o signo do dragão

2012-02-02T00:22:00.007-02:00

Raramente iam ao concerto, menos ainda ao teatro. Mas se encontravam, sem ter combinado, na Cinemateca, no Passy, no Napoléon, ou nesses cineminhas de bairro, o Kursaal, em Gobelins, o Texas, em Montparnasse, o Bikini, o Mexico, na praça Clichy, o Alcazar, em Belleville, outros mais, perto da Bastilha ou no Quinzième, essas salas sem graça, mal equipadas, que pareciam ser frequentadas apenas por uma clientela heterogênea de desempregados, argelinos, velhos solteirões, cinéfilos, e que programavam, em infames versões dubladas, essas obras-primas desconhecidas das quais eles se lembravam desde os quinze anos, ou esses filmes com fama de geniais, cuja lista sabiam de cor e que, fazia anos, tentavam ver, sem conseguir.

2012-02-01T20:03:00.004-02:00

That's precisely why we're trying to make movies - so that future Foucaults won't be able to make such assertions with quite such assurance.

(...) there's nothing in the Nazism of linguistics we have any use for.

2012-02-01T20:01:00.001-02:00

FEATURE FILM WITH VIDEO ESSAY: Brian De Palma's RAISING CAIN is re-cut

2012-01-30T04:09:00.001-02:00

2012-01-26T17:01:00.003-02:00

2012-01-26T16:06:00.003-02:00

But these films -- which tells us, in an alien tongue, stories that are completely foreign to our customs and way of life -- do talk to us in a familiar language. What language? The only one to which a film-maker should lay claim when all is said and done: the language of mise en scène. For modern artists did not discover African fetishes through a conversion to idols, but because those unusual objects moved them as sculptures. If music is a universal idiom, so too is mise en scène: it is this language, and not Japanese, that has to be learned to understand 'Mizoguchi'. A language held in common, but here brought to a degree of purity that our Western cinema has known only rarely.

2012-01-26T02:55:00.004-02:00

Querem realmente discutir classicismo?

Tenham um mínimo de bons modos, sejam higiênicos e façam-se o favor.

(e, por uma vez pelo menos, vejam os filmes)

2012-01-24T01:47:00.001-02:00

2012-01-22T01:07:00.002-02:00

Uma ótima opção para quem não se satisfez com a versão truncada dos fatos, como descrita no bastante parcial e por vezes simplesmente desonesto livro do Antoine de Baecque.

The Superstition of School

2012-01-19T22:28:00.002-02:00

by G. K. Chesterton

It is an error to suppose that advancing years bring retrogressing opinions. In other words, it is not true that men growing old must be growing reactionary. Some of the difficulties of recent times have been due to the obstinate optimism of the old revolutionary. Magnificent old men like [Russian revolutionary Peter] Kropotkin and [poet Walt] Whitman and William Morris went to their graves expecting Utopia if they did not expect Heaven. But the falsehood, like so many falsehoods, is a false version of a half-truth. The truth, or half-truth, is not that men must learn by experience to be reactionaries; but that they must learn by experience to expect reactions. And when I say reactions I mean reactions; I must apologize, in the world of current culture, for using the word in its correct sense.

If a boy fires off a gun, whether at a fox, a landlord or a reigning sovereign, he will be rebuked according to the relative value of these objects. But if he fires off a gun for the first time it is very likely that he will not expect the recoil, or know what a heavy knock it can give him. He may go blazing away through life at these and similar objects in the landscape; but he will be less and less surprised by the recoil; that is, by the reaction. He may even dissuade his little sister of six from firing off one of the heavy rifles designed for the destruction of elephants; and will thus have the appearance of being himself a reactionary. Very much the same principle applies to firing off the big guns of revolution. It is not a man's ideals that change; it is not his Utopia that is altered; the cynic who says, "You will forget all that moonshine of idealism when you are older," says the exact opposite of the truth. The doubts that come with age are not about the ideal, but about the real. And one of the things that are undoubtedly real is reaction: that is, the practical probability of some reversal of direction, and of our partially succeeding in doing the opposite of what we mean to do. What experience does teach us is this: that there is something in the make-up and mechanism of mankind, whereby the result of action upon it is often unexpected, and almost always more complicated than we expect.

These are the snags of sociology; and one of them is concerned with Education. If you ask me whether I think the populace, especially the poor, should be recognized as citizens who can rule the state, I answer in a voice of thunder, "Yes." If you ask me whether I think they ought to have education, in the sense of a wide culture and familiarity with the classics of history, I again answer, "Yes." But there is, in the achievement of this purpose, a sort of snag or recoil that can only be discovered by experience and does not appear in print at all. It is not allowed for on paper, even so much as is the recoil of a gun. Yet it is at this moment an exceedingly practical part of practical politics; and, while it has been a political problem for a very long time past, it is a little more marked (if I may stain these serene and impartial pages with so political a suggestion) under recent conditions that have brought so many highly respectable Socialists and widely respected Trade Union officials to the front.

The snag in it is this: that the self-educated think far too much of education. I might add that the half-educated always think everything of education. That is not a fact that appears on the surface of the social plan or ideal; it is the sort of thing that can only be discovered by experience. When I said that I wanted the popular feeling to find political expression, I meant the actual and autochthonous popular feeling as it can be found in third-class carriages and bean-feasts and bank-holiday crowds; and especially, of course (for the earnest social seeker after truth), in public-houses. I thought, and I still think, that these people are right on a vast number of things on which the fashionable leaders are wrong. The snag is that when one of these people begins to "improve himself" it is exactly at that moment that I begin to doubt whether it is an improvement. He seems to me to collect with remarkable rapidity a number of superstitions, of which the most blind and benighted is what may be called the Superstition of School. He regards School, not as a normal social institution to be fitted in to other social institutions, like Home and Church and State; but as some sort of entirely supernormal and miraculous moral factory, in which perfect men and women are made by magic. To this idolatry of School he is ready to sacrifice Home and History and Humanity, with all its instincts and possibilities, at a moment's notice. To this idol he will make any sacrifice, especially human sacrifice. And at the back of the mind, especially of the best men of this sort, there is almost always one of two variants of the same concentrated conception: either "If I had not been to School I should not be the great man I am now," or else "If I had been to school I should be even greater than I am." Let none say that I am scoffing at uneducated people; it is not their uneducation but their education that I scoff at. Let none mistake this for a sneer at the half-educated; what I dislike is the educated half. But I dislike it, not because I dislike education, but because, given the modern philosophy or absence of philosophy, education is turned against itself, destroying that very sense of variety and proportion which it is the object of education to give.

No man who worships education has got the best out of education; no man who sacrifices everything to education is even educated. I need not mention here the many recent examples of this monomania, rapidly turning into mad persecution, such as the ludicrous persecution of the families who live on barges. What is wrong is a neglect of principle; and the principle is that without a gentle contempt for education, no gentleman's education is complete.

I use the casual phrase casually; for I do not concern myself with the gentleman but with the citizen. Nevertheless, there is this historic half-truth in the case for aristocracy; that it is sometimes a little easier for the aristocrat, at his best, to have this last touch of culture which is a superiority to culture. Nevertheless, the truth of which I speak has nothing to do with any special culture of any special class. It has belonged to any number of peasants, especially when they were poets; it is this which gives a sort of natural distinction to Robert Burns and the peasant poets of Scotland. The power which produces it more effectively than any blood or breed is religion; for religion may be defined as that which puts the first things first. Robert Burns was justifiably impatient with the religion he inherited from Scottish Calvinism; but he owed something to his inheritance. His instinctive consideration of men as men came from an ancestry which still cared more for religion than education. The moment men begin to care more for education than for religion they begin to care more for ambition than for education. It is no longer a world in which the souls of all are equal before heaven, but a world in which the mind of each is bent on achieving unequal advantage over the other. There begins to be a mere vanity in being educated whether it be self-educated or merely state-educated. Education ought to be a searchlight given to a man to explore everything, but very specially the things most distant from himself. Education tends to be a spotlight; which is centered entirely on himself. Some improvement may be made by turning equally vivid and perhaps vulgar spotlights upon a large number of other people as well. But the only final cure is to turn off the limelight and let him realize the stars.

(1923)

A Piece of Chalk

2012-01-19T22:12:00.000-02:00

by G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936)

I remember one splendid morning, all blue and silver, in the summer holidays when I reluctantly tore myself away from the task of doing nothing in particular, and put on a hat of some sort and picked up a walking-stick, and put six very bright-colored chalks in my pocket. I then went into the kitchen (which, along with the rest of the house, belonged to a very square and sensible old woman in a Sussex village), and asked the owner and occupant of the kitchen if she had any brown paper. She had a great deal; in fact, she had too much; and she mistook the purpose and the rationale of the existence of brown paper. She seemed to have an idea that if a person wanted brown paper he must be wanting to tie up parcels; which was the last thing I wanted to do; indeed, it is a thing which I have found to be beyond my mental capacity. Hence she dwelt very much on the varying qualities of toughness and endurance in the material. I explained to her that I only wanted to draw pictures on it, and that I did not want them to endure in the least; and that from my point of view, therefore, it was a question, not of tough consistency, but of responsive surface, a thing comparatively irrelevant in a parcel. When she understood that I wanted to draw she offered to overwhelm me with note-paper.

I then tried to explain the rather delicate logical shade, that I not only liked brown paper, but liked the quality of brownness in paper, just as I like the quality of brownness in October woods, or in beer. Brown paper represents the primal twilight of the first toil of creation, and with a bright-colored chalk or two you can pick out points of fire in it, sparks of gold, and blood-red, and sea-green, like the first fierce stars that sprang out of divine darkness. All this I said (in an off-hand way) to the old woman; and I put the brown paper in my pocket along with the chalks, and possibly other things. I suppose every one must have reflected how primeval and how poetical are the things that one carries in one's pocket; the pocket-knife, for instance, the type of all human tools, the infant of the sword. Once I planned to write a book of poems entirely about things in my pockets. But I found it would be too long; and the age of the great epics is past.

With my stick and my knife, my chalks and my brown paper, I went out on to the great downs. . . .

