Decalogue

Midrash is a genre of literature used in the Jewish religion to interoperate scripts from the Torah to find meaning or decipher values. The Decalouge, written and directed by Krysztof Kieslowski, works as a type of Midrash because it illustrates the the Ten Commandments and attaches emotional visual elements to them. Pretty much everyone knows was the Ten Commandments are but it may be hard for some to by into or really grasp with out a medium like this. In the first Decalouge, Kieslowski explores the first Commandment, "You shall have no other God than me." There is a father and son who love each other very much and a sister of the father who appears many times also. The father does not really believe in God, he is more of rational thinker who places his belief in numbers and science. The son has many questions about death and God, which are not so much answered by the father but by the sister who tries her best to explain these tough topics. In the end, the father places his faith in his numbers and pays for it. He allows his son to go and skate on the lake where he dies. This shows that one must place their faith in God and only God or bad things will happen. In the fifth Decalouge, Kieslowski depicts the fifth Commandment, "Thou shall not kill" in a very gripping way. Throughout the film you see clips of three different individuals, a young aspiring lawyer, an adolescent male roaming the city, and a mean middle aged taxi driver. You are not sure the motives or back stories for any of these characters. The boy and taxi driver paths cross when the boy gets in the taxi and ask him to drive him to another town. Along the way you see the boy wrapping rope around his hand, which he eventually uses to strangle and kill the taxi driver. Then the lawyer at the beginning of the film is defending this boy who is sentenced to death. The lawyer has a long talk with the boy who tells him his was killed by a tractor operated by his friend after they had been drinking. The lawyer feels at fault for the boys execution. This medium depicts the fifth Commandment and highlights that not all murder is the same but it is all wrong and affects every involved. Both of the individuals that were murdered weren't great people but you still feel bad for them at the point of their death. Kieslowski does a great job to compare and contrast murder and capital punishment, which seem separate but are really one in the same.

There are many symbols used in this film. In the first one, there is always a man sitting by the lake next to a fire. He always appear very glum and the audience has no idea his intentions or purpose. He is in every scene by the lake until the end when the son drowns. This lead the viewer to believe he symbolizes God or some guardian angel, as he is not there when disaster happens. In the final scene, the father who doesn't really believe in God, goes to the church and flips the table that you pray at and the Virgin Mary has wax dripping from her eyes, which symbolizes her sympathy for the father as she also a child who died. The father reaches for holy water, but it is frozen, which is ironic because the boy died because the lake was not frozen. In the fifth Decalouge the same character that appeared by the fire in the first returns multiple times in very symbolic manners. First you see him bathroom as a very cheerful man who the boy pushes into the stall for no reason. Then he appears as a worker when the boy and taxi driver pass him on the way to the murder. In this scene he is holding a ruler, which symbolizes the measuring of ones soul and he also shakes his head a little as they pass. His last appearance is in the jail where the boy is to be executed. In this scene he carrying a ladder to symbolize the boys ascendence to heaven. Again, the audience is led to believe that this character symbolizes God.

These films capture the emotions of the Commandment very well. They force the audience to think about them in a less religious sense and more of an every day life sense. You don't have to be religious to do right. Kieslowski is just trying to make the viewer think about the Commandments in a different light and he does a very good job.