yeah, really excited about that one.
― tanuki, Sunday, 29 January 2012 21:42 (twelve years ago) link
Anyone in this thread planning to see the series at the National Gallery (Washington, DC)?
― stop me before i eat again (j.lu), Monday, 30 January 2012 15:42 (twelve years ago) link
I am. Hyped for it.
― encarta it (Gukbe), Monday, 30 January 2012 15:43 (twelve years ago) link
saw A Man Escaped again last week, tot forgot about the teenage Matt Damon type who enters midway.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Monday, 30 January 2012 15:44 (twelve years ago) link
UGGGH. Netflix has pulled L'Argent from its roster. Saw it years ago but wanted to refresh my memory.
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 30 January 2012 15:45 (twelve years ago) link
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).
― tanuki, Monday, 30 January 2012 15:55 (twelve years ago) link
I watched L'Argent on Hulu Plus a few weeks ago. Don't know if it's still there.
― circa1916, Monday, 30 January 2012 21:13 (twelve years ago) link
bleh, we're not getting this retro til may
― donna rouge, Monday, 30 January 2012 22:02 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Monday, 30 January 2012 22:25 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― Lady Writer, Male Seether (C. Grisso/McCain), Monday, 30 January 2012 22:26 (twelve years ago) link
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.
― tanuki, Sunday, 5 February 2012 21:08 (twelve years ago) link
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
― quick brown fox triangle (schlump), Sunday, 5 February 2012 23:39 (twelve years ago) link
Posting on Bresson during the Super Bowl--the most solitary of the solitary.
― clemenza, Sunday, 5 February 2012 23:44 (twelve years ago) link
I watched the first quarter, now I'm over here to see what's buzzing
― Hambone Italiano (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 6 February 2012 00:01 (twelve years ago) link
― quick brown fox triangle (schlump), Sunday, February 5, 2012 5:39 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
guitar-strumming parisian BOSSA NOVA band. on a BARGE. for the win.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Monday, 6 February 2012 03:18 (twelve years ago) link
How does it compare to this Bossa Nova? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNuMoVqKEuE
― Hambone Italiano (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 6 February 2012 03:43 (twelve years ago) link
it's in b+w.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Monday, 6 February 2012 05:46 (twelve years ago) link
no it isn't!
― tanuki, Monday, 6 February 2012 05:48 (twelve years ago) link
yes, it is. the bresson.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Monday, 6 February 2012 05:57 (twelve years ago) link
no, it isn't actually.
is it?
see what i did there?
actually i just forgot.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Monday, 6 February 2012 05:58 (twelve years ago) link
it is a very 'blue' film iircty for bossa nova clarification
― quick brown fox triangle (schlump), Monday, 6 February 2012 11:16 (twelve years ago) link
Looking forward to A Man Escaped tonight, the start of our Toronto series. Bart Testa, one of my film professors 30 years ago (he does the Frank Zappa entry in the first Rolling Stone Record Guide), is introducing.
― clemenza, Thursday, 9 February 2012 21:01 (twelve years ago) link
I ended up seeing five of these: A Man Escaped, Mouchette, Diary of a Country Priest, Angels of Sin, and Four Nights of a Dreamer. I went in tired every time, so staying alert was a struggle. A Man Escaped, which I'd never seen and thought I'd like, I didn't care for at all. Mouchette was good, but when you know you're not nearly as moved at the end as you're supposed to be, that's a problem. I liked Four Nights of a Dreamer, which I saw today, best. I guess this a Kael thing, but after the pronounced flatness of the first four, it was a relief to have some beautiful colour photography, a little music, and pretty girls. The lead guy, who looks so much like a young Scorsese in the still you always see, had some good comic timing reminiscent of Jean-Pierre Léaud at times.
http://altscreen.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/four-nights.jpg
― clemenza, Monday, 12 March 2012 00:13 (twelve years ago) link
Meant to add, I think Woody Allen may have gotten the idea for Annie Hall's penultimate scene--where Alvy's play fixes everything that went wrong in his final meeting with Annie--from Four Nights.
― clemenza, Monday, 12 March 2012 00:18 (twelve years ago) link
those elements you list are why I found 4 Nights to be his most "ordinary," if that's the word.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Monday, 12 March 2012 00:45 (twelve years ago) link
Other Bresson films have different virtues but Pickpocket (which I know isn't on your list) and A Man Escaped generate, in my judgment real suspense.
They're also very short.
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 12 March 2012 00:51 (twelve years ago) link
I saw Pickpocket years ago and think I liked it fine (can't be sure, though). Four Nights is definitely the odd film out. I'm sure my general susceptibility to the look and feel of '70s films is a part of what I liked--hard to believe that that would apply to a Bresson film, but Four Nights felt very much of its era.