I crossed one swell of living turf after another, looking for a place to sit down and draw. Do not, for heaven's sake, imagine I was going to sketch from Nature. I was going to draw devils and seraphim, and blind old gods that men worshipped before the dawn of right, and saints in robes of angry crimson, and seas of strange green, and all the sacred or monstrous symbols that look so well in bright colors on brown paper. They are much better worth drawing than Nature; also they are much easier to draw. When a cow came slouching by in the field next to me, a mere artist might have drawn it; but I always get wrong in the hind legs of quadrupeds. So I drew the soul of a cow; which I saw there plainly walking before me in the sunlight; and the soul was all purple and silver, and had seven horns and the mystery that belongs to all beasts. But though I could not with a crayon get the best out of the landscape, it does not follow that the landscape was not getting the best out of me. And this, I think, is the mistake that people make about the old poets who lived before Wordsworth, and were supposed not to care very much about Nature because they did not describe it much.

They preferred writing about great men to writing about great hills; but they sat on the great hills to write it. They gave out much less about Nature, but they drank in, perhaps, much more. They painted the white robes of their holy virgins with the blinding snow, at which they had stared all day... The greenness of a thousand green leaves clustered into the live green figure of Robin Hood. The blueness of a score of forgotten skies became the blue robes of the Virgin. The inspiration went in like sunbeams and came out like Apollo.

But as I sat scrawling these silly figures on the brown paper, it began to dawn on me, to my great disgust, that I had left one chalk, and that a most exquisite and essential chalk, behind. I searched all my pockets, but I could not find any white chalk. Now, those who are acquainted with all the philosophy (nay, religion) which is typified in the art of drawing on brown paper, know that white is positive and essential. I cannot avoid remarking here upon a moral significance. One of the wise and awful truths which this brown-paper art reveals, is this, that white is a color. It is not a mere absence of color; it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black. When, so to speak, your pencil grows red-hot, it draws roses; when it grows white-hot, it draws stars. And one of the two or three defiant verities of the best religious morality, of real Christianity, for example, is exactly this same thing; the chief assertion of religious morality is that white is a color. Virtue is not the absence of vices or the avoidance of moral dangers; virtue is a vivid and separate thing, like pain or a particular smell. Mercy does not mean not being cruel, or sparing people revenge or punishment; it means a plain and positive thing like the sun, which one has either seen or not seen.

Chastity does not mean abstention from sexual wrong; it means something flaming, like Joan of Arc. In a word, God paints in many colors; but he never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white. In a sense our age has realized this fact, and expressed it in our sullen costume. For if it were really true that white was a blank and colorless thing, negative and non-committal, then white would be used instead of black and grey for the funereal dress of this pessimistic period. Which is not the case.

Meanwhile I could not find my chalk.

I sat on the hill in a sort of despair. There was no town near at which it was even remotely probable there would be such a thing as an artist's colorman. And yet, without any white, my absurd little pictures would be as pointless as the world would be if there were no good people in it. I stared stupidly round, racking my brain for expedients. Then I suddenly stood up and roared with laughter, again and again, so that the cows stared at me and called a committee. Imagine a man in the Sahara regretting that he had no sand for his hour-glass. Imagine a gentleman in mid-ocean wishing that he had brought some salt water with him for his chemical experiments. I was sitting on an immense warehouse of white chalk. The landscape was made entirely of white chalk. White chalk was piled more miles until it met the sky. I stooped and broke a piece of the rock I sat on: it did not mark so well as the shop chalks do, but it gave the effect. And I stood there in a trance of pleasure, realizing that this Southern England is not only a grand peninsula, and a tradition and a civilization; it is something even more admirable. It is a piece of chalk.

(1905)

2012-01-18T03:03:00.001-02:00

Les films paraissent très grinçants par rapport au régime communiste polonais de l’époque. Comment ont-ils perçu par les autorités à leur sortie ?

Déjà, à l’époque, ils ont effectivement été perçus comme tels et on leur a reproché d’être irrespectueux. Ce sont les critiques qui demandaient même aux autorités communistes : "Quand allez-vous dire "assez" ?". Et c’est ce qui s’est passé avec mon quatrième film, Haut les mains !.

2012-01-17T01:44:00.000-02:00

2012-01-15T04:54:00.000-02:00

UNA TEMPORADA COMPLETA

2012-01-13T21:12:00.001-02:00

“Avec mon assistant on s’est dit: on ne sait pas quoi faire, on a signé le contrat, on a un titre, un scénario et une histoire qui pour une fois avait emballé un acteur et un producteur. Mais simplement l’histoire durait deux minutes, et un long metrage doit faire une heure trente. Donc, avec mon assistant, on s’est dit: ‘Prends tous les romans que tu aimes, je te donne les miens; il m’en reste une vingtaine, va chez Hemingway, Faulkner, Gide et prend des phrases.’ Et aujourd’hui, pour les trois quarts, on ne sait absolument plus de qui elles sont. Surtout qu’à certains moments, on les a un peu modifiées. C’est dans ce sens là que je ne me mets pas au générique. Ce n’est pas moi qui ai fait le film. Je n’en suit que l’organisateur conscient.”

***

“(...) por causa de sua pequenez, debilidade e impotência diante do todo-poderoso, Jó tem uma consciência aguda, decorrente de sua capacidade de auto-reflexão: para poder subsistir, ele precisa manter-se sempre consciente de sua impotência em face do Deus Onipotente. Este último não precisa precaver-se do mesmo modo, porque não depara em parte alguma com aquele obstáculo insuperável que poderia levá-lo à hesitação e, consequentemente, também à auto-reflexão. Terá Javé concebido a suspeita de que o homem possui uma luz infinitamente pequena, mas não obstante mais concentrada do que a dele?

Não se vê claramente por que o sofrimento de Jó e o jogo da aposta divina cessam abruptamente. O sofrimento absurdo de Jó poderia continuar enquanto ele vivesse. Mas não devemos perder de vista o pano de fundo deste acontecimento: não me parece impossível que algo tenha surgido pouco a pouco neste pano de fundo, ou seja, uma compensação do sofrimento inflingido imerecidamente e que não podia deixar Javé indiferente, mesmo que só o pressentisse de longe. E então aquele que fora torturado imerecidamente foi elevado imperceptivelmente, e sem disto se dar conta, a uma superioridade de conhecimento de Deus que o próprio Deus não tinha.”

2012-01-10T00:00:00.000-02:00

Ciné TVO - Parlons Cinema: avec Eric Rohmer (1977)

2012-01-05T15:42:00.032-02:00

Director:
Harry Fischbach

Cast:
André S. Labarthe - Critique, cinéaste
Harry Fischbach - Director, ciné TVO
Eric Rohmer

1
00:00:24,690 --> 00:00:27,179
MOVIE TALK

2
00:00:35,060 --> 00:00:37,429
The few themes addressed
caught my interest at an early age,

3
00:00:37,969 --> 00:00:41,570
as is often the case and I stuck
with them

4
00:00:42,270 --> 00:00:45,929
and tried to adapt them as films.

5
00:00:46,640 --> 00:00:52,289
You were forced to produce
that series of films yourself?

6
00:00:53,280 --> 00:00:56,320
''Produce'' is a big word.

7
00:00:56,950 --> 00:01:01,549
I had a borrowed camera in
my hand

8
00:01:02,390 --> 00:01:05,000
and one reel of film in my pocket,

9
00:01:05,560 --> 00:01:09,219
because it was made
one 100-foot reel at a time.

10
00:01:09,930 --> 00:01:15,290
We shot in the street with a
spring-wound camera.

11
00:01:16,239 --> 00:01:18,549
You can't call that a ''production.''

12
00:01:19,069 --> 00:01:22,140
I didn't even know
if it'd ever be shown.

13
00:01:22,780 --> 00:01:27,849
Each shot in "La Collectionneuse" was done
in one take. We had very little film stock.

14
00:01:28,750 --> 00:01:32,969
I wanted to shoot in 16mm, but in color.
I envisioned it as a color film.

15
00:01:33,760 --> 00:01:37,769
But Nestor Almendros with whom
I shot my films in 16mm,

16
00:01:38,530 --> 00:01:41,400
beginning with the segment
in "Paris vu par" ...

17
00:01:42,000 --> 00:01:44,810
He didn't do "Suzanne's Career"
or "The Bakery Girl of Monceau",

18
00:01:45,400 --> 00:01:51,079
but he'd shot some educational
films for me.

19
00:01:53,170 --> 00:01:57,480
Nestor said, ''Use 35mm. It won't cost
much more, and it's better.''

20
00:01:58,280 --> 00:02:00,890
I hesitated thinking if we shot
in 35mm,

21
00:02:01,450 --> 00:02:05,760
it'd be a vicious circle.
Everything would cost more.

22
00:02:06,549 --> 00:02:12,030
He said, ''No, I can get a 35mm camera
cheaply, and we'll use very little film.''

23
00:02:12,990 --> 00:02:18,669
Film stock was precious back then.
When filming, it's usually: ''Camera,''

24
00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:26,419
then ''Clapper'', then ''Action!'', I did
the opposite. First I said, ''Action!''

25
00:02:27,509 --> 00:02:32,900
Then, if it was going well, I tapped
the cameraman and he started filming.

26
00:02:44,129 --> 00:02:46,530
MOVIE TALK

27
00:03:07,580 --> 00:03:09,099
"La Collectionneuse" was based

28
00:03:09,520 --> 00:03:11,860
on a story
I'd written a long time ago,

29
00:03:12,389 --> 00:03:15,520
before 1950. It was very old.

30
00:03:16,159 --> 00:03:20,379
The only thing
I kept was the structure,

31
00:03:21,159 --> 00:03:24,500
and, in particular, the bit about
the Chinese vase.

32
00:03:25,169 --> 00:03:28,889
I changed the characters completely.

33
00:03:29,599 --> 00:03:33,939
In the film they were based
on the actors portraying them.

34
00:03:34,740 --> 00:03:39,629
I used the actors I had on hand.
They were Barbet Schroeder's friends,

35
00:03:40,520 --> 00:03:45,909
and I found their personalities
really interesting,

36
00:03:46,849 --> 00:03:51,770
both the two men and Haydée,

37
00:03:52,659 --> 00:03:55,409
and I thought I could
fit them into the story.

