France, 1966
Directed by Jacques Rivette
With Anna Karina (Suzanne Simonin), Micheline Presle (Madame de Moni), Francine Bergé (Sister Sainte-Christine), Liselotte Pulver (Madame de Chelles), Marc Eyraud (Father Séraphin), Jean Martin (Monsieur Hébert), Francisco Rabal (Dom Morel), Christiane Lénier (Madame Simonin)
Her face is barely visible, bent over the prayer stool near the altar, wrapped in the white veil completing the gorgeous white dress, so distant in the stately long shot capturing the moment. Her voice, crucially, is also barely audible, her “No” getting lost in the distance while one of the nuns attending to the novice hastily shouts a clear “Yes”. The archbishop, a bit surprised, proceeds with the ceremony that is to make Suzanne Simonin a nun. But she gives at first no answers to the traditional questions and then shouts her rejection of the life that has been forced upon her, frantically standing up and crying for help while running away from the altar and throwing her hysterical body against the long and tall wooden grating separating the clerics from the lay attending the ceremony – which is cut short as it has become a real scandal.
It would always be a matter of dissonance, a note trying to get heard, unless it is dropped from the shot composition, a body trying to set free, unless it is left out of the frame. As Suzanne Simonin and her mother, Madame Simonin, a few days after the scandal, bitterly argue, the mother insisting her daughter bows to the best deal she can expect since the lack of money and her birth’s illegitimacy prevent her from getting married successfully and since a lady on her own with no wealth, no connections, no skills, is likely to have a hardscrabble life, their angry words are drawn out by the resonant sound of bells – to escape the influence of the Catholic Church is impossible, no matter what. Bells would keep ringing along the narrative, not always with the same ominous meaning, and Suzanne would be getting through shocking experiences both vindicating her spontaneous, deep-seated rejection of the status of nun and pointing to the troubles lying inside convents which are too hastily revered by the outside world and too conveniently used to hide away girls their families do not know what to do with, or even do not want in the first place to take care.
The dissonance is emphasized by a striking score, composed by Jean-Claude Eloy, which owes little to the 18th century, the era when the tragedy of Suzanne Simonin takes place and it was conceived by writer Denis Diderot, and even less to the previous century marked by the Baroque movement. It is on the contrary a truly dissonant and demanding piece of contemporary music, a foray in the musical vanguard for a period piece whose costumes and sets are more than convincing. With simple chords and sparsely played, the score highlights the gap between the lead character and her surroundings and points to further tension. The voice of Suzanne Simonin is also clashing with the rest of the cast as she is played by the Danish-born actress Anna Karina, the heroine expressing thus her doubts and her anger in a strange but alluring accent; the intense physicality of the interpretation sets also the character clearly apart from the rest of the actors. This is a body that fails to fit with the expectations of a convent and of the representation of a convent.
The drama unfolds in remarkably sparse settings where the camera tends to move rarely and then quietly and smoothly: as performed in the first sequence the camera moves as the crisis is inevitable, closing on the desperate face. The intensity of Suzanne Simonin’s plight can be felt as genuinely, terribly inescapable as she stands clearly as the prey of an institution refusing to bow to a personal will even if it is plain the person is unwavering and unbreakable. The convents’ corridors become paved with hell even as they are supposed to prepare for heaven but Suzanne Simonin keeps pacing them stubbornly and tragically, facing rage and humiliation, out of necessity and also out of stunning confidence in her own yearning, judgment, and faith.
Her story is shaped by her relations with three different mothers superiors. In the first convent where she is welcomed she is readily embraced by Madame de Moni. The gentle old lady lends a benevolent face to the institution, caring and cheering, aware of the novice’s reluctance but confident she can find enough faith to take the veil. Madame de Moni may be sensitive and sensible, she is still eager to make Suzanne Simonin a nun. And her persuasion leads to a success while promising an acceptable life in the convent for Suzanne Simonin. However, the faces of the nuns in the background as the novice and the mother superior talk or as they meet the novice in the corridors suggest the leadership’s kindness is not so widely and eagerly shared.
