The movie black robe wasn’t one that I expected to gain much from, but it ended up surprising me in how beautifully it displayed the contrast of cultures. Though the main purpose was to show the contrast of spirituality, beliefs, and religion of Catholicism and the “native” society, the movie also portrayed contrasts in many other areas of life. It helped to show how much a person’s or a societies belief could shape the other areas of their lives. By showing such seemingly different types of humans it also brought the concept of humans as a species together because, in either case, the human is faced with the same trials and given the same choices. The message of this film is that we are all created to be one, and it is when we try to live alone that this connection is destroyed and chaos erupts.
Religion in the movie was ever present. “Black Robe” did a fairly accurate job of portraying the Catholic religion by always trying to live by the Truth even if it means dying alone or trying for a hopeless cause. The tribes didn’t so much have a religion as much as they had beliefs, which defined their decisions, reasoning, actions, and interpretations. Black Robe continually tried to convert the Indians to Catholicism but because they were so set in their former beliefs, the idea of one God and his son, Jesus, was extremely distant to them causing them to think Black Robe a demon and to persecute him for his beliefs.
The role of violence, sex, and death is ever present in Black Robe as well. Black Robe’s ideals and ways of life were strongly contrasted with that of all other characters. I was able to see the Indians as an entirely different culture, but also as one not far from our own selves in the sense that they had the same temptations, desires, and human weaknesses. All common faults of man, the Indians did not see anything wrong with such ways of life, and questioned why Black Robe would live a life without these “pleasure.”
This movie was especially good to watch following the Comanche Empire book because although the tribes were separate, the film was able to portray the Native Americans in a light that helped me to understand them better which carried over into understand the Comanche better. The violence in the book and the film was extreme, but the Indians though nothing of it. It wasn’t that they were complete barbarians, but more that this was a way of life for them. It was characteristic for Indians to be violent and through this, in both situations they were able to feel and gain power. The maltreatment of women was evident in both as well. Again, this wasn’t something they were purposely doing, it was just embedded in their culture, what they had always practiced. While reading about the Comanche I thought them to be a power hungry semi-uncivilized people with purpose only to engage in acts that help themselves. It was hard for me to understand why they behaved and acted as they did, but now when I am able to compare them to the Indians in Black Robe it helps me to understand the general Native American culture on a much greater level.
I found the strongest message of the movie though to be much deeper than culture. It seemed that the idea of culture was portrayed as merely the outside, a tool that made it more difficult for people to relate to each other in this movie. But Black Robe saw through this trap, and truly had love for the native people. He did not wish to convert them for his own selfish desires, but for the way of God. He wished that these people might be saved in order that they may have eternal life and so they would not die alone. Whether one believes in religion or not, it is amazing to see the love that Black Robe portrays for these people when it is continually unreturned and mocked. Nonetheless, Black Robe relentlessly continues to reach out. Eventually he is rewarded when a tribe wishes for baptism, and it is here that you are able to see how we are all one, despite what is on the surface, and that humans were created for each other.
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