38
00:03:56,000 --> 00:03:59,870
I had the story, but I had to modify
it to include them.

39
00:04:00,599 --> 00:04:04,110
One character was difficult to modify
the narrator, Patrick Bauchau.

40
00:04:04,810 --> 00:04:07,650
That's why his character

41
00:04:08,240 --> 00:04:10,610
was completely my creation,

42
00:04:11,150 --> 00:04:14,280
and likewise his dialogue.

43
00:04:14,919 --> 00:04:16,500
Are you reading this?

44
00:04:16,920 --> 00:04:20,379
He had little input on dialogue and insisted
on keeping the character's name,

45
00:04:21,060 --> 00:04:23,430
which in the story was Adrien.

46
00:04:24,430 --> 00:04:28,379
Whereas Daniel Pommereulle's
character was much less defined

47
00:04:29,430 --> 00:04:33,240
so the character in the film
could become Daniel Pommereulle.

48
00:04:33,970 --> 00:04:38,600
His dialogue about painting,
about women, are his own words.

49
00:04:39,439 --> 00:04:44,480
I found his statements interesting,
so I said, ''Let's keep them.''

50
00:04:45,379 --> 00:04:47,870
It was true cinéma vérité.

51
00:04:48,420 --> 00:04:52,759
As for Haydée, her character was
more complex

52
00:04:53,550 --> 00:04:56,389
and difficult to fit into the film.

53
00:04:56,990 --> 00:04:59,069
For example, she denies being
a ''collector,''

54
00:04:59,560 --> 00:05:04,920
and what's amusing is that in the film
she denies it too.

55
00:05:05,870 --> 00:05:09,240
We talked a lot...

56
00:05:11,509 --> 00:05:15,170
and her words and expressions became
part of the film.

57
00:05:15,879 --> 00:05:20,889
In the film, I based the way
the characters speak on the actors.

58
00:05:22,120 --> 00:05:25,629
I'd like to return to the "Six Moral Tales".

59
00:05:26,319 --> 00:05:32,740
You've said you had the idea
for the first one, and then the last.

60
00:05:33,829 --> 00:05:37,959
I'd like you to explain how these
six films are connected.

61
00:05:39,029 --> 00:05:43,920
The Moral Tales were written as
variations on a theme.

62
00:05:44,810 --> 00:05:51,110
Actually, I realized that only after
they'd all been written.

63
00:05:52,180 --> 00:05:55,370
I saw they had the same theme.

64
00:05:56,019 --> 00:06:00,680
While pursuing one girl, a boy meets
another girl

65
00:06:01,519 --> 00:06:03,250
and spends the film with her,

66
00:06:03,689 --> 00:06:08,759
and at the end, he returns to the first girl,
realizing she's the one he really wants.

67
00:06:11,100 --> 00:06:12,939
That's the theme of all the Moral Tales.

68
00:06:13,399 --> 00:06:16,709
Of course, the audience isn't interested
in the girl he chooses

69
00:06:17,370 --> 00:06:22,060
but in the girl the film is about and
who gets abandoned at the end.

70
00:06:22,910 --> 00:06:25,519
So right off, the audience will be at
odds with the narrator

71
00:06:26,079 --> 00:06:29,240
and it's this tension that I find
interesting.

72
00:06:30,649 --> 00:06:34,110
I wanted the Moral Tales to be
very varied.

73
00:06:34,790 --> 00:06:39,569
I've noticed in films, and even in books

74
00:06:40,430 --> 00:06:42,269
that when an author makes his
characters talk

75
00:06:42,730 --> 00:06:45,829
the characters speak in the same
style as the author.

76
00:06:46,470 --> 00:06:48,689
It's very difficult to change your style,
maybe even impossible.

77
00:06:49,199 --> 00:06:54,149
Balzac manages to do it,

78
00:06:55,040 --> 00:06:58,000
but his efforts are often rather
conspicuous.

79
00:06:58,610 --> 00:07:02,040
He'll have a gypsy speaking
gibberish, for example.

80
00:07:02,720 --> 00:07:04,500
It's very difficult.

81
00:07:04,949 --> 00:07:09,370
I think the best solution is to
''cut and paste''

82
00:07:10,189 --> 00:07:11,920
using the words of other people.

83
00:07:12,360 --> 00:07:15,019
That's why, in the Moral Tales,

84
00:07:15,600 --> 00:07:19,439
I often used my actors' own words.

85
00:07:20,170 --> 00:07:22,600
I did this for "La Collectionneuse"
as well as "Claire's Knee"

86
00:07:23,139 --> 00:07:25,800
with Aurora, a foreigner who speaks
French her own way,

87
00:07:26,370 --> 00:07:30,529
and a bit with Vitez's character in
"My Night at Maud's".

88
00:07:31,649 --> 00:07:36,889
He was the only one who collaborated
on his own dialogue.

89
00:07:40,660 --> 00:07:44,000
This allowed me to obtain a
language which was quite obscure.

90
00:07:44,660 --> 00:07:47,350
In fact I don't always understand it.

91
00:07:47,930 --> 00:07:51,910
There are words and references
that I don't know.

92
00:07:52,670 --> 00:07:57,360
But the actors were very picky
about the words they used.

93
00:07:58,209 --> 00:08:02,550
They wouldn't allow substitutions.
They'd absolutely refuse.

94
00:08:03,339 --> 00:08:06,910
This led to many arguments
about what words to use.

95
00:08:08,050 --> 00:08:11,649
This makes it seem affected, which can
be annoying in "La Collectionneuse",

96
00:08:12,350 --> 00:08:15,540
but it's very realistic, because
they really were like that.

97
00:08:16,189 --> 00:08:19,180
After "La Collectionneuse" came
"My Night at Maud's",

98
00:08:19,790 --> 00:08:21,629
which was a success.

99
00:08:22,100 --> 00:08:25,560
"La Collectionneuse" was a success too
on its own level.

100
00:08:26,230 --> 00:08:28,920
It played at only one movie theater,

101
00:08:29,500 --> 00:08:32,490
but it played there for months,

102
00:08:33,110 --> 00:08:35,129
and I think it sold
over 70,OOO tickets

103
00:08:35,610 --> 00:08:38,769
which is remarkable for a film
in only one theater.

104
00:08:39,409 --> 00:08:43,769
Audiences loved it. It's the only film
I made that followed the era's fashion.

105
00:08:44,590 --> 00:08:48,399
Audiences loved the new fashions
the long hair, the blue jeans.

106
00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:52,370
Then there was Haydée Politoff,

107
00:08:53,029 --> 00:08:55,899
whom audiences adored.

108
00:08:56,500 --> 00:08:59,370
Marcel Carné signed her for his
new film right after that.

109
00:08:59,970 --> 00:09:03,919
- She had a certain boldness.
- Yes, audiences loved that.

110
00:09:10,539 --> 00:09:14,200
Rivette did the camera work on a
film I made at Andre Bazin's house

111
00:09:14,919 --> 00:09:17,529
based on an Edgar Allan Poe story
called "Bérénice".

112
00:09:18,090 --> 00:09:22,009
He taught me to edit. I was too clumsy
to edit my films in 16mm,

113
00:09:22,759 --> 00:09:24,370
so he was my editor.

114
00:09:24,789 --> 00:09:27,570
"Bérénice" was your third short film?

115
00:09:28,159 --> 00:09:32,610
You made "Journal d'un Scélérat"
in which Gégauff played a role,

116
00:09:33,429 --> 00:09:35,889
and "Charlotte and Her Steak".

117
00:09:36,440 --> 00:09:39,600
You're right that was later.

118
00:09:40,240 --> 00:09:45,070
It was a film shot in 35mm
before Bérénice.

119
00:09:45,950 --> 00:09:47,500
It was released -

120
00:09:47,919 --> 00:09:49,970
It wasn't released until I found
financing.

121
00:09:50,450 --> 00:09:54,350
Godard had become famous by then,
so I thought the film might be shown.

122
00:09:59,029 --> 00:10:01,309
Because Godard appears in
that film.

123
00:10:04,529 --> 00:10:10,070
At the time, you made a lot of
short films, one after another.

124
00:10:11,039 --> 00:10:15,929
Actually, they were spread out
quite sparsely

125
00:10:16,809 --> 00:10:20,590
throughout the '50s.

126
00:10:21,320 --> 00:10:26,240
"Journal d'un Scélérat", in 16mm
was never finished.

127
00:10:27,120 --> 00:10:32,159
It was shot in 1949-50 almost as
a joke.

128
00:10:34,730 --> 00:10:38,980
Bérénice wasn't made until 1954,
I think.

129
00:10:39,769 --> 00:10:42,759
Another amateur film "La Sonate à Kreutzer"

130
00:10:43,370 --> 00:10:45,120
was made in 1956.

131
00:10:46,009 --> 00:10:50,200
Then, gradually, I got the idea to
write about cinema.

132
00:10:54,919 --> 00:11:00,929
I wrote an extremely long article
about color cinema.

133
00:11:01,960 --> 00:11:04,179
I thought color was the future
of cinema.

134
00:11:04,690 --> 00:11:07,299
People were frightened that
color meant the end of cinema

135
00:11:07,860 --> 00:11:10,990
just like they'd thought talking
pictures did earlier.

136
00:11:11,629 --> 00:11:14,529
I didn't have a clue about the
technical aspects of color film,

137
00:11:15,139 --> 00:11:18,649
but I wrote an article about
color aesthetics.

138
00:11:19,639 --> 00:11:23,620
I've lost it, but I've changed my mind
on the subject anyway.

139
00:11:24,379 --> 00:11:27,070
Was it ever published?

140
00:11:28,049 --> 00:11:31,830
I submitted the article to
Jean-Georges Auriol,

141
00:11:32,549 --> 00:11:35,620
chief editor at the Revue du cinéma.

142
00:11:37,019 --> 00:11:41,470
He read it and said, ''interesting,
but we just ran an article on color,''

143
00:11:42,299 --> 00:11:44,879
which was true.

144
00:11:48,100 --> 00:11:51,470
''But feel free to submit something
else.

145
00:11:52,139 --> 00:11:55,009
We're looking for articles on film
theory in general.''

