Stellet Licht

I finally managed to track down a copy of Stellet Licht and watched it the other night. I was interested in this film for several reasons, one being that as far as I know, it's the only feature length film in Plaut Dietsch, the Dutch/German dialect of my Mennonite forebears. It was the language of my parents and grandparents and my whole extended family. Another reason is that it's set in Mexico where several of my mother's uncles and aunts on her father's side settled in the 20's and 30's when my mom was a little girl. They moved there from Saskatchewan because Saskatchewan at that time was getting too modern for traditional Mennonite tastes and was bringing in English language education and all the trappings of the modern world. Fortunately for me, my mom's parents didn't move there, keeping their genetic line in Canada.

When I was a kid, my mom often spoke of her aunts and uncles in this far away and exotic place, and often spoke of wanting to visit them someday. When I "retired" in 2001, one of the first things I did was to take Mom and my two sisters to Mexico to try and track down some of these long-lost relatives. Daughter Megan was studying in Puebla at the time, so she joined us for a portion of the trip. So there we were, in the wilds of Mexico, driving around in a big white GMC Suburban with blacked out windows, which marked us as drug dealers, federales, or anything but natives. In any case, we did find the Mennonite Colony in question, near Nuevo Ideal, about 60 miles north of Durango.

That trip was truly memorable, and Mom has often said it was the trip of a lifetme, but it isn't really the subject of this post.

Some of the Mennonites we visited in Mexico were the old horse-and-buggy Mennonites, but living right next door to them in the village were Mennonites who drove cars and used more modern conveniences. Modernity was a problem for my mother's uncles and aunts, and how to live in the modern world is still a problem today.

The Mennonites in Stellet Licht are of a more modern strain than the strict traditionalists. They are religious, but drive trucks and cars. Johann (prounced Ja-HOWN) is a married man with several kids, but he's tormented by his love for another woman. And to make matters worse, he's been totally open with his wife about it all.

Who'd a thunk it?! A Cannes Film Festival award winning movie in Plaut Dietsch about illicit Mennonite love, made in Mexico by a Mexican director, with a non-professional local Mennonite cast???

But does the movie work? If you speak or understand a bit of Plaut Dietsch (there's still some of it imbedded in my brain, but I was very thankful for the English subtitles) and know a bit about Mennonite culture, it will all seem quite familiar. If you can get through the first third or so of the movie, you'll probably get all the way through. The beginning is tough going at times, with long scenes with a fixed camera, where not much happens. Some of those scenes, like the opening scene, are truly beautiful, but after a while you'll find yourself saying "Get on with it!" If you stick with it, it's well worth watching. It even has a brief soft-core sex scene! The ending was more than a bit weird, and I may have to watch it again, just to see if I got it or not.

This is definitely an "art house" movie and will never see wide distribution or popularity, but I think it could be a minor hit in the vast Mennonite diaspora. I know I was glad to see it.

Ps. If you're wondering where to get it, I found it on DVD at http://www.tower.com/.

Pps. In case you're wondering what I'm doing up at this ungodly hour, I woke up at 4 this morning to the sounds (and smells) of Farley having a violent diarrhea attack. It wasn't a great start to the day for either of us, but we're both doing fine now.