Pigs and Battleships
Thank you for recognizing the transcendent cinematic power of this donkey picture. Even though this is probably not even my favorite Bresson picture (right now that would be PICKPOCKET), there are scenes in this movie that I would count among my very favorite in all of cinema. It's regrettable that Bresson falls into this odd nether-region as an auteur. That is, most of the world has never heard of him, and many who have cannot make it past the idea that he is someone they are "supposed" to like, and that his films are cold and forbidding. The final scene of this film pretty much had me blubbering like an infant. I was many miles away from mere intellectual admiration.
Damn straight, bud. Bresson's "genius" is never more evident than that last shot, which is possibly the most powerfully unaffected shot in the movies, or at least after the slipper shot in TOKYO STORY.
Also, check out SECRET SHOES. It is pretty fucking insane.
Hey bud, how come you haven't dressed down Le Chuck for saying about PURPLE (C ... poor) BUTTERFLY that it "is such a Ryan movie."
And Bresson's donkey movie is so boring I don't even want to see it.
I *will* have something to say about PURPLE BUTTERFLY soon enough. Good to see you alive & kicking, bud. And you might actually go for Bresson's donkey movie. I'm serious.
Well, there's no way I won't see ROBERT BRESSON'S JACKASS (it's coming to Washington this spring). But it's more from duty than high expectations -- of the seven Bressons I've seen, five are "con" or "CON." The two exceptions are A MAN ESCAPED (PRO) and BOIS DE BOULOGNE (pro). This is officially a trend in my opinion.
I know you don't like L'ARGENT and DIARY OF A COUNTRY PRIEST, but you're con on PICKPOCKET?!?
I'm not much of a fan of BOIS DE BOULOGNE, which struck me as a mismatch of material and director (Ophuls woulda rocked it).
In any case, like PICKPOCKET and A MAN ESCAPES, I think BALTHAZAR is both a magnificent expression of a singular style (reducing cinema to its essential building blocks) *and* a deeply committed, "spiritual" film. As Waz notes, it happens to have one of the great closing shots in cinema, which lifts it up a notch for me. But I don't want to oversell this to a Bresson skeptic. Mike's 40something might be a better gauge.
(But having just seen THE SON, it's difficult to figure out why you'd bite on Dardennes' single-minded and "essentialist" style but not its antecedent: mid-period Bresson.)
"Word" on the better director for BOIS DE BOULOGNE. That would have rocked. It's also the least Bressonian Bresson movie.
Why did I bite on THE SON? Because Gourmet is a great actor with a great face. Because the Dardennes don't have Bresson's flat, deterministic, Jansenist and anti-psychological style, which I usually find insufferable (the gambling trip to London in PICKPOCKET is, in a nutshell, why Bresson gives me jock-itch).
And I guess because I always knew why I was watching THE SON and LA PROMESSE (and even ROSETTA, which I only come across as not-liking because Gabe pushes me that way). What is Olivier going to do? Is the boy going to turn in his father? Will she get a job? This is not thick or necessarily suspenseful plotting (I saw THE SON with a history professor at Howard who found it boring and slow), But they're *something* but I need *something* to hang my hat on while I'm watching the movie. Bresson reminds me of cold script readings at the audition and narrated in the style of a Barney episode.
It's Rohmer with neither common grace nor secular pleasure.
Generic Viagra
Online Generic Viagra
buy generic viagra cialis
Cialis works the same way as Viagra. Both the drugs enhance blood flow to the groin area. The major point of
difference is that Cialis remains effective for a 36-hour time period, compared to just four hours with
Viagra. In addition, Cialis can take effect slightly faster than Viagra. They each take effect in up to 30
minutes, give or take a few minutes. The best part about Cialis is that it offers the couple more
flexibility.
Commenting by HaloScan