146
00:11:55,610 --> 00:11:59,889
That's when I got the idea for an
article

147
00:12:00,679 --> 00:12:02,960
called "Cinema, the Art of Space".

148
00:12:03,850 --> 00:12:08,269
I believe all my theories on cinema
began with that article.

149
00:12:09,190 --> 00:12:12,259
Being both a film theorist

150
00:12:12,789 --> 00:12:16,190
and a filmmaker

151
00:12:16,860 --> 00:12:23,570
how did you view mainstream films
of the '50s?

152
00:12:24,710 --> 00:12:29,870
I viewed them with an attitude of
contempt

153
00:12:30,779 --> 00:12:33,940
natural to the outcast who knows
he'll never be accepted.

154
00:12:34,580 --> 00:12:38,769
That was my situation, and the situation
of all my friends at Cahiers du Cinéma.

155
00:12:39,549 --> 00:12:42,679
We knew that to storm the citadel
of the film industry,

156
00:12:43,320 --> 00:12:46,690
we'd have to produce our own
films

157
00:12:47,360 --> 00:12:53,039
because we'd never make them
by climbing the industry ladder.

158
00:12:54,029 --> 00:12:56,750
Our friends who'd tried, that
had run into walls

159
00:12:57,340 --> 00:13:00,090
because the film world is extremely
closed.

160
00:13:00,669 --> 00:13:03,250
Is that when you gave up teaching?

161
00:13:03,809 --> 00:13:06,179
I gave up teaching gradually.

162
00:13:06,710 --> 00:13:08,580
In a way, I never really gave it up,

163
00:13:09,049 --> 00:13:12,330
because I still have one foot
in the university...

164
00:13:15,559 --> 00:13:20,860
but I taught actively until 1956.

165
00:13:22,460 --> 00:13:26,879
It was harder for young filmmakers
back then than it is today.

166
00:13:27,700 --> 00:13:31,889
Even so, you can draw a parallel
between then and now

167
00:13:32,669 --> 00:13:34,629
because cinema is now in a crisis

168
00:13:35,110 --> 00:13:39,210
similar to that in the 1950s
perhaps worse.

169
00:13:39,980 --> 00:13:44,460
But it's different. The avant-garde
has become the mainstream.

170
00:13:45,289 --> 00:13:48,039
Before, there was commercial
cinema

171
00:13:48,620 --> 00:13:51,429
and ''outsider'' cinema which no
theaters would show.

172
00:13:52,029 --> 00:13:54,169
It was scorned.

173
00:13:54,659 --> 00:14:01,049
Now just about anyone can make
a film, but they can't get it shown.

174
00:14:02,139 --> 00:14:04,659
It might get a three-day run
somewhere, but that's all.

175
00:14:05,210 --> 00:14:09,250
It was a type of cinema hated
even by amateur filmmakers.

176
00:14:10,009 --> 00:14:13,879
They admired professional-looking films
in 35mm with special effects, etc.

177
00:14:14,620 --> 00:14:19,340
But now you can make, films
in 8mm or 16mm

178
00:14:20,190 --> 00:14:22,360
and there's always some sort
of audience.

179
00:14:22,860 --> 00:14:26,700
Back then
the only audience for it

180
00:14:27,429 --> 00:14:30,590
was at the Ciné-club du Quartier Latin
and that was it.

181
00:14:31,230 --> 00:14:35,070
Everything changed in the
late '50s

182
00:14:35,799 --> 00:14:39,870
when new technology made
filmmaking cheaper,

183
00:14:40,639 --> 00:14:42,809
leading to the birth of the
New Wave.

184
00:14:43,639 --> 00:14:50,169
When Chabrol managed
to get funding for his first films,

185
00:14:51,289 --> 00:14:55,419
and Truffaut's first film was a success
plus the press coverage of all this,

186
00:14:56,190 --> 00:15:00,440
since you'd had more experience

187
00:15:01,230 --> 00:15:07,149
and had made
a few short films already,

188
00:15:08,169 --> 00:15:12,070
did you have trouble
getting your first feature made?

189
00:15:12,809 --> 00:15:18,169
I hadn't made so many films.
I'd made a few in 16mm.

190
00:15:19,110 --> 00:15:22,070
In 35mm

191

00:15:22,679 --> 00:15:27,629
I made one with Godard, "Presentation"
(Charlotte and Her Steak)

192
00:15:28,519 --> 00:15:32,029
then another that Chabrol produced,

193
00:15:32,730 --> 00:15:35,570
but that was linked to
"Le Signe du Lion".

194
00:15:36,159 --> 00:15:42,019
Chabrol made it possible for me
to make "Le Signe du Lion".

195
00:15:43,570 --> 00:15:45,590
He produced it.

196
00:15:46,210 --> 00:15:53,009
Didn't Gégauff lend his name
to try to attract backers?

197
00:15:54,149 --> 00:15:56,340
No, Gégauff's name wasn't important.

198
00:15:56,850 --> 00:16:01,129
He helped me with the dialogue.
It's fairly complex.

199
00:16:02,360 --> 00:16:07,720
Someone who knew Godard well saw
this film and said, ''That's Godard's story.''

200
00:16:08,659 --> 00:16:11,059
It could have been the story
of any one of us,

201
00:16:11,600 --> 00:16:14,409
since we'd all found ourselves
in Paris or elsewhere

202
00:16:15,000 --> 00:16:17,929
in situations as miserable as
the one in "Le Signe du Lion".

203
00:16:18,539 --> 00:16:24,139
Gégauff influenced not only me
but Chabrol - you see it in his films -

204
00:16:25,110 --> 00:16:29,029
and Godard as well. You can see it
in films like "Le Petit Soldat".

205
00:16:31,720 --> 00:16:36,289
Chabrol even suggested that
Gégauff play the character.

206
00:16:37,120 --> 00:16:38,929
I didn't agree.

207
00:16:39,389 --> 00:16:45,919
I wanted Jess Hahn an American
actor, for the role.

208
00:16:47,970 --> 00:16:52,220
Paul Gégauff got a dialogue credit,

209
00:16:53,009 --> 00:16:55,879
but, as he probably mentioned,

210
00:16:56,480 --> 00:17:01,549
his collaboration was only partial.
He wrote part of the dialogue.

211
00:17:02,450 --> 00:17:05,029
He didn't write very much of it.

212
00:17:05,589 --> 00:17:08,109
We worked one day.
I'd show him the dialogue,

213
00:17:08,660 --> 00:17:11,559
and he'd say:
''I don't like that. Try this.''

214
00:17:12,160 --> 00:17:14,680
He himself doesn't claim
to have written the dialogue.

215
00:17:15,230 --> 00:17:20,799
He said, ''Claude used my name
with distributors to grease the wheels,''

216
00:17:21,769 --> 00:17:24,609
but he said he didn't contribute
much to the dialogue.

217
00:17:25,210 --> 00:17:28,670
But I'd like to give him credit,

218
00:17:29,339 --> 00:17:34,559
because his personality had a
strong influence

219
00:17:35,480 --> 00:17:38,410
on many of the films
of certain of his friends:

220
00:17:39,019 --> 00:17:41,009
Godard, myself and Chabrol.

221
00:17:41,490 --> 00:17:44,480
What was so special
about Gégauff?

222
00:17:45,089 --> 00:17:47,309
He had a very strong personality.

223
00:17:47,829 --> 00:17:51,900
- As a person, or in his books?
- Both. Himself and his ideas.

224
00:17:52,670 --> 00:17:56,829
With Godard it was more
Gégauff's sayings.

225
00:17:57,599 --> 00:18:01,230
For example, one of his sayings
was in "Le Petit Soldat".

226
00:18:01,940 --> 00:18:05,690
''I don't like sunny places.
I prefer Brittany.'' That's Gégauff.

227
00:18:08,279 --> 00:18:10,299
His way of being provocative?

228
00:18:10,779 --> 00:18:13,119
Yes, provocative and paradoxical.

229
00:18:14,519 --> 00:18:19,650
It was different with Chabrol's films.
He actually became the character.

230
00:18:20,559 --> 00:18:23,990
For example, Brialy's character
in "The Cousins".

231
00:18:24,670 --> 00:18:27,890
When" Le Signe du Lion" was
released

232
00:18:28,539 --> 00:18:33,319
did it profit from the success
of the New Wave

233
00:18:34,170 --> 00:18:39,059
and the fact audiences were interested
in young filmmakers making their debuts.

234
00:18:39,950 --> 00:18:45,339
You were older than your colleagues,
but you were still new.

235
00:18:46,289 --> 00:18:49,420
How was the film received
when it was released?

236
00:18:50,059 --> 00:18:52,690
Badly. It wasn't released at
the height of the New Wave

237
00:18:53,259 --> 00:18:59,849
but at the ''ebb tide'' in 1962.

238
00:19:00,970 --> 00:19:05,309
Quite naively - they weren't
trying to be nasty

239
00:19:06,109 --> 00:19:09,180
Chabrol's new producers thought

240
00:19:09,809 --> 00:19:13,059
the film would be less boring
if they shortened it.

241
00:19:13,710 --> 00:19:17,309
Since the music in
"Le Signe du Lion" was modern

242
00:19:18,019 --> 00:19:21,329
and atonal...

243
00:19:23,490 --> 00:19:29,059
and might hurt many people's ears,

244
00:19:30,700 --> 00:19:34,069
it was replaced with very
conventional music.

245
00:19:34,740 --> 00:19:38,170
Similar things happened on
"L'Atalante".

246
00:19:38,839 --> 00:19:41,089
He did that without my knowledge,

247
00:19:41,609 --> 00:19:47,210
but luckily the profession harbored
certain honest souls who alerted me.

248
00:19:48,180 --> 00:19:51,369
The editors told me what he'd
done.

249
00:19:52,019 --> 00:19:55,740
I tried to do what I could.

250
00:19:56,789 --> 00:19:59,400
I turned to Langlois, and he helped.

251
00:20:01,660 --> 00:20:06,410
Finally, the producer and I
came to an agreement:

252
00:20:07,269 --> 00:20:11,690
Only my original version
would be shown in theaters.

253
00:20:12,509 --> 00:20:15,579
Anyway, no theater in Paris
would've shown the edited version.

