"A Man Escaped" is my favorite black and white
Bresson, slosely followed by "Pickpocket" and "Au
Hasard Balthazar."

"Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne" us in a class (and
world) unto itself.

I don't know what to say about your dislike of his
color film as I consider "Le Diable Probablement" to
be one of his crowning achievements.

--- Paul <forlino@...> wrote:

> Yesterday I received in the mail the videotape
> (published by Kino
> Video) of Diary of a Country Priest. I watched the
> entire thing.
> I'm devastated. I've truly never been so
> profoundly moved by any
> film as this. I'd seen it 30 years ago, at Melnitz
> Hall in UCLA,
> and it never left my memory; but in that version the
> narrator's voice
> was dubbed (by a man with a British accent) rather
> than having
> subtitles. I mean, the actual voices of the actors
> speaking on
> screen weren't dubbed -- (those did have subtitles)
> -- but just the
> narrator's voice, including the concluding words
> about the priest's
> death. But now for the first time I saw the whole
> movie with
> complete subtitles --- no voice-dubbing in English
> at all, and thus I
> could hear Claude Laydu actually speaking even
> during the narration,
> and his beautiful acting both in the sound of his
> voice as well as
> his expressions. Now I want to try to find Les
> Dames du Bois de
> Boulogne on videotape or DVD -- since I don't have
> it in my
> collection. And also Pickpocket, which I love.
> What do any of of
> you members of this group think is Bresson's finest
> black-and-white
> film, by the way? I found the following review
> of "Diary" --
>
>
http://www.imagesjournal.com/2004/reviews/diary/text.htm
> - and
> in it, the author Gary Morris states: "....And
> while it perhaps
> lacks the unassailable brilliance of A Man Escaped,
> Pickpocket,
> Balthazar, and Mouchette, the film is both a
> considerable formal
> achievement and a crucial precursor of the modern
> cinema of
> alienation." I wonder what he's referring to by
> "unassailable
> brilliance". The cinematography? A sense of
> "refinement"?
> Lighthandedness? One thing I loved in "Diary" is
> the way
> occasionally a scene will gradually "fade" out,
> overlapping into the
> beginning of the following scene, which imparts a
> poetic and loving
> quality. And the occasional soft focus in the film
> reminds me of
> Renoir's 1930's films. I'm wondering whether I
> should try to find
> the Criterion DVD version. Is anyone familiar with
> it -- and how it
> compares to the Kino Video tape? Any advice would
> be appreciated.
> This might sound like heresy to some of the Bresson
> admirers in this
> group but I just can't take a liking to Bresson's
> color films.. I
> love all of his B/W feature films (including Les
> Anges du Peche).
>
> ----- Paul
>
> (e-mail address.... forlino@...)
>
>
>




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