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Dead leaves, in brilliant black and white, float slowly by on the surface of a shallow stream as the credits roll up and Sebelius’s “Valse Triste” hums in the background, part dance, part dirge. Then suddenly the slamming of lead and steel. It’s the linotype. Hands on fire beat the keyboard, the lines of lead type fall into place, wheels churn and the newspaper pops out shouting truth to power.

The Last Sentence is one of the best, and most challenging, films about journalism, character and love.

It is Feb. 3, 1933, and in Germany Adolph Hitler has just come to power; the boldest response in Europe emanates from a newspaper in Sweden, Goteborgs Handels-och Sjofartstdning, which declares,“Mr. Hitler is an insult….” The editor Torgny Karl Segerstedt (Jesper Christensen), who has led the paper since 1917, a one-time theologian who failed his doctoral exam,has replaced his religious belief with political liberalism and a single-minded fight against Nazism. He foresees a world war and, with the backing of his friend and publisher Axel Forssman (Bjorn Granath), makes the newspaper a strong voice against the background silence of a timorous Sweden.

Christensen’s square features and full gray hair appear to embody Segerstedt’s rock integrity and wisdom—though he looks older than early 60s of his character—while a weak-willed Sweden shivers lest the mighty Germany roll over Sweden after it marches across Poland and France. Hermann Goring personally expresses his outrage as the paper proudly prints another in-your-face editorial. Meanwhile, on screen, another dimension of Segerstedt emerges.

In 1905, while still a professor of comparative religion, Segerstedt married Puste Segerstedt, a Norwegian; they had four children, one, a son, who died at age 13, seven years before. On some level Segerstedt may love his wife, but he does not love her well. He has forbidden her to mention the lost boy and strikes her when she pleads with him for a little affection. He has taken a mistress, Maja, the more glamorous Jewish wife of his friend and publisher, who with Swedish detachment tolerates the infidelity. During a formal dinner party at their home for the elite of Swedish society, Torgny sits with Maja and freezes out his wife at the other end of the table. During the entertainment, following a piano recital, Maja, in an artificial display of affection, persuades Puste to sing. She sings Greig’s emotional “I Love You,” pleading for love from her husband who directs all his attention to Maja and his three faithful dogs.

Obviously director Jan Troell knows that dogs will love indiscriminately; in fact, as he uses newsreels to knit the storyline to world events, we catch a shot of Hitler loving his dog. We are beginning to see the other—the “real”?—crusading editor who, having frozen God out of his life, has replaced religion with righteousness and poisoned his relationships with those most dependent on his love. When Torgny reaches 65 his friends and supporters throw a gala in his honor, which ends with the presentation of a pen the size of a spear and a life-size paper mache horse, wheeled into the dining room for the now intoxicated crusader knight to mount and ride for their laughs and cheers. In 1940 he is summoned to the royal palace in Stockholm by King Gustaf V, who warns that the brazen editorials are putting neutral Sweden in danger.

Puste dies in 1934 of heart failure, and Torgny mourns too late. Maja, distraught over Hitler’s advance and conscious of the anti-Semitism in Swedish society, commits suicide in 1942. The ghosts of his women, some of whom whose love he has exploited—his mother, Puste, Maja and his secretary—appear to him in mourning veils. He drinks too much and suffers a stroke but keeps writing. As his health fades he is forced to ask himself whether he has written in sand. On his deathbed in March 1945 he asks his daughter and nurse whether Hitler still lives. He does, but they lie and tell him he has died. The man proud that he has always written the truth dies in peace based on a benevolent lie.

 

“The Last Sentence,” a film by Jan Troell, opens in New York on Friday, June 20. 

Son of Raymond A. Schroth, of Trenton, N. J., a World War I hero and editorial writer and reporter for the Trenton Times, Brooklyn Eagle and New York Herald Tribune for over 40 years, and of Mildred (Murphy) Schroth, of Bordentown, N. J., a teacher in the Trenton public and Catholic school systems, Raymond A. Schroth, S.J., has spent his life as a Jesuit, journalist, and teacher.

After graduating from Fordham College in 1955--where he majored in American civilization, studied in Paris, and was editorial editor of the Fordham Ram--he served as an antiaircraft artillery officer in Germany for two years and joined the Society of Jesus in 1957. Ordained a priest in 1967, he obtained his PhD in American Thought and Culture at the George Washington University and taught journalism at Fordham until 1979. During that time he was also associate and book editor of Commonweal magazine.

After two years as academic dean of Rockhurst College in Kansas City, he became academic dean of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. In 1985-86 he held the Will and Ariel Durant Chair in the Humanities at Saint Peter's College in Jersey City. From 1986 to 1996 he taught journalism at Loyola University in New Orleans and was adviser to the Maroon, its award-winning newspaper. In 1995 the Southeast Journalism Conference named him Journalism Educator of the year. In 1996 he returned to Fordham as assistant dean of Fordham College Rose Hill and director of the Matteo Ricci Society, which prepares students to compete for prestigious fellowships. Meanwhile, from 1967 he served as a resident faculty member in the student residence halls.

He has published eight books, including: The Eagle and Brooklyn: A Community Newspaper (Greenwood); Books for Believers: 35 Books Every Catholic Should Read (Paulist); with Jeff Theilman, Volunteer: with the Poor in Peru (Paulist); and The American Journey of Eric Sevareid (Steerforth), a biography of the CBS commentator.

In 1999 he moved to Saint Peter's College, where he wrote two books: From Dante to Dead Man Walking: One Person's Journey through Great Religious Literature and Fordham: A History and Memoir, (Loyola Press in 2001-2002). In 2000 Saint Peter's College named him the Jesuit Community Professor in the Humanities. In Spring 2003 he was made editor of the national Jesuit university review, Conversations and will continue to serve in this position until 2013. His The American Jesuits: A History, (New York University Press, 2007), was followed by Bob Drinan: The Controversial Life of the First Catholic Priest Elected to Congress, (Fordham University Press, 2010). He taught a graduate journalism course at NYU in 2004 and journalism history at Brooklyn College in 2006.

In recent summers he has traveled to Gabon, South Africa, Peru, Iraq, Jordan, Syria, France, Thailand, Vietnam, Cuba, Indonesia, the Czech Republic, and China to educate himself, write articles, and take pictures. In 2003 his National Catholic Reporter media essays won the Catholic Press Association's best cultural columnist award. His over 300 articles on politics, religion, the media, and literature have appeared in many publications, including the Columbia Journalism Review, Commonweal, America, the New York Times Book Review, the Los Angeles Times, New York Newsday, Kansas City Star, Boston Globe and the Newark Star Ledger, where he was a weekly online columnist for several years. From time to time he lectures and appears on radio and TV. He is listed in Who's Who and Contemporary Authors. In his free time he swims, bikes, walks, reads, goes to movies and restaurants, and prays.