The director said that poetry and reality are sisters

Toy 2022-01-12 08:01:26

April 1960, "Friends of the Film" Amis du film


Michel d'Hoop: Do you know how dry some people think "Pickpocket" is?

Robert Bresson: They didn't realize that in order to create, the first thing to do is to trim and remove. Also: to choose. The worst hidden dangers of a film are impurity, overfilling, and disorder. Too many incompatible things are revealed at the same time. Dramatic art (which is a completely different creation) was introduced and then ruined everything. I force myself to capture reality — fragments of reality, as pure fragments as possible — and arrange them in a certain order. This may give a layman audience a kind of asceticism or even a kind of dry impression, which he can't find in ordinary films, and this may surprise him by comparison.

Dupp: "Pickpocket" is notable because of the extremely constrained style of the character's lines, which is more than your other films. You seem to be looking for an increasingly asceticist art of speaking.

Bresson: You have to know that people have connected film writing to drama. Out of convenience, laziness, or lack of imagination. Nowadays, the challenge of film writing is to stay away from drama. The visual language that belongs only to itself is diametrically opposed to the usual speech form. The effects and exaggerations of professional actors will only increase the already overflowing things. Sadly, the habit has been formed. We have enrolled the audience in a school. It is not easy to drive them away. My character borrowed a tone, which is neither a drama, nor a general film, nor a life-although it is very close. One day I surprised myself because I said to one of my performers: Talk like you talk to yourself. The focus is only to emphasize the movement from the outside to the inside. I understand this as the core movement of film writing, which is the opposite of the drama (from the inside to the outside).

Dupp: In "Pickpocket" there is very little dialogue between two people who are destined to love each other.

Bresson: Love does not always express itself through a lot of words. It is often silent, in fact. Moreover, love is one of the deeper story lines in "Pickpocket". It is important to keep it in a state that is just reachable.

Dupp: After listening to what you just said, it seems to mean that everything is completely decided before you shoot. However, you often talk about improvisation.

Bresson: Yes. With each film, my door to improvisation has opened wider and wider. But the infrastructure is unchanged. Moreover, what prevents me from falling into the trap of overly pre-designed shots is the use of non-professional actors. Although I direct them to a certain meaning, I will let them surprise me.

Dupp: Don't you fear that they will do something contrary to your intentions?

Bresson: If I chose them not because of the appearance type but because of the moral similarity with my role, if I did not make a mistake when choosing them, then there would be no such risk. During the shooting, I became aware of them, and they also became aware of me.

Dupp: Your deconstruction of similar behavior is excellent. That is poetry. You succeeded in making us feel close to your protagonist, Michel, because everything he did seemed natural and very real.

Bresson: That's because poetry and reality are sisters. Contrary to what we generally think, the poems on the screen are not born from a set of poetic images or a paragraph of poetic text, but from a set of real details-or more accurately a combination of them.

Dupp: You have already talked about the shooting aspect, can you talk about the editing aspect?

Bresson: Editing is the placement of every visual and sound element of the film-extremely precise placement. These elements are recorded individually, and in my system, they don't gain life until I arrange them to touch each other. By then, they should look like they never want to be separated again.

Dupp: Do you give sound a lot of importance?

Bresson: The sound element has a strong suggestive ability. But they must first be decomposed (I'm thinking about the sound of the street in "Pickpocket", or the sound of Gare de Lyon) and then recomposed. If you don't do that, you will only get terrible noise. We think what we hear is not what we hear. Shots taken in crowds (in real crowds) are equally challenging. It is very difficult for me to be precise in those environments. From it there are almost insurmountable problems.

Dupp: What makes you want to pursue such a big difficulty?

Bresson: Capture real needs. A reappearance, even if well directed, can produce very different results.

Dupp: As a concluding remark on the technical aspects, I must congratulate you for those panoramic panning and motion lenses...

Bresson: ...and we didn't notice them.

Dupp: Why don't you want us to see the movement of the camera?

Bresson: First of all, because this is not about the trajectory of an eye, but about an eye consciousness. Secondly, because all techniques should remain hidden.

Dupp: Did you conceive your subject from a dramatic perspective?

Bresson: Drama is created by dramatists. In "Pickpocket", just as in my previous film "Death Convict Escape", the drama is that there is no drama. There is no drama in the prison, at least there is no visible drama. On the surface, there is nothing. Drama becomes an inner thing. The theme of a film does not have to be conceived in the way that the theme of a novel is conceived. Moreover, I have a strong vision for a film that has no theme at all, or has a thousand themes at the same time. The practice of imposing the kind of plot we expect in a drama or novel on a film unintentionally limits its field of activity, and it is vast.

Dupp: However, in "Pickpocket", there is a drama about conceit...

Bresson: ...It is not visible. It flows from the character and its actions. It is not the subject of this film.

Dupp: Where did the religious and spiritual aspects of "Pickpocket" come from?

Bresson: The objects and creatures in it are definitely seen from a specific angle unique to me.

Dupp: In "Pickpocket", you show a kind of fondness for opponents, which is reminiscent of "Death Convict Escape".

Bresson: Hands are like people. They have their own intelligence, their own will. They (often) take themselves to places where we did not direct them. * They may take the pickpocket where he does not want to go.

Dupp: You seem to be fascinated by certain scenes: the stairwell...

Bresson: As a place, a stairwell is no less than a bedroom. After the chaos on the street, you entered the quiet home space from the stairwell. It is an important place in daily life.

Dupp: Why are all your films omitted?

Bresson: The editor invited the audience in. The ideal situation should be for the audience to see, feel, and understand the film, everyone in their own way.

Dupp: However, you seem to develop certain specific themes-for example, it is impossible for a person to be happy alone.

Bresson: I don't develop anything; I don't prove anything. I imagine a character, place him in a certain situation, and then watch his behavior (from an inner perspective).


Notes:

Gare de Lyon (Gare de Lyon) was built in 1849 in the 12th arrondissement to the south east of Paris. Before the second-generation station house was built in 1855, it was called L'embarcadère de Lyon (L'embarcadère de Lyon). The iconic clock tower was built during the reconstruction of the Paris World Expo in 1900.

* Quoted from the French essayist and philosopher Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592), which can be found in the earliest new edition of Essais ( Essais ) published behind him : "La main se porte souvent où nous ne l'envoyons pas", Volume I, Chapter 21, " De la force de l'imagination " ( De la force de l'imagination ), Bordeaux: Marie de Gournay, 1595, p. 35v.

View more about Pickpocket reviews

Extended Reading
  • Shannon 2022-03-21 09:02:46

    Just like a documentary, the minimalism that is admired is slightly ingenious, the scenes in silence are intriguing, and the rhythm editing is remarkable. Tension, a group of pictures of gangs committing crimes on the train are presented like flowing clouds and flowing water. Even if there are routines in some videos, they are also beautiful routines...

  • Hope 2022-03-24 09:03:01

    Watching someone stealing wallets on the subway was stunned. One watched an eyeliner cut, a passerby crossed the back of a passerby, followed but stopped at the back of the target object. The camera was neither a pov nor an object, but stopped in the middle! Later, after stealing the wallet, it was found and forced to be forced to steal the man's foot. fat rope is close

Pickpocket quotes

  • Michel: I can be honest. At least let me try.

  • Michel: These walls, these bars -- I don't care. I don't even see them.