Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne (1945)
Country: FR
Technical: bw 84m
Director: Robert Bresson
Cast: Maria Casarès, Paul Bernard, Elina Labourdette
Synopsis:
A woman breaks off her relationship with a man who she senses has ceased to love her, and takes her revenge by quietly arranging for him to meet and be entranced by a dancer on hard times.
Review:
Based on a tale from Diderot's Jacques le fataliste, in which a man is tricked into marrying a prostitute, Bresson's second film, scripted by Jean Cocteau, transplants all of this to a vaguely identifiable present in which all the scandalous implications of the narrative are airbrushed out of existence. For example, the mother, who is no better than an 'entremetteuse' for her daughter, is nevertheless tenderly attached to her wellbeing. The title, which refers to both mother and daughter, is a nodding allusion by which any French audience might guess at the true depths of Agnès's fall in the film, and the appropriateness of Hélène engineering their meeting there (it is a long-established haunt of prostitutes). Cocteau's dialogue meanwhile occupies an ethereal super-reality, focusing on the inner sentiments of the characters in a manner akin to the very sentimental novel Diderot was satirising in the first place. Naturally, Bresson allows little of the tawdry to reveal itself openly, and the film is an awkward affair, lacking the treatment it deserved from a Clouzot, say, and yet depriving its director of the prime materials he would ultimately need to express himself: Casarès was a star, and she dominates the film.
Country: FR
Technical: bw 84m
Director: Robert Bresson
Cast: Maria Casarès, Paul Bernard, Elina Labourdette
Synopsis:
A woman breaks off her relationship with a man who she senses has ceased to love her, and takes her revenge by quietly arranging for him to meet and be entranced by a dancer on hard times.
Review:
Based on a tale from Diderot's Jacques le fataliste, in which a man is tricked into marrying a prostitute, Bresson's second film, scripted by Jean Cocteau, transplants all of this to a vaguely identifiable present in which all the scandalous implications of the narrative are airbrushed out of existence. For example, the mother, who is no better than an 'entremetteuse' for her daughter, is nevertheless tenderly attached to her wellbeing. The title, which refers to both mother and daughter, is a nodding allusion by which any French audience might guess at the true depths of Agnès's fall in the film, and the appropriateness of Hélène engineering their meeting there (it is a long-established haunt of prostitutes). Cocteau's dialogue meanwhile occupies an ethereal super-reality, focusing on the inner sentiments of the characters in a manner akin to the very sentimental novel Diderot was satirising in the first place. Naturally, Bresson allows little of the tawdry to reveal itself openly, and the film is an awkward affair, lacking the treatment it deserved from a Clouzot, say, and yet depriving its director of the prime materials he would ultimately need to express himself: Casarès was a star, and she dominates the film.
Country: FR
Technical: bw 84m
Director: Robert Bresson
Cast: Maria Casarès, Paul Bernard, Elina Labourdette
Synopsis:
A woman breaks off her relationship with a man who she senses has ceased to love her, and takes her revenge by quietly arranging for him to meet and be entranced by a dancer on hard times.
Review:
Based on a tale from Diderot's Jacques le fataliste, in which a man is tricked into marrying a prostitute, Bresson's second film, scripted by Jean Cocteau, transplants all of this to a vaguely identifiable present in which all the scandalous implications of the narrative are airbrushed out of existence. For example, the mother, who is no better than an 'entremetteuse' for her daughter, is nevertheless tenderly attached to her wellbeing. The title, which refers to both mother and daughter, is a nodding allusion by which any French audience might guess at the true depths of Agnès's fall in the film, and the appropriateness of Hélène engineering their meeting there (it is a long-established haunt of prostitutes). Cocteau's dialogue meanwhile occupies an ethereal super-reality, focusing on the inner sentiments of the characters in a manner akin to the very sentimental novel Diderot was satirising in the first place. Naturally, Bresson allows little of the tawdry to reveal itself openly, and the film is an awkward affair, lacking the treatment it deserved from a Clouzot, say, and yet depriving its director of the prime materials he would ultimately need to express himself: Casarès was a star, and she dominates the film.