Filmmaker Yelena Popovic talked to Orthodox Observer about her new movie, Moses the Black, which premiered in the United States on January 30.
She explained that she took her inspiration from the Lives of the Saints, but told the story in a manner that can touch the hearts of those who need it most: “I did it to help those—hopefully—who suffer the most,” she said.
These are, in her opinion, “those who feel they are prisoners of destruction, of this terrible lifestyle that they feel they either cannot get out of, or they don’t believe that there is repentance” – shortly, those who “don’t believe that God is merciful enough to give them another chance”.
The film director confessed that she spoke to many pastors and spiritual advisers, who all told her that the hardest thing for former gang members is to believe that they could be forgiven.
For those in bondage
“This particular storyline will speak very closely to the hearts of people who have been in gangs, who have done things they’re not proud of,” Yelena Popovic said. But the movie is not addressed only to them.
“So I think this is for people—they don’t have to be in gangs or suffer from addictions—for any kind of bondage. And we all have something; I mean, I certainly do,” said the filmmaker.
She used to wonder why this movie felt so personal.
“And I realized that, for me, it was about getting out.”
“And when I wrote that down—get out—I put that on the side of my notebook, and that’s what guided me through every scene of this film. And I wanted, hopefully, to transmit that to the audience: that there is always a way out. If you feel stuck, if you feel your life is meaningless, if you feel that you don’t have a life, that you don’t have a voice, that it’s like you’ve tried everything, and somehow you feel like you can’t find a way—that there is a way,” Yelena Popovic explained.
A brutal story with a spiritual message
The movie does not embellish reality: next to Omar Epps, who’s cast in the leading role, play rappers Wiz Khalifa and Quavo, whose language is quite vulgar.
Yelena Popovic expressed her gratitude for Omar Epps’ work. “He really dived into this with his full heart and soul, so it meant a lot to him”.
“I’m kind of a hardcore storyteller. I am a student, I would say, of Dostoyevsky. If you read his writings, you would see that he would always show the ugly truth of our world, of society, of the human soul. And yet, there is light at the end of the tunnel. And this is something that I like doing with my work, and I believe that I’ve done that here,” she confessed.
“This is the film for people that need that—that God loves as much as He loves all of us who are trying to live a spiritual life—but He wants all of us to be saved.”
Inspiration from a saint
The director read about Saint Moses the Black and prayed daily to him while she wrote and filmed. “He’s a saint of repentance. He’s one of the holy desert fathers that people don’t typically recognize. Even though at the beginning of his life he was a very brutal, violent gang leader in the land of Egypt”, she emphasized.
“And what’s interesting about him is like not only that he repented of his deeds and changed, but he became a very well-respected desert father. He was the disciple of St. Macarius of Egypt.”
She mentioned that St. Moses the Black, who led a band of robbers and murderers, became the abbot of a monastery in the desert and ended up as a martyr, knowing his end in advance.
“This is something that’s geared toward people—the same work that St. Moses the Black wants to do,” added Yelena Popovic.
Yelena Popovic is well-known in Romania for the film Man of God, a biopic of St. Nektarios of Aegina.
See also:
- Yelena Popovic, from Hollywood to faith: Man can never be happy if he doesn’t have God in his heart
- Yelena Popovic: My goal was to bring St Nectarios to the hearts of people. I felt his story could help them
- Yelena Popovic, director of the film about St. Nektarios: An Orthodox Christian can offer a lot to the world
Photo credit: Basilica.ro / Raluca Ene (archive – article opening)
