Filed under: 1950's, Bresson, Robert, Cinematheque, French, Uncategorized
Robert Bresson
France 1959 BW
Disappointing film. Loosely and poorly based on Crime and Punishment. Plot bad – filmmaking worse.
Horrible trait of presenting the characters on screen and than narrating all their actions and thoughts, rather than allowing the scenes to present themselves (in the first person). Thus he stands: thoughts are narrated. He walks: the narrator describes where he is going. He goes to the racetrack: the film contains not a single shot of a racing horse.
Fortunately the film forgets Dostoevsky at some points, forgets to be clever, and produces some rather effective and exciting scenes of various pick-pocketing methods, in particular in very clever sequences with three pickpockets working together. These scenes are what must account for the status and description of this as a remarkable film. I have seen worse – I have seen far better.