254
00:20:16,210 --> 00:20:19,049
But finally, the original version
was shown

255
00:20:19,650 --> 00:20:21,759
at La Pagode in Paris.

256
00:20:22,250 --> 00:20:27,700
And the version they'd cut, the
''amputated'' version, would be shown -

257
00:20:28,660 --> 00:20:30,799
I really don't know where.

258
00:20:31,289 --> 00:20:33,630
Unfortunately, I think it was
shown in England,

259
00:20:34,160 --> 00:20:37,029
even though they'd promised
not to show it abroad.

260
00:20:37,630 --> 00:20:43,720
This first release must have made
it hard for you

261
00:20:45,009 --> 00:20:49,549
to make another film.

262
00:20:50,380 --> 00:20:56,619
Terribly hard, because I had
to start over from scratch

263
00:20:57,680 --> 00:21:01,630
and make films in 16mm.

264
00:21:04,319 --> 00:21:08,569
Outside the commercial film circuit

265
00:21:09,599 --> 00:21:11,500
of ''theatrical releases,''

266
00:21:11,970 --> 00:21:17,130
did you produce
your films in 16mm for -

267
00:21:18,039 --> 00:21:22,930
After "Le Signe du Lion", I was finished.
No producer would back me.

268
00:21:23,809 --> 00:21:29,380
Godard pulled some strings to get me
a producer: de Beauregard.

269
00:21:30,349 --> 00:21:34,009
I tried to do a film with him but he
was in dire financial straits

270
00:21:34,720 --> 00:21:37,819
due to troubles "Le Petit Soldat"
was having with the censors,

271
00:21:38,460 --> 00:21:40,480
so nothing ever came of it.

272
00:21:40,960 --> 00:21:42,799
I'll tell you about the project.

273
00:21:43,259 --> 00:21:46,359
It was an adaptation of Dostoyevsky.

274
00:21:47,869 --> 00:21:54,019
Translations vary, but I used the title
"Une Femme Douce".

275
00:21:56,509 --> 00:21:58,970
After that I pitched it to someone else...

276
00:22:01,079 --> 00:22:05,940
but in the end the film was never
made.

277
00:22:06,819 --> 00:22:12,740
In your film career, you made the
Moral Tales,

278
00:22:13,759 --> 00:22:20,470
but you didn't adapt another
author's work until "The Marquise of O".

279
00:22:21,799 --> 00:22:29,359
So with these six films you became
defined as an auteur,

280
00:22:30,609 --> 00:22:33,009
because you wrote and conceived
your own films.

281
00:22:33,549 --> 00:22:38,880
What led you to make the
"Six Moral Tales"?

282
00:22:39,819 --> 00:22:42,339
Production constraints.

283
00:22:42,890 --> 00:22:46,369
I realized that once again
I could only make amateur films...

284
00:22:48,160 --> 00:22:50,119
because I couldn't find a producer.

285
00:22:51,630 --> 00:22:57,460
That's when I got the idea
of using certain subjects,

286
00:22:58,470 --> 00:23:02,809
subjects I'd tried to make into
short stories

287
00:23:03,609 --> 00:23:05,779
when I was very young.

288
00:23:08,579 --> 00:23:13,380
I realized that these stories had
a common theme.

289
00:23:14,250 --> 00:23:17,500
Actually, there were only four stories.

290
00:23:18,160 --> 00:23:21,880
I had to add two more because
I wanted six.

291
00:23:22,599 --> 00:23:25,230
Any special reason for that number?

292
00:23:25,799 --> 00:23:30,579
I'm a little superstitious about numbers.

293
00:23:31,440 --> 00:23:36,420
The number six crops up in authors
from Virgil to Stevenson,

294
00:23:37,309 --> 00:23:39,329
favorite writers of mine.

295
00:23:43,619 --> 00:23:48,950
So I completely rewrote the stories
and added two more.

296
00:23:49,890 --> 00:23:52,289
I'd thought out the first one
but hadn't written it yet.

297
00:23:52,829 --> 00:23:56,369
I had the "Bakery Girl of Monceau"
in my mind as a short story.

298
00:23:57,059 --> 00:24:00,779
And the last one was conceived
as an end to the series.

299
00:24:01,500 --> 00:24:03,809
That was "Love in the Afternoon".

300
00:24:04,339 --> 00:24:08,380
That's when I decided to make films
in 16mm.

301
00:24:09,140 --> 00:24:11,069
Why bother with bulky cameras

302
00:24:11,549 --> 00:24:17,380
when you could make films in 16mm
under much better conditions?

303
00:24:18,390 --> 00:24:20,470
- With synchronized sound?
- Yes.

304
00:24:20,950 --> 00:24:23,089
At the time, we'd just discovered
Canadian cinema.

305
00:24:23,589 --> 00:24:26,339
We'd seen many Canadian films
in 16mm

306
00:24:27,059 --> 00:24:30,099
that were perfect from a
technical viewpoint.

307
00:24:30,730 --> 00:24:33,160
And Michel Brault made a film
in France

308
00:24:33,700 --> 00:24:36,799
shot by Rouch with the famous
Coutant camera.

309
00:24:37,440 --> 00:24:39,779
The first time I saw that camera
was when Rouch used it.

310
00:24:40,309 --> 00:24:42,940
I thought,
''Why not make films in 16mm?''

311
00:24:43,509 --> 00:24:51,220
There were so many advantages to 16mm
that it became the norm for TV

312
00:24:52,490 --> 00:24:55,829
but for theatrical releases it was
easier to do a blow-up print.

313
00:24:56,490 --> 00:25:00,589
It's difficult to project 16mm directly,
even in small theaters.

314
00:25:01,359 --> 00:25:04,730
There's a problem with the sound,
optical sound.

315
00:25:05,400 --> 00:25:10,289
We've never managed to get
good-quality optical sound.

316
00:25:11,170 --> 00:25:14,160
- You could use a double system print.
- The theater has to be equipped.

317
00:25:14,769 --> 00:25:17,839
If a 16mm film is projected using
perfectly adjusted equipment,

318
00:25:18,480 --> 00:25:20,910
the quality is as good as 35mm,

319
00:25:21,450 --> 00:25:24,490
but that equipment is difficult
to get.

320
00:25:25,119 --> 00:25:31,539
In short, it's a technical problem
that's never been resolved.

321
00:25:32,630 --> 00:25:38,400
Even though I was wrong about 16mm
being the future of cinema,

322
00:25:39,400 --> 00:25:44,230
I was still right in terms
of shooting and distribution,

323
00:25:45,109 --> 00:25:51,730
because increasingly, films are shot
in 16mm and then blown up to 35mm.

324
00:25:54,109 --> 00:25:59,880
When Barbet Schroeder made
"Paris vu par"...

325
00:26:00,890 --> 00:26:03,849
it was a way of applying my ideas
about 16mm.

326
00:26:04,460 --> 00:26:08,559
We discovered it was impossible, and the
lab said, ''Why don't you do a blow-up?''

327
00:26:09,329 --> 00:26:11,940
We were afraid a 35mm blow-up
wouldn't come out well.

328
00:26:12,500 --> 00:26:16,950
On the contrary, a 16mm film looks better
when it's blown up to 35mm.

329
00:26:18,740 --> 00:26:21,200
Then why aren't you still
shooting in 16mm?

330
00:26:21,740 --> 00:26:26,460
Because if you can afford it,
it's still better to shoot directly in 35mm.

331
00:26:28,349 --> 00:26:32,980
One of the paradoxes of cinema...

332
00:26:34,720 --> 00:26:38,440
is that it has form without content.

333
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:43,500
Cinema's lack of ideas is its
deepest flaw.

334
00:26:44,299 --> 00:26:49,099
I myself, as a filmmaker, lack ideas,
and that's probably why I made films.

335
00:26:49,970 --> 00:26:52,140
I'm not an author. I have no ideas.

336
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:55,859
And when I speak with my friends,
they often say,

337
00:26:56,509 --> 00:26:58,440
I don't have any ideas either.

338
00:26:58,910 --> 00:27:03,950
Very often it's the people with the fewest
ideas who end up having the most.

339
00:27:04,849 --> 00:27:07,690
A story either comes about by
chance,

340
00:27:08,289 --> 00:27:16,230
or it's the fruit of a thought process
that takes a long time to develop.

341
00:27:18,329 --> 00:27:19,619
Not bad.

342
00:27:20,029 --> 00:27:21,460
Wait, I'll help you.

343
00:27:38,990 --> 00:27:41,099
Stop it. You'll make me fall.

344
00:27:46,630 --> 00:27:52,200
Very few films have truly original
scripts.

345
00:27:53,170 --> 00:27:55,950
Today's scripts aren't very original,
though perhaps more than before,

346
00:27:56,539 --> 00:28:04,220
but on the other hand, they lack
the compelling power of earlier cinema.

347
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:07,730
Scripts used to be adapted
from existing stories

348
00:28:08,250 --> 00:28:11,819
that were thrilling, interesting,
enthralling for audiences.

349
00:28:12,519 --> 00:28:14,769
Now scripts are pages
from private journals,

350
00:28:15,289 --> 00:28:17,690
so the audiences
isn't as interested

351
00:28:18,220 --> 00:28:23,730
even if it's a very refined,
intellectual one.

352
00:28:24,700 --> 00:28:31,059
What's the cause of this?
Is it harder to write screenplays?

353
00:28:32,140 --> 00:28:34,980
Are there fewer novels around?

354
00:28:35,579 --> 00:28:39,529
There's the evolution of literature
of the novel.

355
00:28:40,279 --> 00:28:45,609
The novel has been attacked.
It's lost its credibility.

356
00:28:46,549 --> 00:28:49,980
The essential quality of cinema
isn't found in the script.

357
00:28:50,660 --> 00:28:54,670
I think cinema can clothe the
fictional form

358
00:28:55,430 --> 00:28:58,470
especially the fictional form,
and also the theatrical form.

359
00:28:59,099 --> 00:29:01,940
But theater also has content.
It's not just a form.

360
00:29:02,539 --> 00:29:05,880
You write a play and you can read it.
It's meant to be read.

361
00:29:06,539 --> 00:29:08,319
It's nothing like a novel.

