The Films of Robert Bresson

I would have voted Lancelot too!

For a second I thought I was on the Walker Percy thread and was gonna say: RONG!

Country Priest is the most emotionally affecting, L'Argent is his most accomplished, Le Diable is his darkest, Une Femme Douce is his most visually-beautiful, perhaps.

have only seen country priest. it's heavy as fuck but i think there was something precious in there. i've heard you need to watch it differently to most other films. my best friend told me that. we will watch it again some day. the priest's relationship with that young lady/girl was intriguing

Country Priest still my favourite.

also RIP that actress who jumped in front of a train :(

country priest would have been my pick if i'd voted. i don't think i can watch the donkey again.

Still haven't watched A Man Escaped.

You should! It's a rather straightforward story (man is arrested, man devises way of breaking out, etc.), but the way Bresson films it can pretty much only be described as "poetic".

I'm sure it's great. Everything Bresson did was.

Ignatiy V inaugurates a series of essays:

http://mubi.com/notebook/posts/robert-bresson-the-over-plenty-of-life

related to 2-week NYC retro:

http://www.filmforum.org/films/bresson.html

Diary of a Country Priest is extraordinary. So much Bresson still to watch.

xp really weird to think that "that dude from the arty video store" is now an "authority"

The Trial of Joan of Arc pulls off the climactic barbecue better than the other 3 Jeanne films I've seen.

"just a little bread dipped in wine..."

We've got a big series starting at the Lightbox next month (hooked in to the same series showing in NY, undoubtedly):

http://tiff.net/filmsandschedules/tiffbelllightbox/2012/4400000375

yes, full North American tour:

http://mubi.com/notebook/posts/complete-bresson-retrospective-to-tour-north-america

Apparently George Cukor is responsible for evangelizing about Bresson's greatness after watching Country Priest.

I.V. on Bresson and comedy:

http://mubi.com/notebook/posts/the-comedy-stylings-of-robert-bresson

Diary... is so great.

Pains me to say it: his version of the Joan of Arc story is the weakest of the four, adds nothng to Dreyer's version beyond the non-silence of it. V well made staged and made and yet..

Four? I think I also know of Preminger, Victor Fleming and Rivette versions, I guess that's four

I hope you're not including the Milla Jovovich version

VF version with Ingrid Bergman in the title role was on last week but I didn't watch it.

I didn't know there was a Rivette version! Was thinking of Dreyer, Bresson, Ingrid then Jovovich.

The Jovovich version has 'tude ;-), which is more than can be said for the Bresson version.

Dreyer, with the right soundtrack (or even completely silent) is best.

Havne't seen Ingrid and that has to be corrected.

Sandrine Bonnaire is Joan in the Rivette version. I only saw Part I, the first four hours.

the films of robert depression

Looked this up, and I had forgotten, basically because I sense it probably won't be very good. Not sure he's the go to guy for 'The Battles'; they probably involve toy horses. xp = the end of Pickpocket gave me a very warm feeling.

xp really weird to think that "that dude from the arty video store" is now an "authority"

― tanuki, Sunday, January 8, 2012 12:22 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark

hyou mean ignatiy? hes a real good writer....

oh i know — didn't mean it as a slight, just weird seeing reg'lar folks become "celebrities"

http://www.momogalerie.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/Robert-Bresson-balthazar-Momo-Galerie-Romaric-Tisserand-margherita-ratti-.jpeg

Didn't dislike what I saw of the Rivette, just didn't have the opportunity to see the rest of it.

so what of Four Nights of a Dreamer? New print tonight.

it's coming here in feb -- une femme douce and jeanne d'arc this sunday.

braggin alert - i saw "a man condemned to die has escaped" on the big screen, with a pristine print

it is incredibly intense, basically pure action in the sense of not much talking, tiny noises having huge significance, the relationship of bodies in space driving the plot forward

and i love how the title says it all: the plot is entirely given away, so all that's left is the action of how it happens, and your empathy with this guy being enough to draw you into feeling what he's feeling

lLes Anges du péché and Les Dames de Bois du Boulogne at GSFC last night — a treat to see Les Dames on the big screen but Les Anges was the highlight — probably his most "literary" film, really excellent dialogue and a lot more in common with his later films than I'd expected.

i'd like to come down to chicago to see the ones i haven't seen on the big screen, esp four nights of a dreamer which i've only seen in a nth generation VHS bootleg.

yeah, really excited about that one.

