Moral Certainty in "The Man without a Face"

 

The Man without a Face is a movie that displays the relationship between an ostracized man and a young boy develops and strengthens even against societal stereotyping and ‘norms’. The movie starts with the young boy, Charles Norstadt and his ideal dream he has, everything for him is perfect except one thing, he always misses a face in the crowd. At the end of the movie we see his dream come true and this time he sees this missing face in the crowd. From this we gather that Charles comes to a moral certainty about the man without a face. He is able to come to this moral certainty in a journey with the man, Charles questions, reasons, and finally believes and trusts the man without a face, Mr. Jason McLeod.

            Norstadt’s dream includes graduating from the boarding school his father attended and he takes the first step in moral certainty when he goes to McLeod for tutoring so that he might pass the entry exam. Despite Norstadt’s fears about McLeod, fears generated by the town and those who ostracized him, Norstadt continues to work with McLeod. Norstadt begins to develop a relationship with McLeod, a relationship that reminds me of a father-son relationship. McLeod teaches the boy geometry, Latin, and reasoning skills. However when Norstadt finds out the truth about his father and goes to McLeod for consolation their relationship is severed.

            Additionally, Norstadt finds out about a story that McLeod molested a child before and the child was killed and so Norstadt begins to question McLeod’s character and credibility. The boy is confused because although he knows McLeod based upon their relationship he does not know the truth about the story. When he confronts McLeod, the man yells at the boy saying, “I didn’t spend all summer [teaching you] so you could cheat on this question”. The question is did the man really molest/kill his previous student. Norstadt is able to come to the conclusion or certainty that the man didn’t because of his experience over the summer. His experience and relationship with McLeod conveyed no violence or molestation. He does not come to certainty because anyone told him yes or no, rather he uses personal judgment and knowledge to choose a decision.

            Norstadt’s moral certainty was a process. All moral certainties are a process and a risk to make or come to because there is no object or compass that can filter out all lies and bad things. Norstadt can only make the decision because of his experience with McLeod despite the rumors and lies from the people in his town. McLeod illustrates a great teacher because of his ability to teach things such as math and Latin but also reasoning and skepticism. Whether Norstadt was right or wrong, McLeod commended his student for the journey and the decision he was able to make. McLeod says toward the end, “You can’t teach a thing without giving away your trust”. He is saying this regards to a man asking why he didn’t check with the boy’s mother before continuing to teach him. McLeod is saying that in order to teach you cannot have a final goal or trust a person to learn. If you trust, people will disappoint you. It is better to let go of trust and be gifted with a student who can reason and solve problems and make judgments for themselves with the information they are given.

            It is difficult to explain how or why Norstadt comes to this moral certainty about McLeod. In an argument McLeod has with men who are questioning him after finding Norstadt in his home, McLeod tries to tell them about his friendship with the boy. He says with regards to not being able to explain their friendship, “No I don’t think I can, and the tragedy of that is I don’t know why I can’t”. It is hard to explain something such as love or friendship in a way that makes sense because what makes up love or friendship is not empirical. There is no tangible or hard evidence to prove to anyone that McLeod and Norstadt are close friends. However, in themselves there is certainty about their friendship and trust for each other. Charles Norstadt is certain of McLeod’s friendship and honest appearance because inside of him he can reason and he can decide what to think and believe. McLeod gets his second chance in teaching and is able to succeed in Norstadt because of the boy’s ability to decide that one pivotal issue for himself with certainty.