A bunch of Benedictine monks in Michigan might have something to teach us about playing well with others.
The monks, or as they're called at their monastery "the brethren," allowed themselves to be filmed in 1970 by the famed documentarian Frederick Wiseman. At the height of what Wiseman called "the commune movement" in the United States, the country was intrigued by the idea of creating a utopian enclave, a place apart from the world's small- and large-scale conflicts. Today, Wiseman's exploration of how people get along still fascinates.
The result of Wiseman's time in the monastery near Three Rivers, Mich., is "Essene," a documentary he named after the ascetic community of men believed to be the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls. "Essene" and a handful of other Wiseman documentaries were screened this week during the filmmaker's visit to Salt Lake City.
"I had always wanted to do a movie about a monastery," Wiseman told his admiring audience at the new Main Library. The picture, in his classic black-and-white cinema verité format, documents how modern ascetics coexist in close quarters, and how they manage the tension between what one man wants for himself and what will work for the whole community.
In the beginning of "Essene," the men discuss how to see past all the little irritants in their brothers' behavior. How do you keep from being driven to distraction by those habits, quirks and tics?
One monk likened the monastery to a kind of microcosm of a city. It's populated by individuals with their own agendas, but they have to live close together, somehow accommodating each other's needs. The monk had recently lived in Manhattan, one of the country's most space-poor places. The presence of people at both elbows could rapidly drive a person nuts. The environment instead drove the monk-to-be toward a new attitude.
"It's really difficult to live in that city," he says, "until you realize you don't have to like all of those people." Yet you can "love and care for them," wanting the best for the community.
Another Benedictine brother adds that it's easier to live peaceably with others when you see not just the people they are now, but the people they are becoming. "You're watching a person blossom," in community life, the monk says.
All of this sounds sweet, but Wiseman's documentary debunks any illusions about Benedictines living happily ever after. The monastery is no utopia, populated as it is by some quirky guys. One older monk insists that "familiarity breeds contempt;" therefore, the use of first names among the brethren is inappropriate. This is his attempt to draw up boundaries around himself and to control the people around him.
Therein lies the rub, as "Essene" shows us. The last several minutes of the film are devoted to a sermon by one monk, who talks about trying to "manage the things of this world." It's hard to find peace, he implies, when you're running around aiming to control your surroundings. Instead we may strive toward the mind set of Mary, Christ's mother.
"Mary looked through the things of this world," the monk says. She didn't try to possess or bend them to her preferences. That attitude is contrary to the one adopted by most modern Americans. The "egoism" of trying to arrange the world around you, the monk says, sooner or later leads to trouble: "As soon as one ego runs into another ego, there's war."
"Essene" offers a few glimpses of harmony, when the monks sing together. Those scenes show how it is possible to put one's ego aside in favor of a group process. The result is a unified, though brief, song.
"I don't really know why anyone agrees to be filmed," Wiseman told the library audience. He has made documentaries about basic training in the U.S. military, about a Massachusetts prison for the criminally insane and most recently about domestic violence in America.
Some of the people he films simply want to be better understood by viewers on the outside. In the case of the Michigan monastery, the monks didn't say what their hopes were regarding the 86-minute documentary about their lives.
But the abbot, boss of every aspect of their existence, had given Wiseman permission to stay with the community for a few weeks. Soon after he arrived, Wiseman attended an afternoon prayer meeting during which the abbot prayed for the success of the film. That was his way of telling the brethren that the cameras were all right with him, the filmmaker recalled.
Wiseman, widely regarded as the grandfather of cinema verité, calls himself a student of how communities run themselves. He goes into filming with his mind clear of preconceived themes and aims to make each movie a report on what he learned while immersed in each peculiar environment. His 1967 film "Titicut Follies" was a disturbing picture of a Bridgewater, Mass., prison that had descended into a kind of hell. It shows how authorities, when under constant stress, can turn inhumanly callous toward their charges.
"Essene" portrays the other end of the spectrum: men seeking communal love, peace and intimacy with God. In it, we see how even monks, living in what looks like a tranquil refuge, have to struggle to stand each other. You can't really get away from human nature, "Essene" seems to say.
"I hope that the issues (in the films) aren't simply the issues of the moment," Wiseman said. "I hope that they are human issues that are constant."
E-mail: durbani@desnews.com