BEHEMOTH
China, 2015, 90 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Liang Zhao.
Behemoth is the name of a biblical monster.By the end of this documentary, the identity of Behemoth is humanity itself. This documentary won the SIGNIS, World Catholic Association for Communication, award at the 2015 Venice film Festival.
The film is a documentary but it is also a cinema poem, making a great impact with its visuals as well is its poetic commentary and its focus on Dante’s Inferno with an enigmatic man appearing every so often, naked, lying on the earth, quoting Dante -like verses about the hell that the birth is becoming.
The setting of the film is central Mongolia, a Chinese perspective on the destruction of the earth through mining. There are many vistas of the mines, the blasts and explosions, the vastness of the expense of destruction, the roads, the long line of trucks filled with coal… Inferno -like images in themselves.
The contrast is with the local people, those with their herds, the disappearance of the grasslands, industry overtaking the earth.
The film for also focuses on the miners, seeing them in close-up, going down the mines, the endless trucks and drivers.The film also takes us into the towns, working shantytowns, wives and children coping with the hard work of husbands and fathers – and, sometimes, the women having to go out during the night to work on filling the coal trucks. There is very little bright colour so it is a surprise when we go into a home and see a coverlet in red – which means that the lives of the ordinary people are harsh, hard, dirty, needing continued washing, and with very few prospects of change and hope.
While this film is a poetic indictment of life in some parts of China, industrialisation, it also takes us into the vast cities being built, blocks and blocks of high-rise accommodation, empty, and modern streets with blinking traffic lights but practically no traffic.
The film is not particularly hopeful in its outlook – it is rather and visual, emotional and intellectual challenge.
1. The impact of the film? Awards?
2. The title, the biblical creature and monster, the story of creation, God in creation, God and people? The monster on earth? Destructive, the application of the image to human beings and the destruction of Earth?
3. The film as a documentary, message, the beauty of the earth, destruction, industry, mines and coal, resources and energy, open face, coalmines and shafts? Images of devastation? The continued stream of trucks, the coal, making cliffs, the contrast with the green fields and the flocks, the transition of the film to the city and the point made about the extravagance of empty cities?
4. The poetic dimension of the film, the references to the Divine Comedy? The verse, the themes? The naked man lying on the earth, finally standing and looking at the world? The musical score?
5. The photography, the vistas and the impact, the cutting of the earth, the explosions, the layers of excavation, the long roads, long lines of trucks, bumper-to-bumper? The open cut mines, going down the lift, the shafts, the various levels, the rails and the wagons, the dangers?
6. The portrait of the workers, the hard work, the variety of tasks and responsibilities, the dirt, the scenes of washing, men and women, loading the trucks, the small vehicles, even during the night? Homes, clothes, drabness, the bright quilt and its contrast? The drab lives of the workers? Homes and the collective? No picture of any boss or executive?
7. Mongolia, the sheep, going down the cliffs, the cattle with the sheep, the Mongolian tents and dwelling place for the family, the men, the women, the children in the fields? Living side-by-side with industry?
8. The transition to the cities, empty, few vehicles, the traffic lights, the vast tall buildings? The information about these Chinese cities?
9. A film for China, the world – a challenge?