362
00:29:08,779 --> 00:29:11,180
But a script doesn't exist
apart from a film.

363
00:29:11,710 --> 00:29:13,990
Story and script are different.

364
00:29:14,509 --> 00:29:20,690
A story can be told as a play
or a novel,

365
00:29:21,759 --> 00:29:25,920
and there are authors who
write both.

366
00:29:26,690 --> 00:29:29,150
For example, Marguerite Duras

367
00:29:29,700 --> 00:29:32,740
can adapt her novels
and her plays to the screen.

368
00:29:33,369 --> 00:29:41,990
But a script is the screen adaptation
of a story. It's a bit different.

369
00:29:47,450 --> 00:29:49,289
Today...

370
00:29:50,420 --> 00:29:55,900
since cinematographic form is
increasingly valued as a subject in itself,

371
00:29:56,859 --> 00:30:00,579
stories, of course, aren't as
strong as they used to be.

372
00:30:02,230 --> 00:30:05,660
Perhaps the Moral Tales were

373
00:30:06,329 --> 00:30:09,670
my contribution to this research
on subject matter.

374
00:30:10,640 --> 00:30:15,240
Before making the Moral Tales,
your principal activity was teaching.

375
00:30:16,079 --> 00:30:19,740
During the Moral Tales -
- I edited Cahiers du Cinéma.

376
00:30:20,450 --> 00:30:22,259
I basically lived at the office.

377
00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:25,240
Filmmaking was something
you did on the side?

378
00:30:25,789 --> 00:30:27,900
I remember one day,
at the Cahiers

379
00:30:28,390 --> 00:30:34,400
you lowered a cable to the courtyard
to record restaurant noises.

380
00:30:35,500 --> 00:30:39,339
"The Bakery Girl of Monceau"
allowed you to make the others?

381
00:30:40,000 --> 00:30:42,930
Yes, it snowballed from there, because
that's how I met Barbet Schroeder.

382
00:30:43,539 --> 00:30:47,289
He plays the male lead
in the movie

383
00:30:48,009 --> 00:30:50,940
and he wanted to be a producer.

384
00:30:52,549 --> 00:30:53,720
After that film

385
00:30:54,079 --> 00:30:58,619
he scraped together funding for
"Paris vu par"...

386
00:30:59,450 --> 00:31:01,349
With Rouch and Godard.

387
00:31:01,819 --> 00:31:07,910
Those filmmakers were chosen
at my suggestion.

388
00:31:08,960 --> 00:31:14,349
They were filmmakers I found
interesting and worthy of support.

389
00:31:15,299 --> 00:31:18,700
We also approached some others,
who turned us down.

390
00:31:19,369 --> 00:31:21,240
Jacques Rozier, for example.

391
00:31:21,710 --> 00:31:23,670
There was Chabrol, Douchet -

392
00:31:24,140 --> 00:31:29,029
There was Chabrol, Douchet
Jean Rouch, Godard, Jean-Daniel Pollet.

393
00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:32,529
I really liked his film -

394
00:31:37,420 --> 00:31:40,049
"Pour vu qu'on ait l'Ivresse"...

395
00:31:41,660 --> 00:31:44,440
And myself. That makes six.

396
00:31:46,269 --> 00:31:48,670
So "Paris vu par"...

397
00:31:49,200 --> 00:31:53,650
The title is "Paris vu par" Godard,
Chabrol, etc.

398
00:31:55,480 --> 00:31:58,380
Schroeder stayed on with you

399
00:31:58,980 --> 00:32:02,849
to co-produce "Suzanne's Career"
and "My Night at Maud's".

400
00:32:03,579 --> 00:32:05,309
It all happened at the same time.

401
00:32:05,750 --> 00:32:11,140
Making "Paris vu par"... took a long time.
I think a year in all.

402
00:32:12,089 --> 00:32:14,279
The segments were made one
after the other.

403
00:32:14,789 --> 00:32:17,069
We thought that if we couldn't
make the film

404
00:32:17,599 --> 00:32:20,940
at least we could sell them or get
production credit as short films.

405
00:32:21,599 --> 00:32:24,000
It was all very complicated.

406
00:32:24,539 --> 00:32:26,559
That's when I made my second film,
"Suzanne's Career".

407
00:32:27,609 --> 00:32:31,680
Those two films
"The Bakery Girl of Monceau"

408
00:32:32,450 --> 00:32:34,089
and "Suzanne's Career"

409
00:32:34,509 --> 00:32:37,789
were sold to French television

410
00:32:39,549 --> 00:32:42,539
thanks to Jean-José Marchand,
who saw them, liked them

411
00:32:43,160 --> 00:32:45,849
and bought them.

412
00:32:48,059 --> 00:32:50,019
They were shown on TV?

413
00:32:50,559 --> 00:32:53,250
"Suzanne's Career" was aired once

414
00:32:53,829 --> 00:32:56,380
and I think "The Bakery Girl of Monceau"
was aired several times.

415
00:32:57,269 --> 00:32:59,200
I think it was aired twice.

416
00:32:59,670 --> 00:33:01,660
"Suzanne's Career" was aired
in '63.

417
00:33:02,140 --> 00:33:06,420
I think "The Bakery Girl" looked better on TV
than "Suzanne's Career".

418
00:33:07,410 --> 00:33:09,549
I saw them both on TV.

419
00:33:12,150 --> 00:33:14,869
That brought in a tiny amount
of money

420
00:33:15,460 --> 00:33:19,769
that allowed us to buy film stock
for "La Collectionneuse".

421
00:33:21,029 --> 00:33:25,720
There's a characteristic of the
"Moral Tales" that I like.

422
00:33:26,569 --> 00:33:31,640
Actually two things. One is the
question of location.

423
00:33:34,640 --> 00:33:39,029
In the "Moral Tales" and your segment
of "Paris vu par"...

424
00:33:39,849 --> 00:33:42,339
we always know where we are.

425
00:33:42,880 --> 00:33:47,329
It's not easy to change shots and have
audiences know where they are

426
00:33:48,150 --> 00:33:50,730
in terms of the previous shot
and the following one.

427
00:33:51,690 --> 00:33:57,839
The second thing is what could be
called the ''traditional'' aspect,

428
00:33:58,900 --> 00:34:01,390
the dialogue in your films.

429
00:34:02,769 --> 00:34:07,049
This became increasingly important
with each Moral Tale.

430
00:34:08,269 --> 00:34:12,719
In the first one there's a story
and a setting,

431
00:34:13,550 --> 00:34:17,800
and bit by bit, discussions grow
out of this.

432
00:34:19,449 --> 00:34:21,730
Your films sometimes have a
literary form.

433
00:34:22,260 --> 00:34:26,360
Certainly. My films are filmed
conversations.

434

00:34:27,130 --> 00:34:30,230
I admit it wasn't very unique in
the '60s,

435
00:34:30,860 --> 00:34:35,400
and my friends' films also contain
conversations.

436
00:34:36,239 --> 00:34:39,429
Maybe presented differently,
but Godard's films contain conversations.

437
00:34:40,070 --> 00:34:42,030
Breathless has conversations.

438
00:34:42,510 --> 00:34:46,550
Yes, certainly, but they're always -

439
00:34:47,309 --> 00:34:50,090
Yours are on
a different philosophical level.

440
00:34:50,679 --> 00:34:53,699
Yes, but there's a common spirit.

441
00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:58,360
When people used to define
the Cinéma de Qualité in the '50s,

442
00:34:59,130 --> 00:35:04,349
they said cinema was, after all,
drama

443
00:35:05,260 --> 00:35:11,349
so lines shouldn't be too long to
keep things moving.

444
00:35:12,409 --> 00:35:16,449
Is there a linguistic style
specific to literature or cinema?

445
00:35:17,210 --> 00:35:19,579
Or theater?

446
00:35:20,110 --> 00:35:23,070
Perhaps theater is better at
conveying ideas.

447
00:35:23,880 --> 00:35:28,239
But now this is also done in cinema
in Rohmer's films.

448
00:35:29,059 --> 00:35:31,110
You don't see this very often,
which is why -

449
00:35:31,590 --> 00:35:36,010
- But theater is made to be spoken.
- That's exactly my question.

450
00:35:36,829 --> 00:35:38,440
Plato's Dialogues aren't made
to be spoken.

451
00:35:38,869 --> 00:35:42,300
It didn't give me the idea,
but what encouraged me,

452
00:35:42,969 --> 00:35:47,480
what gave me the daring to use
very long conversations in a film,

453
00:35:48,309 --> 00:35:53,230
was being at Cahiers du Cinéma
and interviewing directors.

454
00:35:54,110 --> 00:35:56,570
That was my job.

455
00:35:57,119 --> 00:35:59,260
I dealt with a lot of people,

456
00:35:59,750 --> 00:36:06,400
but I also transcribed the recordings
and edited the interviews.

457
00:36:07,530 --> 00:36:11,369
That taught me how people speak.

458
00:36:12,099 --> 00:36:17,429
I realized they don't speak the way
characters do in novels.

459
00:36:18,369 --> 00:36:22,650
Sometimes they speak
in a very literary style,

460
00:36:23,440 --> 00:36:25,340
in very long sentences.

461
00:36:25,809 --> 00:36:30,090
And I tried - and succeeded since
it came naturally at that point -

462
00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:36,239
to have my characters in "My Night
at Maud's" use the same expressions

463
00:36:37,190 --> 00:36:42,519
used by people in interviews
I'd transcribed for Cahiers du Cinéma.

464
00:36:43,460 --> 00:36:46,679
But audiences aren't used to this.

465
00:36:47,329 --> 00:36:50,320
They're getting used to it.

466
00:36:50,940 --> 00:36:54,070
TV shows like this one are common now
and they're just recorded conversations.

467
00:36:54,710 --> 00:36:56,730
Tape recorders are part of our
lives now.

468
00:36:57,210 --> 00:37:03,159
I think perhaps the great discovery
that made the New Wave possible

469
00:37:04,179 --> 00:37:10,769
wasn't the 16mm or hand-held camera
but the tape recorder.

470
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:14,260
If I didn't read, I'd think

471
00:37:14,730 --> 00:37:18,829
and thinking is the hardest,
most demanding thing of all.

