There is something mesmerizing in the way, how most of the characters of Andrzej Wajda’s Danton (1983) look like they’re on the brink of a mental breakdown.
Just look at Antoine de Saint-Just (Bogusław Linda), how he leans himself to the wall in his first scene with Maximilien Robespierre (Wojciech Pszoniak), saying he had no sleep. Look at the deep dark circles under his eyes. His gaze, looking into the distance, almost (?) like crazy. Look a Camille Desmoulins (Patrice Chérau), the nice and neat, young Camille, who is literally whining himself through the entire story, so devastated, that his cellmate got annoyed by him. And there is François Louis Bourdon (Andrzej Seweryn), the turncoat revolutionary, with his weary look, dirthy hair, and sweating, shining face. Even Georges Jacques Danton ( Gérard Dépardieu) doesn’t bother to wear his wig properly anymore.
Everybody, all the revolutionaries are looking weary and exhausted.
Except Maximilen Robespierre.
He is the most composed character in the film, although he is the most aware of the inevitable, that they’re doomed.
If we rely on the visual symbolism of the film and approach the story from this direction, we are able to realise easily, why this fictional representation of the events is considered cynical.
Danton tells the story of the titular character’s last five days between his return to Paris and his execution. It’s based on a theatre play by Polish dramatist Stanisława Przybyszewska premiered in 1929. Andrzej Wajda, the director of the film adaptation directed also the theatre version of the story (with Wojcech Pszoniak in his role as Robespierre) in the 1970s in Poland. The script of the film version was written by Jean-Claude Carrière in collaboration with Andrzej Wajda, Agnieszka Holland, Bolesław Michałek, and Jacek Gąsiorowski.
The story is set in the spring of 1794 when the glorious revolution has already turned into a bloody terror. We don’t see the entire process, how this could happen, only the endgame of the nightmare, when the revolution started devouring its own children.
Danton is the titular character, who tries to restore an earlier stage of the revolution, but he fails and falls, (almost) like an ancient Greek hero. Indeed, he is the tragic hero of the story. But here comes the cynicisms: unlike in traditional storytelling, where being a tragic hero means also being morally superior, there is little to admire or be relatable to this man.
Paradoxically, no other character deserves the label “tragic hero” more than he,
but the morally higher meaning of this phrase is ruthlessly vanished.
His fall isn’t even caused by his desperate attempt to do something and to sacrifice himself for the greater good (as traditional tragic heroes do). He just deeply miscalculates his political opponent’s actions and falls into the pit of wishful thinking. He is convinced, that he would not be executed,
because that would mean the fall of his rivals.
And why would people cause harm to themselves, wouldn’t they?
He is right, proved by the subsequent historical events, that killing him would mean also the ultimate death of his killers. But he is just incapable to face the harsh reality, that no matter, how irrational this sounds and looks, they would do it anyway.
Robespierre is the only one, who dares to take this final logical step. He knows, that they are in the phase, where literally every step leads to the guillotine. Should they spare the life of Danton? Then the revolution is doomed. Should they execute him for treason? Then the revolution is doomed. There is no way out, no matter how they would decide.
Although Robespierre is ill (his fever, which becomes worse during the execution of Danton and co, can be interpreted as psychosomatic illness), he is very composed and reserved in public. In other situations, his perfectly fitted wig might be an unpleasant relic of the Ancient Regime (ironically, what they want to vanish for good), but now it’s the symbol of his enorm self-control. While everyone is actually going mad (just look at them!), therefore their actions are not really fit to be judged,
his behaviour is what is genuinely worth watching, what he does in this insane situation.
First, he seems cautious and calculative about how they should react to Danton’s return and the pamphlet written by Desmoulins was caught before it could have been distributed on the streets. Only when these people push him to make a decision, comes the point when he wants to accelerate the events.
After his dinner (the last meeting) with Danton, where the latter is so drunk, he falls asleep, Robespierre goes right to Desmoulins trying to save him. To find an excuse why he should be spared. The body language is revealing. Here is the man, the head (and seemingly the only clear mind) of the terror, who even flinches when he is touched by the woman living under the roof ( it’s never clarified who is she, most likely a sister), his only real human connection is the one to Desmoulins. He tries to save him even for a second time, but can’t even meet him, and became indirectly ridiculed by Desmoulins and the other imprisoned men.
This seems to be the defining moment,
as if Robespierre would accelerate also his own destiny deliberatelly.
There is an unfair trial, laws are changed from one minute to the other just to get rid of Danton, Desmoulins and the others, while Robespierre is posing like “The Supreme Being” (doesn’t it sound like something like, what’s this name, a king?) 1 in David’s studio, where he orders to make disappear someone from the painting.
Now there is definitely no way back.
The entire story is framed in a motive about a boy learning the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen” by heart. He is not very good in the beginning, but in the end, he cites it to Robespierre. And the dissonance between the great words and what just happened in the story undermines the possibility of catharsis.
Wajda’s film is often interpreted as a parabole of the Polish Solidarity movement in the early 1980s. Of course, there are elements in the story that remind easily of this typical double scheme, especially for the older Central- and Eastern European audience. But as time goes by, these kinds of actualities are less and less important.
The primarily historical events, what the film depicts, on the other side, is a clearly understandable situation, even for those, who knows very little about this turbulent time of French history.
- In fact, Supreme Being is a creation of the French revolution, a replacement of God after traditional religion was banished because the leaders realized, people still need something supernatural, something beyond their life. The first and only celebration of the Supreme Being, in the centre of its earthy representative, Robespierre, hence my comparison with the position of a king, was held only weeks before the fall of the man himself.