Imagine, if you will, a film with tremendous star power, including Jeremy Irons and Robert de Niro in the two leading roles, a spectacular setting centered around a South American waterfall that’s 100 feet higher than Niagara Falls, and cinematography if the highest order, and yet . . . it didn’t even earn enough in theaters to repay production costs. And it’s remembered today almost solely for its soundtrack, whose composer Ennio Merricone was best known up till that time for his music in the so-called “spaghetti westerns” that included The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.
The great film critic Roger Ebert said that:
The Mission feels exactly like one of those movies where you’d rather see the documentary about how the movie was made. You’d like to know why so many talented people went to such incredible lengths to make a difficult and beautiful movie – without any of them, on the basis of the available evidence, having the slightest notion of what the movie was about. There isn’t a moment in The Mission that is not watchable, but the moments don’t add up to a coherent narrative. At the end, we can sort of piece things together, but the movie has never really made us care. (“The Mission”)
Kind of harsh, isn’t it? And Ebert is completely correct about the “incredible lengths” that were required to make the film, or even to get it funded. I’m going to quote somewhat at length from an article in the New York Times written just after the film won several awards at the Cannes Film Festival in October 1986:
The effort to make The Mission began in 1975, when the Italian producer Fernando Ghia first approached the screenwriter Robert Bolt and asked him whether he would be interested in writing a screenplay about the 18th-century struggle of two Jesuit priests to protect missions of the indigenous Guarani Indians in South America.
Mr. Ghia’s inspiration came from having read The Strong Are Lonely, by Fritz Hochwalder, a German dramatist whose play was published in 1956. . . . Robert Bolt, a master of the epic movie script who had written Lawrence of Arabia, A Man For All Seasons, Dr. Zhivago, and The Bounty, liked the theme and quickly agreed. In 1975, Mr. Bolt and Mr. Ghia toured the ruins of the great Jesuit missions established in the 18th century in the jungles around the Iguassu Falls, at 269 feet more than 100 feet higher than their North American counterpart, Niagara. It was then and there that Mr. Bolt decided to make this spectacular landmark the focal point of the movie, Mr. Ghia said.
Mr. Bolt produced a script seven months later. But for the next nine years, Mr. Ghia searched unsuccessfully for financing. Finally, in 1984, Mr. Ghia struck a deal. (“’The Mission’ Carries a Message from Past to Present”)
If you’d like to read further about the trials and tribulations of the actual filming, I’d encourage you to follow the link above and read the entire article—it’s fascinating.
Be that as it may, everyone pretty much agrees that the music is fabulous. Ennio Merricone was at first very reluctant to take on the job of writing it, though, as he’d made enough money from his film work (what he calls “applied music,” that is, music for a specific use) and therefore wanted to devote himself to “absolute music,” which stands on its own and has no outside reference. But he was persuaded to watch the film in its first edit, before any sound at all had been added, and he found it so beautiful that he “cried for half an hour” after viewing the final massacre scene. He was fearful that his music might ruin its perfection but was persuaded to give it a go. Much later he found out that the original composer who had been considered was Leonard Bernstein, but it had proved impossible to get him involved. Had Merricone known that he was second choice he probably would have refused the commission.
Merricone faced several challenges as he composed the film’s score, among which was
the necessity to feature ethnic music, music of the Guarani, which is unfortunately completely lost. So I composed a theme, “Vita nostra” [Our Life], that illusorily evoked this identity. To achieve this, I matched the melody to a Latin text that conveys the locals’ protest; and I coupled a second overlapping theme based on the same material. (from Ennio Morricone: In His Own Words, accessed via Google books)
Here’s Morricone’s own translation of the lyrics he wrote:
Our life, our life, our earth, so they cry out.
Our pain, our pain, so warriors call.
So our rage our faith they call.
And here’s a word-for-word translation of the text. In the film, the two “overlapping themes” are used several times to portray the conflict between the Guarani and the European cultures.
Vita, vita nostre
Life, life ours
Tellus nostre, vita nostre,
Earth, land ours life ours
Sic clamant.
Thus they cry out
Poena nostra vires nostra.
Pain ours strength ours
Sic clamant
Thus they cry out
Ira nostra fides nostra
Wrath, anger ours faith ours
Sic clamant
Thus they cry out
Morricone apparently wrote his own Latin text for the piece; I have been unable to find any source for it that predates him. Each side in this conflict, the Guarani and the Europeans, claims ownership or sovereignty over their lives, the land, their strength, and even their own pain and anger. The two themes “fight” each other, clashing instead of harmonizing.
One confusing aspect of the piece is its title. Merricone had originally chosen something else that had the word “requiem” in it, referring to the Roman Catholic mass for the dead. However, “On Earth As It Is In Heaven” was suggested instead, I believe by the director of the film Roland Joffe. I think the title is meant to say that the situation on earth should be the way it is in heaven, but it isn’t—things are very imperfect down here. The title phrase doesn’t appear in the actual lyrics, though, and since it is part of the standard Lord’s Prayer the two texts sometimes get confused. So the YouTube video of Rene Clausen’s Concordia Choir singing his own arrangement under his direction is titled “Our Father,” the opening words of the Lord’s Prayer. When I was looking for a Clausen performance video I kept skipping over this one, thinking that it wasn’t the correct one.
Instead of picking a specific film clip showcasing the piece, I’ve elected to include a “tribute” video that includes a montage of scenes from the film, all with the accompaniment of “On Earth.” If you’ve never seen the film you’ll at least get an idea of what happens and might even decide to go against Ebert’s review and watch the whole thing.
And here’s Clausen’s lovely and challenging arrangement:
And then, as an added treat, here’s a conversation from 2022 with Jeremy Irons and the British producer of the film, David Puttnam. The two of them are absolutely delightful as they discuss the future of Britain and the making of The Mission. It’s a great treat.
