The Films of Robert Bresson

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.

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, 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.

L'Arent is in color and also probably his best film other than, depending on my mood, the ass Christ.

Une Femme Douce is in color and probably his most visually-gorgeous film. Not very cheery, though.

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

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.

Every time I hear pebbles crunching under feet I think of Bresson

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.

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?

Now think I'd put Mouchette #2 behind Man Escaped.

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.

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?

I was, yes. Was really impressed with L'Argent.

http://www.filmcomment.com/entry/kent-jones-and-b-kite-on-bresson-part-one

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.

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?

Diary of a Country Priest. Mouchette. Then move to the colour ones, specifically Lancelot and L'Argent.

L'Argent is my favorite.

still havent seen 'au hasard' or 'priest' but my faves are devil probably and mouchette

Thanks I'll probably go the Gukbe route.

L'ARGENT also my favorite.

diary of a country priest!

awesome vampire scenes too

Une femme douce and four nights of a dreamer are ones I've checked out in the last couple of years after seeing the "essentials"
Both so beautiful
My fave remains diary tho

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=FED1zl5p-kA

Donald Richie on Au Hasard Balthazar

A Man Escaped has, to BluRay.

http://www.fandor.com/blog/daily-bressons-a-man-escaped

I watched the Criterion a couple weeks.ago

http://vimeo.com/98484833

his book, mentioned way back by schlump, is being reissued.

http://hyperallergic.com/337987/an-auteurs-enduring-and-confounding-guide-to-filmmaking/

What do people think of Les dames du Bois de Boulogne? I've managed to somehow not seen any of his films, but Les dames is playing this weekend. I get that it's probably not the best place to start with Bresson, but would it be, I don't know, an actually bad place to begin?

i don't see why you should bypass it; just know it's not typical of the later stuff.

thanks

Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne is great, has some really breathtaking scenes. It's definitely an early work, but I'd butter it in the better half of his.

otm -- I love early films where an artist's processes are still embryonic (e.g. Tori Amos' debut)

butter? have no idea how that happened...

tbh Bresson's rep for emotional devastation is one reason I haven't gone out of my way to see, eg, the donkey, so I was actually pretty intrigued by Les Dames, which sounds a little too mannered to be too depressing (?). Just thought I'd check in with y'all since the thread got bumped

I butter both halves, personally.

The Donkey is overrated. I also rewatched Mouchette recently, and was a bit disappointed, remembered it better. I think his fifties films are the best, of course, but after that I prefer his 70's films like Four Nights of the Dreamer and The Devil, Probably. But they're advanced work, they definitely only work if you accept the style completely. Lancelot is a bridge too far, even for me.

Lancelot and Country Priest are my two favourites. I wouldn't say The Donkey is overrated but it's the closest to that bridge too far for me.

Lancelot is just too silly... I mean, the skeleton hanging from a tree with his armor still on... Every Bresson film has a minimalist feel, but Lancelot just feels too wrong to me. And it's not just because it's a historical film, Jeanne d'Arc is much better. Agreed on Country Priest, that one is fantastic, though.

Balthazar is the best - the scene where the donkey encounters the other caged animals in particular is a transcendent bit of filmmaking. I don't understand what this 'bridge too far' business means in this context, but Lancelot is great as well, even if the echoes with Monty Python and the Holy Grail (especially the way violence is treated in both of them) is a bit disconcerting.

The only Bresson I've seen that comes close to being a disappointment is A Gentle Woman (haven't watched Four Nights of a Dreamer).

“I began writing these notes 20 years ago. At that time, I still went to see films. Now I don’t go any more. I’ll tell you why: I don’t go, as I say in the book, because I can’t abide these actors who—in close-ups that reveal every detail—are there only to provide mimicry and theatrical gestures. And this feeling has grown even stronger—something has changed and I simply can’t do it, I can’t bear to see it or hear it.”

http://lithub.com/robert-bresson-im-not-a-director-i-am-a-filmmaker/

Another link which I saw shared on Facebook. There was some chat that Bresson was a bit of a big fibber sometimes, that he was in fact a frequent moviegoer, and that he continued to work with 'professional' actors throughout his career.

http://www.publicbooks.org/artmedia/the-intrusion-artist

notes on the cinematographer is good to dip into

A Man Escaped is such an amazing movie. It maintains the doomy tautness to the death and has really brilliant use of off camera events and truncated faceless nazis to create atmosphere of indifferent evil. Brilliant use of Mozart as well.

L'Argent creates the same effects with the so-called villains.

RB is Dennis Cooper's fave artist

http://denniscooperblog.com/happy-birthday-to-me-robert-bresson-day-restored/

A Facebook friend asked just the other day if there was any 'good' anti-Bresson criticism; as with Ozu, it seems thin on the ground.