472
00:37:21,670 --> 00:37:23,599
I think people think too much.

473
00:37:24,400 --> 00:37:26,679
The main thing is to be absorbed,

474
00:37:27,210 --> 00:37:30,610
and a book forces me to think
its way.

475
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:34,150
What I don't want is to think my
own way.

476
00:37:34,750 --> 00:37:35,920
I want to be led.

477
00:37:36,280 --> 00:37:39,000
Like an Arab. In a street, he feels
the street

478
00:37:39,590 --> 00:37:41,170
while we think about the goal.

479
00:37:41,590 --> 00:37:45,070
It was an Arab who said, ''One is
the first figure of an endless number.''

480
00:37:47,789 --> 00:37:49,659
An idea is a flash.

481
00:37:50,260 --> 00:37:52,750
We have just three or four
original ideas in our lifetime.

482
00:37:53,769 --> 00:37:56,199
People who are always
thinking don't exist.

483
00:37:56,739 --> 00:37:58,909
Look at Dali's ''melted watches'',
for example.

484
00:38:00,969 --> 00:38:03,219
It's true.
I'm looking for nothing.

485
00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:06,849
If I come across Rousseau,
I read Rousseau.

486
00:38:07,380 --> 00:38:09,750
I could just as well read
Don Quixote.

487
00:38:10,679 --> 00:38:12,579
If a pretty girl fell in my arms,
I'd take her...

488
00:38:13,050 --> 00:38:15,889
It developed the audience's ear.

489
00:38:16,489 --> 00:38:18,980
They were used to hearing theater.
Now it's very different.

490
00:38:19,530 --> 00:38:22,489
One the best things about
Cahiers du Cinéma was the interviews.

491
00:38:23,099 --> 00:38:25,730
Each new issue
was eagerly awaited,

492
00:38:26,300 --> 00:38:32,039
because we felt like we were
in contact with Renoir, Ophüls -

493
00:38:33,340 --> 00:38:37,090
That wasn't done anywhere else.

494
00:38:37,809 --> 00:38:40,800
Now it's the norm
but it took a long time to catch on.

495
00:38:41,409 --> 00:38:46,630
Many journalists scorned tape recorders,
and some still do. They still take notes.

496
00:38:47,989 --> 00:38:53,969
Was making the film a gamble?
Did you wonder if it'd be a success?

497
00:38:54,989 --> 00:38:58,059
You always expect success, but I
didn't expect that big a success.

498
00:38:58,699 --> 00:39:03,969
I thought we might have trouble,
but that we'd break even.

499
00:39:04,900 --> 00:39:08,969
Even though your films contain
these conversations

500
00:39:09,739 --> 00:39:12,110
you haven't made it
into a trademark style.

501
00:39:12,650 --> 00:39:16,809
- Your latest film, "The Marquise of O"
- It has conversations too.

502
00:39:17,579 --> 00:39:22,590
No other director would have dared
to film a conversation

503
00:39:23,489 --> 00:39:28,909
as tiresome and static as the one
at the count's marriage.

504
00:39:29,860 --> 00:39:32,320
Others would have trimmed it
but I didn't

505
00:39:32,869 --> 00:39:36,380
because what I liked about Kleist's work
were his conversations.

506
00:39:37,070 --> 00:39:39,849
I admit I have trouble with language,
but it isn't insurmountable.

507
00:39:40,440 --> 00:39:43,659
If it were, I'd just do what I did for
"La Collectionneuse".

508
00:39:44,309 --> 00:39:48,440
I'd write dialogue based
on the way the actors spoke.

509
00:39:49,219 --> 00:39:52,940
I wouldn't put words in my characters'
mouths. It'd be artificial.

510
00:39:53,650 --> 00:39:56,750
I'd return to my old way
of working.

511
00:39:57,389 --> 00:40:02,989
Language specific to a certain
community changes quickly.

512
00:40:03,960 --> 00:40:07,829
It evolves, and expressions
go out of style.

513
00:40:08,570 --> 00:40:11,789
Especially among students,
or groups that evolve quickly.

514
00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:15,219
Working-class language doesn't change
as much, but it has changed.

515
00:40:15,809 --> 00:40:22,670
Will cinema suffer through language's
aging process like it does -

516
00:40:23,820 --> 00:40:25,519
Changing hairstyles.

517
00:40:25,949 --> 00:40:29,380
"La Collectionneuse" portrayed people
in synch with the times,

518
00:40:30,059 --> 00:40:34,400
but times have changed,
and language has changed accordingly,

519
00:40:35,190 --> 00:40:38,380
so now the film is
behind the times.

520
00:40:39,030 --> 00:40:42,400
But isn't it better to make films
in synch with the times,

521
00:40:43,070 --> 00:40:44,940
in tune with a certain period,

522
00:40:45,400 --> 00:40:48,300
rather than trying to make timeless
films that in the end -

523
00:40:48,909 --> 00:40:51,159
When you watch the "Rules of the
Game" today, you know it was in '39.

524
00:40:51,679 --> 00:40:53,960
This is a problem that concerns
me.

525
00:40:54,480 --> 00:40:58,840
In the past, I was drawn
by the way people spoke.

526
00:40:59,650 --> 00:41:01,429
I'm deeply interested in language.

527
00:41:01,889 --> 00:41:07,809
Currently, I find a kind of sloppiness
has crept into the French language...

528
00:41:10,730 --> 00:41:13,690
and I don't like it very much.

529
00:41:14,300 --> 00:41:16,610
I like colloquial language,
but today,

530
00:41:17,139 --> 00:41:19,750
especially as it's used,
in intellectual circles

531
00:41:21,840 --> 00:41:24,679
I find little of interest in it.

532
00:41:25,280 --> 00:41:28,380
For example,
no one uses inversion anymore,

533
00:41:29,010 --> 00:41:32,579
placing the verb before the subject
to signify a question.

534
00:41:33,289 --> 00:41:35,570
I don't like that.

535
00:41:37,619 --> 00:41:41,429
A Eustache film I liked had a
working-class setting,

536
00:41:42,159 --> 00:41:45,820
but the characters used inversion
maybe because they were southerners.

537
00:41:46,530 --> 00:41:49,219
Eustache's language is very literary.
I liked that.

538
00:41:49,800 --> 00:41:53,309
That said, I also believe characters
in film should speak naturally.

539
00:41:54,010 --> 00:41:57,670
I'm getting around this currently
by shooting films set in the past.

540
00:41:58,380 --> 00:42:02,130
When I return to contemporary films,
I don't know what my position will be.

541
00:42:02,849 --> 00:42:06,010
Perhaps by then language
will have evolved further.

542
00:42:06,650 --> 00:42:11,750
Today's spoken language
is so extremely impoverished...

543
00:42:13,559 --> 00:42:15,869
that it doesn't inspire me.

544
00:42:16,400 --> 00:42:18,329
You find the same dialogue
in every film now.

545
00:42:18,800 --> 00:42:22,639
I'm not saying it's artificial.
It's very close to how people really talk.

546
00:42:23,469 --> 00:42:25,369
Dialogue was much more artificial
in the '50s.

547
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:30,179
But modern speech is extremely poor,
and dialogue isn't very interesting.

548
00:42:31,179 --> 00:42:36,369
You said you're making films
set in the past.

549
00:42:37,280 --> 00:42:39,420
What films are you referring to?

550
00:42:39,920 --> 00:42:41,670
"The Marquise of O" and the
following film.

551
00:42:43,159 --> 00:42:45,440
My next film is set in medieval times

552
00:42:45,960 --> 00:42:49,530
and the one after that may be set
in the past as well.

553
00:42:50,230 --> 00:42:51,900
What is your current project?

554
00:42:52,329 --> 00:42:55,429
"Perceval", based on Chrétien de
Troyes' version.

555
00:42:56,070 --> 00:42:59,349
It's my own translation in verse.

556
00:43:00,469 --> 00:43:02,840
It will be in verse in modern French

557
00:43:03,380 --> 00:43:05,630
but very close to the original.

558
00:43:06,150 --> 00:43:08,989
- Will you shoot it this year?
- I'll shoot it in a studio

559
00:43:09,579 --> 00:43:14,150
but unfortunately it's a big-budget film,
double the budget of my previous films,

560
00:43:14,989 --> 00:43:20,210
so I have to deal with commercial
concerns for the first time.

561
00:43:21,130 --> 00:43:25,550

Until now, I've been able to make my
films because they cost half as much

562
00:43:26,369 --> 00:43:31,760
as any film with comparable
production values.

563
00:43:32,710 --> 00:43:36,170
Is there a reason
for your return to the past?

564
00:43:36,840 --> 00:43:39,769
Are there lessons to be learned?

565
00:43:40,380 --> 00:43:43,860
I always dreamed of making films set
in the past, but I never had the budget.

566
00:43:44,550 --> 00:43:47,769
Now I do so I'm taking
advantage of it.

567
00:43:48,420 --> 00:43:53,900
Another reason is that
frankly right now...

568
00:43:57,460 --> 00:44:01,000
I have no ideas or stories
to tell about modern times

569
00:44:01,699 --> 00:44:04,309
and when I see others' films
I'm not satisfied.

570
00:44:04,869 --> 00:44:07,969
It always seems to be the
same story.

571
00:44:08,610 --> 00:44:11,360
I think we're in a terrible slump

572
00:44:11,940 --> 00:44:16,070
in terms of subject matter
for films about everyday life.

573
00:44:16,849 --> 00:44:20,800
The genre's come a long ways,
but now it's hit a dead end.

574
00:44:21,690 --> 00:44:25,500
Do you think American cinema
deals more with modern-day life?

575
00:44:26,159 --> 00:44:28,969
Yes, classic American cinema.

576
00:44:29,559 --> 00:44:33,400
They can even make films
about current events

577
00:44:34,130 --> 00:44:37,000
without making them ridiculous.
The French can't.

578
00:44:37,599 --> 00:44:41,409
Lumet's "Dog Day Afternoon"
was based on a true story.

579
00:44:42,139 --> 00:44:45,619
I didn't see it
but I understand what you're saying.

580
00:44:46,309 --> 00:44:49,880
I'm not sure it works as well today.

