During the last couple of days we have watched the film on the life of the monks of Grand Chartreuse "Into Great Silence" of Philip Gröning.

A meditative experience we can recommend to all - Let yourself be influenced by the scenes and let the silence and the sounds echo in you. It is sort of interesting and surprising how wathing the simple actions of the monks, the scenes of the monastery and of the sorrounding Alps makes a strong influence on the us viewers, renders us part of and a meaningful and even healing experience.

The makers of the film say: "The Grande Chartreuse, the mother house of the legendary Carthusian Order, is based in the French Alps. "Into Great Silence" will be the first film ever about life inside the Grande Chartreuse. 

Silence. Repitition. Rhythm. The film is an austere, next to silent meditation on monastic life in a very pure form. No music except the chants in the monastery, no interviews, no commentaries, no extra material. 

Changing of time, seasons, and the ever repeated elements of the day, of the prayer. A film to become a monastery, rather than depict one. A film about awareness, absolute presence, and the life of men who devoted their lifetimes to god in the purest form. Contemplation.

An object in time....

The film will show the changing of time, seasons, and the ever repeated elements of the day, of the prayer. Faces. A very physical world ( An apple cut, meals brought to the cells, a field plought) And again the monks praying in the choir. Both is very present in the Grande Chartreuse: The physical world and the turning away from that world."

This view of simple everyday objects in the movie might recall that experience which is at the source of metaphysics, the "intuition of being",  the awakening to see things in a new light - illustrated the following way by Jim Arraj in "God, Zen and the Intuition of Being":

The doors that open onto the world of metaphysics are all around us. Someone I know well told me: "Early one morning when I was busy making breakfast the sun came over the horizon and its first rays streamed through a window and struck a red cup sitting on the kitchen table. I had seen that cup hundreds of times before. I had washed it, put it away, drunk from it, and let my fingers get warm around it, but until that morning I had never truly seen it. The sun seemed to illuminate the cup from within. It was no longer a simple kitchen utensil, but sat there in the middle of the table aglow with being. I felt, "This isn't just a cup. It is! And the radiance of this "is" took my breath away." (God, Zen and the Intuition of Being, Part I: The Intuition of Being, Chapter 1: The Mystery of Metaphysics, http://www.innerexplorations.com/catew/gz1.htm )