Indeed, when Madame de Moni dies and is replaced by Sister Sainte-Christine, things change and doubts tear apart Suzanne Simonin anew, but deeper. She eventually chooses to sue the Church, claiming her vows have not been pronounced with her conscience fully aware of what she was doing and what the words meant. Already keen on upsetting the tranquil and lenient ways the late Madame de Moni favored to rule over the nuns and guide them spiritually, Sister Sainte-Christine views the rebellious nun as a nemesis to tame and then to destroy. The film takes a definitely more heartbreaking and horrific turn as the heroine is vilified and then humiliated. Thanks to the commitment of her lawyer, however, her ordeal causes such a scandal that Sister Sainte-Christine is taken to task while Suzanne Simonin gets back the clothes, objects, respect, status that have been ripped from her even as she has always been entitled to them.
She is transferred to another convent and meets the exuberant Madame de Chelles. The contrast could not starker and it seems, despite her ingrained conviction she has no place in a convent, that Suzanne Simonin is going to spend happier and quieter days. But the affection, even devotion, of her new mother superior puzzles her and puts her ill at ease. The sentiment Madame de Chelles claims to have for her new recruit look less and less natural but to the contrary definitely unseemly and unnerving. Hatred and violence stirred by blind zeal and sheer contempt have cause a dreadful plight; but it seems now a convent may also cause pain and torment through other behaviors, sentiments, obsessions. Satan lurks everywhere and tries to fall the innocent soul with any trick – including a love that dares not to speak its name. A new priest sent to the convent to confess the nuns and advice them eventually helps Suzanne Simonin escape a situation where she cannot find happiness: she leaves secretly and illegally the convent to try her luck in the wider world.
Three clerics have in fact played key roles in Suzanne Simonin’s story. The first is the confessor of the Simonin family, Father Séraphin, who has tried to talk the rebellious Suzanne Simonin into becoming a nun, revealing the real reason behind Madame Simonin’s steadfast resolution – she had her daughter from an extramarital affair, which keeps the girl from having the same rights and consideration as her other children and points to how different and lonely a figure she is doomed to be. The second is Monsieur Hébert, the high-ranking cleric called to examine the case of Suzanne Simonin as she suing the Church and as she is denounced by Sister Sainte-Christine as being possessed by Satan and in need of an exorcism. Stern, harsh, but fair-minded, he does not try to convince Suzanne Simonin of anything but instead tries to help her as he gathers she is a victim and a lost soul barely fit to stay in a convent. But he cannot and would not allow her to leave the institution, he just sees to it she finds a better place – which turns out to be a hell from another kind. But another cleric brings hope. Dom Morel understands the suffering of Suzanne Simonin, if only because he has never felt being priest was the right thing. But he denounces the love of Madame de Chelles mainly because he wants to replace it with his own lust: setting the rebellious nun free is the first step to conquer her. When she realizes it, Suzanne Simonin is forced to run away again.
Each man she meets is different but all get Suzanne Simonin under further trouble even as they claim to help her. She is forced to go to a convent first because she is told she has no other choice; once she has experienced the wickedness and cruelty nuns can display, she is simply moved to another one where passion becomes a new danger; finally she is led in the wider world but only to satisfy lust. Loyal, disloyal, or just indifferent, these men of faith remind the audience of the influence of religion and the power of an institution that aids and abets the natural domination of wealth and masculinity.
Written by director Jacques Rivette with the help of Jean Gruault, “La religieuse” adapts Diderot’s text more or less faithfully, cutting short the beginning of Suzanne Simonin’s story and showing less gruesome details. The screenplay makes two crucial changes: the narrative shifts from a first person account to a more distant narration – Suzanne Simonin does not tell, she is observed, thoughtfully and rigorously – and a whole new ending is created – Suzanne Simonin’s ordeal extents into the lay world, the film showing how she is forced to beg in the streets and then to become a prostitute, a profession she resents so strongly she chooses to kill herself. The innocence she has expressed in the film proves to be even more genuine and ingrained than what could have been thought by others and perhaps by the audience, and is more than the narrative device Diderot used to launch his attacks on the church. To Rivette, Suzanne Simonin is dissonant also because her soul is so pure and her mind so clean; in fact this is so remarkable and great a soul than even a convent could not have been enough for her. She had, however, a dangerous illusion: that she can find a place in the wider world, but it turns out to be really out of reach for her. Her death was inevitable, as was the death of the only lover she wanted to know and she did love in the convents – the Christ, of course.