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
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 beautifulMy fave remains diary tho
― buzza, Saturday, 2 March 2013 03:46 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=FED1zl5p-kA
― Johnny Too Borad (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 20 March 2013 00:25 (eleven years ago) link
Donald Richie on Au Hasard Balthazar
― Johnny Too Borad (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 20 March 2013 00:30 (eleven years ago) link
A Man Escaped has, to BluRay.
http://www.fandor.com/blog/daily-bressons-a-man-escaped
― Pope Rusty I (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 6 April 2013 22:02 (eleven years ago) link
I watched the Criterion a couple weeks.ago
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 6 April 2013 22:24 (eleven years ago) link
http://vimeo.com/98484833
― tender is the late-night daypart (schlump), Monday, 26 January 2015 05:23 (nine years ago) link
his book, mentioned way back by schlump, is being reissued.
http://hyperallergic.com/337987/an-auteurs-enduring-and-confounding-guide-to-filmmaking/
― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 16 November 2016 21:07 (seven years ago) link
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?
― rob, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 21:25 (seven years ago) link
i don't see why you should bypass it; just know it's not typical of the later stuff.
― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 16 November 2016 21:29 (seven years ago) link
thanks
― rob, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 21:34 (seven years ago) link
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.
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 21:35 (seven years ago) link
otm -- I love early films where an artist's processes are still embryonic (e.g. Tori Amos' debut)
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:11 (seven years ago) link
butter? have no idea how that happened...
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:21 (seven years ago) link
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
― rob, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:25 (seven years ago) link
I butter both halves, personally.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:26 (seven years ago) link
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.
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:36 (seven years ago) link
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.
― Gukbe, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 22:38 (seven years ago) link
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.
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 23:25 (seven years ago) link
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).
― Darcy Sarto (Ward Fowler), Thursday, 17 November 2016 15:23 (seven years ago) link
“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/
― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 17 November 2016 19:41 (seven years ago) link
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
― Darcy Sarto (Ward Fowler), Thursday, 17 November 2016 19:51 (seven years ago) link
notes on the cinematographer is good to dip into
― diary of a mod how's life (wins), Thursday, 17 November 2016 19:57 (seven years ago) link
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.
― calzino, Wednesday, 23 November 2016 01:12 (seven years ago) link
L'Argent creates the same effects with the so-called villains.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 23 November 2016 01:13 (seven years ago) link
RB is Dennis Cooper's fave artist
http://denniscooperblog.com/happy-birthday-to-me-robert-bresson-day-restored/
― Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 11 January 2017 21:13 (seven years ago) link
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.
― Darcy Sarto (Ward Fowler), Wednesday, 11 January 2017 21:43 (seven years ago) link
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 16 November 2016 23:25 (nine months ago)
Oh man the skeletons with their armour still is so grimly effective and surreal that John Boorman re-used it for Excalibur, where knights dying from the plague were hung on trees. Im halfway throguh Lancelot, but I just wanted to reguister how unique the tone is, how great it looks, how Brittanic Arthurian it feels in an uninhibited, unabandoned way.
― glumdalclitch, Tuesday, 29 August 2017 01:30 (six years ago) link
I want to agree with yuo about Diary of a Country Priest though. I haven't watched Jean D'Arc yet.
L'Argent is one of his best, isn't it? I was heistant after Le diable probablement, but this is much more enjoyable.
― glumdalclitch, Tuesday, 6 February 2018 16:17 (six years ago) link
Yep. I bought the Criterion last year, a rarity these days.
― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2018 16:18 (six years ago) link
Saw this image on Facebook today - Tarkovsky, Welles, Bresson at Cannes in 1983
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjK9cD_2JHZAhVM6aQKHbOoCCAQjRx6BAgAEAY&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.pinterest.com%2Fpin%2F790663278303356930%2F&psig=AOvVaw0x-SOHD5705p6ADOBKcCom&ust=1518020338204499
― Agharta Christie (Ward Fowler), Tuesday, 6 February 2018 16:21 (six years ago) link
Reading Bresson's Notes on the Cinematograph, which is half great advice and half "wow, this guy is a massive asshole"
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 14 November 2018 21:12 (five years ago) link
it's only 88 pages, all brief diary entries, aphorisms, self-reminders, and some veiled criticism. there's a lot of fantastic advice and insights, this is the one I've found most true so far:
What no human eye is capable of catching, no pencil, brush, pen of pinning down, your camera catches without knowing what it is, and pins it down with a machine's scrupulous indifference.
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 14 November 2018 21:18 (five years ago) link
I give that book to a friend as a birthday present and then he proceeded to make a great show of adding his own marginal notes to every page and I was thinking “no, dude, don’t go there.”
― Buckaroo Can't Fail (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 14 November 2018 22:02 (five years ago) link
Laugh at a bad reputation. Fear a good one that you could not sustain.
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 14 November 2018 22:56 (five years ago) link
donkey film = perfect film
― flappy bird, Monday, 8 April 2019 16:19 (five years ago) link
just saw A Man Escaped, it was pretty great!
― Dan S, Wednesday, 9 October 2019 02:16 (four years ago) link
Gonna assign Pickpocket to my students next week as an example of sound design and editing.
― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 9 October 2019 02:20 (four years ago) link
that's my next one
― Dan S, Wednesday, 9 October 2019 02:21 (four years ago) link
also just noticed that Diary of a Country Priest is on the criterion channel
― Dan S, Wednesday, 9 October 2019 02:26 (four years ago) link