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January 14, 2007
The Flowers Of St. Francis
This is the shot where, just three hours ago, I fell in love with Rossellini.
Of all the roughly consecutive vignettes in the The Flowers Of Saint Francis, the only that deals exclusively with Francis himself is the one in which his solitary prayers are interrupted by a leper passing on the road. The scene is almost exactly five minutes long, and comprised of exactly twenty five shots. The same line opens and closes the scene, and comprises practically all its dialogue: Francis, lying prostate on the ground in both instances, cries "My God. My Lord and my all!" But between those two orisons, a seismic shift occurs. Francis' prayer, vague and perfunctory in its first utterance, becomes a fervent pledge of faith, simultaneously bereaved and deeply grateful, after his encounter with the leper.
Rossellini depicts this change in conviction not simply through the physical interaction of the two characters but through the geography of their interaction. The first shot of the scene begins high up on a hill and pans down and across the landscape before cutting to Francis in closeup, whispering his prayers to the dirt. He is disturbed by the sound of the leper's bell, and rises, peering through the foliage as the solitary figure appears around a bend in the road. The scene continues, cross-cutting between Francis and the leper with a precise rhythm but a decidedly confusing sense of space. Rossellini breaks the 180 degree line several times - or, at least, I think he does. It's never clear exactly where the characters are in relation to each other - or rather, it's never clear where Francis is in relation to the leper, who has a road to delineate his progression.
This disorientation continues until Francis ovcercomes his disgust at the leper's ghastly countenance and emerges from the woods with a solidarity of intention that is immediately adopted by the camera, which to this point has remained on axis but suddenly begins to dolly with the characters as they proceed together through open and suddenly definable space. They separate again at the end of the scene, the leper ascending the hill and Francis remaining at its foot, but their relation to each other and the landscape remains simple and clear. And then the camera drifts off again towards the sky, ending the scene where it began but from a different vantage point; the opening shot drifted down from a high, ominiscnet point, and the closing moves up from the ground - from Francis - evidencing the intercession of a third, unseen but formally tangible character.
Posted by David Lowery at January 14, 2007 04:20 AM
Comments
This is exactly the scene, which I first became aware of through Scorsese's running commentary in his documentary My Voyage to Italy , that made me want to see this film, too.
Posted by: aaron w. graham at January 14, 2007 04:17 PM
I've still never seen My Voyage To Italy (or Italianamerican, for that matter). But watching that PBS doc on his journey through Amercan cinema was what finally convinced me to sign up for Netflix. I've just added this one to my queue.
I didn't get to Open City last night, but I've got time set aside for it tomorrow.
Posted by: Ghostboy at January 15, 2007 03:54 AM
Thanks for reminding me of that great scene. I watched "Flowers" right about this time last year and it was a highlight of my 2006 viewings.
Posted by: Paul at January 15, 2007 09:36 AM
still haven't watched any rosselini myself, but i too added a bunch to my netflix queue after watch my dad is 100 years old...i should bump them up and get started watching.
Posted by: brad at January 15, 2007 01:58 PM