Anyone in this thread planning to see the series at the National Gallery (Washington, DC)?

I am. Hyped for it.

saw A Man Escaped again last week, tot forgot about the teenage Matt Damon type who enters midway.

UGGGH. Netflix has pulled L'Argent from its roster. Saw it years ago but wanted to refresh my memory.

Yeah the New Yorker Video DVD is long OOP. I saw it when Doc Films played it here the year before last and I'll see it again when it plays at GSFC (which would make it my most-watched Bresson).

I watched L'Argent on Hulu Plus a few weeks ago. Don't know if it's still there.

bleh, we're not getting this retro til may

getting it again in Brooklyn in April....

I didn't know this abt Man Escaped:

Original author Andre Devigny served as adviser on the film, which was actually shot in the same Montluc prison where he was incarcerated. Devigny also loaned Bresson the ropes and hooks he had used in his escape.

iirc, l'argent is part of Criterion's hulu lineup, with a dvd/blu forthcoming.

also: Olive films has The Devil, Probably in their pipeline.

Four Nights of a Dreamer was brilliant — certainly explodes the narrative of his oeuvre sliding from bleak to bleaker in his later films. I had read that it was supposedly more "comedic" than his others but I didn't think it would be so funny! I hope a new DVD is in the works.

it has been a while since i saw it but i remember thinking it was kinda bresson's blow up, maybe just in setting - something so funny about even just seeing the bressonian leads hazily marching along against a backdrop of like guitar-strumming parisian folkies

I assigned Pickpocket to my students this week, and they've written well about it.

don't know how my post could be improved on really

though i should have mentioned that the photography is just jawdroppingly gorgeous

just saw Mouchette, it is also great, with perfectly economical storytelling

didn't know Bresson beyond Balthazar before now

all three of the ones I've seen - A Man Escaped, Pickpocket, Mouchette - have a ruthless, closed-off quality

Good description

L'Argent is another incredible film. I really like his style as a director

A Man Escaped is so good. The truncated Gestapo guards in it is something that sticks in the memory, if I'm remembering it right you only see angled/restricted shots of them mostly and that adds to the feeling of de-humanised hopeless dread.

enjoyed reading Ebert's tribute article from when he died in 1999:

https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/robert-bresson-was-master-of-understatement

I like the quote: "If the eye is entirely won, give nothing or almost nothing to the ear. One cannot be at the same time all eye and all ear."

I went to a screening of Pickpocket once and another random guy who was there followed me afterward trying to get me to admit it was pretentious bullshit.

Good one

don't think his films are pretentious but they are on the surface inscrutable

they seem very modest

My post was an xpost to Dan S, but I guess it works either way.

I like that only the most significant moments mattered to him: “He pared down every scene and shot, every movement and utterance of his performers, to the bare essentials. Each situation, image, and sound had to have a sharpness, a freshness, a novelty. That is why Bresson’s cinema is forever modern” (Adrian Martin, Criterion)

don't think his films are pretentious but they are on the surface inscrutable

― Dan S, Friday, November 8, 2019 9:57 PM

Really? His films mean what they say.

I think I mean that he doesn't bother to explain anything, you have to make your own interpretation

Martin's review of L'Argent and Bresson is good I think

https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/4719-l-argent-the-weight-of-the-world

Balthazar is a captivating character, but Au Hasard Balthazar as a film is hard for me to grasp

most of his stuff could not be called easy to grasp

The story focuses on the fate of Balthazar, but there is a lot of incidental nihilism in the events he witnesses

Mari’s “no tenderness, no heart, no feelings” masochism is really heartbreaking, in that sense the film elicits empathy, it's the component of the story that means the most to me

I guess there is a lot to think about with it

most of his stuff could not be called easy to grasp

lol nvm The Devil Probably is a nonpareil masterpiece