drivingman's review against another edition
4.0
In this collection of notes Bresson details his minimalist method of filmmaking. It reads like poetry. It's made of one-off phrases such as "the ejaculatory force of the eye" and "noise of a door opening and shutting, noise of footsteps, etc., for the sake of rhythm." There are musings on the actions one does without thinking, or "automatism," and on film's distinction from theater.
"NEITHER THE DIRECTOR NOR SCENARIO-WRITER. FORGET YOU ARE MAKING A FILM."
"Be as ignorant of what you are going to catch as is a fisherman of what is at the end of his fishing rod. (The fish that arises from nowhere.)"
"NEITHER THE DIRECTOR NOR SCENARIO-WRITER. FORGET YOU ARE MAKING A FILM."
"Be as ignorant of what you are going to catch as is a fisherman of what is at the end of his fishing rod. (The fish that arises from nowhere.)"
grasonpoling's review against another edition
4.0
(4.5)
“To find a kinship between image, sound and silence. To give them the air of being glad together, of having chosen their place.”
“To find a kinship between image, sound and silence. To give them the air of being glad together, of having chosen their place.”
krobcecil's review against another edition
4.0
In which Bresson invents Film Twitter.
My one issue is that the more prescriptive insistences about models v. actors Bresson makes, the less convincing and more defensive he seems. That said, the practice unquestionably worked for him. More importantly, every single note here is an invitation to reevaluate assumptions about cinema and to keep pressing it forward.
My one issue is that the more prescriptive insistences about models v. actors Bresson makes, the less convincing and more defensive he seems. That said, the practice unquestionably worked for him. More importantly, every single note here is an invitation to reevaluate assumptions about cinema and to keep pressing it forward.
jacquesdevilliers's review against another edition
4.0
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.
Your film will have the beauty, or the sadness, or what have you, that one finds in a town, in a countryside, in a house, and not the beauty, sadness, etc. that one finds in the photograph of a town, a countryside, or a house.
If, on the screen, the mechanism disappears and the phrases you have made them say, the gestures you have made them make, have become one with your models, with your film, with you - then a miracle.
To create is not to deform or invent persons and things. It is to tie new relationships between persons and things which are, and as they are.
Against the tactics of speed, of noise, set tactics of slowness, of silence.
Dig deep where you are. Don't slip off elsewhere.
Your film will have the beauty, or the sadness, or what have you, that one finds in a town, in a countryside, in a house, and not the beauty, sadness, etc. that one finds in the photograph of a town, a countryside, or a house.
If, on the screen, the mechanism disappears and the phrases you have made them say, the gestures you have made them make, have become one with your models, with your film, with you - then a miracle.
To create is not to deform or invent persons and things. It is to tie new relationships between persons and things which are, and as they are.
Against the tactics of speed, of noise, set tactics of slowness, of silence.
Dig deep where you are. Don't slip off elsewhere.
atticmoth's review against another edition
challenging
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
Robert Bresson’s Notes sur le cinématographe was my favorite professor’s textbook of choice in film school, and I see why. She would have us choose one of Bresson’s famous aphorisms (“Let it be the intimate union of the images that charges them with emotion”) and shoot a short inspired by it or using the technique that he puts forth. It’s only now that I read it through completely (and in French for the first time). The book is composed solely of these poetic little witticisms, taken from Bresson’s journals, and if I were to read it all at once I wouldn’t understand his philosophy as well as I do having read just a page a day. I’ve only seen one of Bresson’s films, Pickpocket, and I can’t say I loved it, but his style was immediately obvious. Perhaps I should say lack of style: Sidney Lumet said “Good style, to me, is unseen style. It is style that is felt.” Bresson shows a tremendous commitment to naturalism and denounces a lot of techniques that he sees as disingenuous. There’s a commitment to depicting truth and reality; he calls actors “models” which is perhaps lost in translation but he doesn’t mean it in an objectifying way, he uses this technique to strip away layers of theatrical performance so the underlying raw emotion is felt onscreen. One of the things he perhaps unfairly criticizes throughout is theatricality (somehow managing to call Dreyer’s Passion of Joan of Arc “masquerade”), which he sees as representing the inauthentic in every way. This stands in stark opposition to Lumet’s philosophy, which grew out of the time he spent in theater and live television, and his mastery disproves Bresson’s point. I couldn’t recommend one over the other because they complement each other; I think any masterclass in film would include both Bresson’s Notes sur le cinématographe and Lumet’s Making Movies.
nick_lehotsky's review against another edition
3.0
Some nice nuggets of advice and observations! The context (though more often the lack of it) renders some of the bulleted jottings irksomely obfuscating, but Bresson’s nods to other artists (particularly those in other mediums) captivates.