Lust for Life Page #2

But by your behavior, you've degraded

the dignity of the church...

- whose representative you are.

- Have you no sense of decency?

Don't you understand

that if the clergy is to be respected...

I don't care to be respected!

I'm trying to live like a true Christian.

I'm not going to worry about how I sleep.

Look at the fresh graves of the children

in the cemetery.

Scrub floors and pick coal

with the women.

Get those fine clothes dirty

with the blood and sweat of dying miners.

Then come here

and lecture me about Christianity!

Hypocrites!

But you must have heard of him.

He came here about a year ago

as a preacher. Vincent van Gogh.

Yes, mister.

You'll find him in the little shack.

Vincent.

Who is it?

It's Theo.

- Vincent, what have you done to yourself?

- Theo.

What's happened to you?

I was sick for a while,

but I'm all right now.

Doesn't anyone look after you?

- I'd better go and get you some food.

- Don't go. Stay and talk.

- Where's the nearest place where I can...

- Please don't go, Theo.

It's been such a long time.

What are we going to do about you?

Father wrote and asked me

to come and find you.

- For months he's not heard from you.

- There was nothing to tell.

What right have you to decide that?

Cut yourself off from everybody,

even from me.

You've become a stranger.

You've changed.

I haven't changed, Theo.

Outwardly, perhaps, but inside me,

I still want the same things.

What things?

The things we talked about

in the old days.

To be of use, to work,

to bring something to the world.

Do you think this is the answer?

I don't know.

We've grown apart, Theo.

Look, you found what you wanted in Paris

and I'm glad for you.

I've found nothing anywhere.

I've made one bad start after another.

One mess after another.

I thought I was on my way here

by doing God's work.

That was the worst failure of all.

But no matter how often I fail,

there is something in me.

- That I am good for something.

- But this is not the way to find it.

Hiding away here, wasting your time.

You've become an idler.

An idler? Yes.

But there are two kinds of idlers.

There's the man who's idle

because he wants to be, out of laziness.

How easy that is. I envy him.

There's the other kind...

the man who's idle in spite of himself.

I want nothing but to work.

Only, I can't.

I'm in a cage, a cage of shame

and self-doubt and failure.

Somebody believe me.

I'm caged. I'm alone.

I'm frightened.

Vincent, listen to me.

When we were children,

I used to follow you about.

If I was frightened, I'd run to look for you.

If I got lost, you'd always come to find me.

We're still brothers, we're friends...

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