The Sacrifice (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1986)

8/10
Tarkovsky's relationship with God and Christianity is a complicated one. I've seen almost all his films now and read his own writings and I still can't entirely make heads or tails of it. Maybe he never could himself. The Sacrifice to me seems reflective of this.

In the film, it's the aging Alexander's birthday. An atheist/teacher/actor/philosopher/father/husband, he is shown planting a tree with his young son and ruminating about the lack of spirituality in the world. A nuclear war breaks out in the middle of the night, and Alexander pleads desperately to God, offering everything he has as a sacrifice provided God return things to how they were the day before. A doctor trapped with Alexander's family at the house convinces him to sleep with a local woman, a purported witch. With God seemingly failing him, he does so. The next morning he wakes up, and everything is indeed back to normal - no nuclear bombs. With his family out, Alexander sets fire to the house. His family discovers him and, confessing his actions, he is taken away to be institutionalized.

No matter how I think about the film, I can't seem to penetrate it with any success. Everything is left as a question - was there really a nuclear war at all? Was the woman really a witch (the movie strongly suggests she was not)? Did sleeping with her really change the world? Did Alexander commit a brave, noble, and ultimately tragic sacrifice...or is this just insanity on the part of a man who has given up? I don't fault the film for not providing answers. In fact I applaud Tarkovsky for creating a work that would probably mean something different to every single person who watched it. I thought it was very moving, myself, moreso than anything else I've seen from Tarkovsky. I wish I could put into words more of my feelings about the film, but I'm finding it hard to say exactly what I want to. Maybe I'll have to sleep on it.

The movie reminded me a lot of Ingmar Bergman's Through a Glass Darkly, which isn't much of a surprise considering the film is rife with Bergman connections. I also wondered if maybe Lars von Trier had watched this movie a lot in recent years - many times I was reminded of Antichrist (which von Trier dedicated to Tarkovsky) and especially Melancholia, with its apocalyptic themes.