― clemenza, Monday, 12 March 2012 00:56 (twelve years ago) link
Clemenza, you were at the Lightbox in Toronto, right? I hope you weren't sitting in the back next to me, and if you were, I apologize for all of my fidgeting and distracting behaviour. It wouldn't have happened if only I got there earlier.
I was real confused by the way the female lead acted. I think it's because she delivered all of her lines in that mildly apprehensive tone, but I found it somewhat difficult to believe she could really be in love with anyone. And what a cocktease too. It is very likely that I missed the whole point of the film.
― ascai, Monday, 12 March 2012 01:28 (twelve years ago) link
L'Arent is in color and also probably his best film other than, depending on my mood, the ass Christ.
― Eric H., Monday, 12 March 2012 01:38 (twelve years ago) link
Une Femme Douce is in color and probably his most visually-gorgeous film. Not very cheery, though.
― tanuki, Monday, 12 March 2012 01:42 (twelve years ago) link
xpost I can't think of another filmmaker who could spend minutes on someone taking money from an ATM (admittedly fraudulently) and have it feel like the most riveting cinema evah
― Eric H., Monday, 12 March 2012 01:45 (twelve years ago) link
Ascai: that's funny--I'm a tyrant about noise, but no, I didn't hear a thing. (I was towards the front-left.) As my friend pointed out to me, the female lead was Léaud's former girlfriend in The Mother and the Whore. She seemed comparable to the female leads in the other Bressons I saw. I thought her sudden choice at the end was effectively hurtful.
― clemenza, Monday, 12 March 2012 01:46 (twelve years ago) link
Every time I hear pebbles crunching under feet I think of Bresson
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 12 March 2012 01:47 (twelve years ago) link
Four Nights of a Dreamer def got more laughs out of an audience than any other bresson film i've seen (low bar, but still). quite beautiful as well.
― buzza, Monday, 12 March 2012 02:54 (twelve years ago) link
i also recall Four Nights as odd in that it was so 70's, i saw it like 10 years ago and was so thrown off because it wasn't what i expected. wikipedia tells me there are quite a few films made of this story (White Nights, Dostoevsky).. is it really that maudlin in the original russian or is this a translation issue?
― seriously, THIS GUY (daria-g), Monday, 12 March 2012 03:42 (twelve years ago) link
Now think I'd put Mouchette #2 behind Man Escaped.
― Literal Facepalms (Dr Morbius), Monday, 12 March 2012 04:11 (twelve years ago) link
Went to see Lancelot Du Lac earlier today, which is starting to rival Diary of a Country Priest for my "favourite Bresson film". I adore it. Audience I saw it with didn't seem too keen based on grumblings upon exit.
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Sunday, 1 April 2012 05:49 (twelve years ago) link
I'm afraid I was one of those who weren't very into Lancelot, even if I didn't say anything out loud. But I really liked Jeanne d'Arc.
Were you at Une Femme Douce/L'Argent tonight?
― Seraphim? I don't even know him! (j.lu), Monday, 2 April 2012 01:52 (twelve years ago) link
I was, yes. Was really impressed with L'Argent.
― stay in school if you want to kiw (Gukbe), Monday, 2 April 2012 01:57 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.filmcomment.com/entry/kent-jones-and-b-kite-on-bresson-part-one
― old people are made of poop (Eric H.), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 13:08 (eleven years ago) link
Jone's essay was really good.
Video essay was tedious. If any film sequence doesn't need that treatment, it's the LdL tournament one.
― Fas Ro Duh (Gukbe), Tuesday, 19 June 2012 17:18 (eleven years ago) link
I've seen Au Hasard Balthazar, A Man Escaped and Pickpocket. I think AHB and AME are a smidge better than Pickpocket. What should I see next?
― you're going home in a crispy ambulance (cajunsunday), Friday, 1 March 2013 13:19 (eleven years ago) link
Diary of a Country Priest. Mouchette. Then move to the colour ones, specifically Lancelot and L'Argent.
― Gukbe, Friday, 1 March 2013 13:29 (eleven years ago) link
L'Argent is my favorite.
― Zero Dark 33⅓: The Final Insult (Eric H.), Friday, 1 March 2013 13:32 (eleven years ago) link
still havent seen 'au hasard' or 'priest' but my faves are devil probably and mouchette
― johnny crunch, Friday, 1 March 2013 14:07 (eleven years ago) link
Thanks I'll probably go the Gukbe route.
― you're going home in a crispy ambulance (cajunsunday), Friday, 1 March 2013 19:25 (eleven years ago) link
L'ARGENT also my favorite.
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 1 March 2013 19:29 (eleven years ago) link
diary of a country priest!
― kiubonaco (wolves lacan), Saturday, 2 March 2013 02:07 (eleven years ago) link