out of the contradicting and struggling influences of ethics and economical wealth. The cultural analysis of a film does then indeed allows certain insight into a current social situation. The example of “The Christening,” all the more meaningful as the film is based on actual events, presents a world of a slow transformation of the Polish value system as mirrored in the anxiousness caused by internally conflicting traditional receipts for action and in the shifts in the national symbols’ emotional connotations. Its conspicuous use of these symbols proves at the 20 See for instance Eric Hobsbawm, op. cit.; Milton Esman, op. cit.; Abdul Said and Luiz R. Simmons (eds.), Ethnicity in an International Context (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Transaction Books, 1976). 9 same time that the transformations are undergoing within the framework of the historically ingrained national culture that – at least for now – does not bear a sign of modifications fostered by transnational currents. As such, it backs the argument on persisting significance of the national identities and “the continuing hold of ethnic styles and national discourses themselves over the vast majority of the planet’s populations.”21 References: Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities. London: Verso, 1983. Barth, Frederic. (Ed.) Ethnic Groups and Boundaries. Bergen – Oslo: Univeristets Forlaget; London: George Allen and Unwin, 1969. 21 Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, op. cit., 160.; see also, among others, Eric Hobsbawm, op. cit.; Milton Esman, op. cit.; Abdul Said and Luiz R. Simmons, op. cit. 10 Eriksen, Thomas H. Ethnicity and Nationalism. London: Pluto Press. 1993. 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