581
00:44:51,849 --> 00:44:58,030
What has happened in recent
French history -

582
00:44:59,090 --> 00:45:04,159
I think cinema is linked to civilization
and American civilization

583
00:45:05,059 --> 00:45:09,039
rightly or wrongly,
is a model for every country.

584
00:45:09,800 --> 00:45:14,900
Due to this, anything that happens
in America is seen as a lesson

585
00:45:15,809 --> 00:45:19,289
and people copy it.

586
00:45:19,980 --> 00:45:22,909
A bank robbery,
or gangsters -

587
00:45:23,519 --> 00:45:25,769
If it happens in America,
it's an example.

588
00:45:26,289 --> 00:45:29,010
If it happens elsewhere, it's not.

589
00:45:29,590 --> 00:45:33,340
There's something else, a kind
of tradition

590
00:45:34,059 --> 00:45:38,070
a pragmatic side to Americans,
their action films, etc.

591
00:45:38,829 --> 00:45:42,460
The French are better at
psychological dramas.

592
00:45:43,170 --> 00:45:45,539
Fiction is fiction. Reality is reality.

593
00:45:46,070 --> 00:45:49,639
I don't want to make a film
about a news item.

594
00:45:50,340 --> 00:45:53,210
I can read about it in the paper.
I might cover it for TV,

595
00:45:53,809 --> 00:45:57,679
but why make a fictional film
about a current event? It's absurd.

596
00:45:58,420 --> 00:46:01,409
I don't mind when Americans do it

597
00:46:02,019 --> 00:46:05,360
but it's a phenomenon I have
trouble understanding.

598
00:46:06,019 --> 00:46:10,000
Don't turn the present into fiction.
The present is reality.

599
00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:16,530
Reality is covered in depth in the news.
I don't see what fiction can add.

600
00:46:17,539 --> 00:46:20,440
In Arthur Penn's film released two
years ago,

601
00:46:21,039 --> 00:46:24,289
one of the characters says,
''I'm going to see a Rohmer film,''

602
00:46:24,940 --> 00:46:27,460
and the other character a detective,
answers

603
00:46:28,010 --> 00:46:30,789
''Watching a Rohmer film
is like watching paint dry.''

604
00:46:31,380 --> 00:46:34,570
I always wondered how you
reacted to that.

605
00:46:35,219 --> 00:46:37,679
I didn't see it, but I heard about it.
I didn't quite understand.

606
00:46:38,219 --> 00:46:41,239
He means my films are boring
and slow, right?

607
00:46:41,860 --> 00:46:46,460
One of the characters said it
an intellectual detective.

608
00:46:48,230 --> 00:46:50,420
I wondered how you reacted,

609
00:46:50,940 --> 00:46:54,920
because it's really a comment
on your cinematic style,

610
00:46:55,670 --> 00:46:57,280
but you didn't see it, so -

611
00:46:57,710 --> 00:47:00,639
No, but I accept his judgment.

612
00:47:01,250 --> 00:47:06,610
It's true that my films are made
up of conversations,

613
00:47:07,550 --> 00:47:12,500
and if the conversation doesn't
interest us, we feel excluded.

614
00:47:13,389 --> 00:47:15,409
It's a common criticism.

615
00:47:15,889 --> 00:47:17,789
The conversation in
"My Night at Maud's"

616
00:47:18,260 --> 00:47:20,980
might interest 3,000 people.

617
00:47:22,170 --> 00:47:26,150
No, that's too few.
Let's say 30,000.

618
00:47:26,909 --> 00:47:29,099
In the end 300,000 found it of
interest

619
00:47:29,610 --> 00:47:33,769
which surprised everyone, myself
included.

620
00:47:34,610 --> 00:47:36,920
The film was successful overseas

621
00:47:37,449 --> 00:47:39,289
Yes, this conversation in French

622
00:47:39,750 --> 00:47:43,760
on typically French subjects like
Pascal,

623
00:47:44,519 --> 00:47:49,559
interested Anglo-Saxons,
Scandinavians and others even more.

624
00:47:50,460 --> 00:47:52,599
Like in the other arts

625
00:47:53,099 --> 00:47:56,349
there are mainstream audiences

626
00:47:57,000 --> 00:47:58,840
and connoisseurs.

627
00:47:59,300 --> 00:48:02,369
Obviously, connoisseurs
should appreciate good work.

628
00:48:03,010 --> 00:48:06,260
Mainstream audiences might not
judge by the same criteria,

629
00:48:06,909 --> 00:48:10,309
but I think they instinctively
recognize good work.

630
00:48:10,980 --> 00:48:14,849
Some say only connoisseurs are capable
of recognizing quality in cinema,

631
00:48:15,590 --> 00:48:18,610
but I think general audiences
sense it too.

632
00:48:22,090 --> 00:48:24,869
This was the case

633
00:48:25,460 --> 00:48:28,269
during the Golden Age of
Hollywood.

634
00:48:28,869 --> 00:48:32,380
Audiences loved those films
and the rare connoisseurs

635
00:48:33,070 --> 00:48:36,030
in foreign countries like
France, etc.

636
00:48:36,639 --> 00:48:39,070
appreciated the films
for different reasons.

637
00:48:39,610 --> 00:48:42,889
When you write a script, do you have
a specific audience in mind?

638
00:48:43,550 --> 00:48:47,030
I believe you must always think
of your audience.

639
00:48:47,719 --> 00:48:51,179
Perhaps I've enjoyed some films
that despise their audience,

640
00:48:51,860 --> 00:48:55,760
but as for myself, I think of
the audience.

641
00:48:56,500 --> 00:48:59,019
I think of the audience

642
00:48:59,559 --> 00:49:04,719
and I've realized that my
audience is quite large.

643
00:49:05,639 --> 00:49:10,119
A great number of people
like my films,

644
00:49:10,940 --> 00:49:13,960
and what's more they like them
for the right reasons.

645
00:49:15,949 --> 00:49:20,019
My films aren't esoteric, written
for a select group of connoisseurs.

646
00:49:20,789 --> 00:49:26,590
Of course, they have little subtleties
that only connoisseurs will enjoy,

647
00:49:27,590 --> 00:49:28,989
but I don't write films
for them.

648
00:49:29,389 --> 00:49:31,730
Are you upset
'cause he didn't try anything?

649
00:49:32,730 --> 00:49:35,829
Would you believe me
if I said I slept with him?

650
00:49:37,139 --> 00:49:38,840
I'd believe anything,
coming from you.

651
00:49:39,269 --> 00:49:41,929
I know if you say yes,
it probably means no

652
00:49:42,510 --> 00:49:44,730
but could just as well mean yes.

653
00:49:56,860 --> 00:49:59,289
You're an immoral little slut.

654
00:49:59,989 --> 00:50:03,179
Well, I certainly wouldn't espouse
your moral code.

655
00:50:06,130 --> 00:50:09,059
MOVIE TALK

2012-01-04T05:01:00.003-02:00

2012 iniciado com o melhor filme que já vi. Nada mau.

2012-01-03T23:14:00.001-02:00

Le masque et la part de Dieu

2012-01-02T20:17:00.002-02:00

http://www.elumiere.net/exclusivo_web/internacional_straub/index.php

2012-01-01T20:58:00.001-02:00

... a ricordo delle creature d'ombra che fecero di noi la loro luce.

2011

2011-12-31T23:59:00.011-02:00

2011-12-30T14:24:00.000-02:00

a última do ano

2011-12-26T15:32:00.007-02:00

Crítico brasileiro é uma coisa engraçada: tenta atribuir a correntes artísticas coisas que até a neurociência revela de maneira mais eficaz (memórias de longa duração explícita/implícita, curto prazo, memórias extintas/esquecidas -> diencéfalo, hipocampo, córtex entorrinal e córtex parietal associativo -> estriado, neocórtex, vias reflexivas; amígdala, cerebelo -> neuroplasticidade etc. etc.).

Por que qualquer leitor deveria ver o último Coutinho se, de acordo com o que se escreve sobre o filme, ele pode ter a mesma experiência numa aula de neurofisiologia?

Aonde se fala do filme?

De que forma se pensa o filme?

De que filme, afinal, tratam?

Nem com cem bilhões de neurônios parecem capazes de escrever algo minimamente pertinente.

Falou.

2011-12-24T23:08:00.000-02:00

Pintor, não te ocupes
em ser moderno.
É a única coisa que,
infelizmente,
não importa o que fizeres,
não poderás evitar de ser.

2011-12-24T13:35:00.002-02:00

Tudo isso teve fim com a falsa explosão cartesiana e escatológica de Dubuffet. Mas os críticos ditirâmbicos da velha arte moderna continuam e continuarão ainda por muito tempo prostáticos e alegres com a feiúra sentada em seus joelhos. Não se fatigarão dela.

Os críticos da velha arte moderna foram sobretudo enganados e corneados pelo "moderno" mesmo. De fato, nada envelheceu mais depressa e pior do que aquilo tudo que num momento eles qualificaram de "moderno".

2011-12-23T23:04:00.003-02:00

A introdução da feiúra na arte moderna começou com a adolescente ingenuidade romântica de Rimbaud, quando disse: "a beleza sentou-se em meus joelhos e estou fatigado dela". Foi por essas palavras cifradas que os críticos ditirâmbicos - exageradamente negativistas, e odiando o classicismo como todo rato de esgoto que se respeita - descobriram a agitação biológica da feiúra e seus inconfessáveis atrativos... Começaram a se maravilhar com uma nova beleza, que diziam "não-convencional", e ao lado da qual a beleza clássica tornava-se de repente sinônimo de frivolidade.

Todos os equívocos eram possíveis, inclusive o dos objetos selvagens, feios como os pecados mortais (que eles são, em realidade). Para ficarem em uníssono com os críticos ditirâmbicos, os pintores passaram a fazer o feio. Quanto mais o faziam, mais eram modernos.

Melhores 2011

2011-12-21T22:45:00.001-02:00

1. Phenomena
2. Phenomena
3. Phenomena
4. Phenomena
5. Phenomena
6. Phenomena
7. Phenomena
8. Phenomena
9. Profondo rosso/Opera
10. Tenebre/Stendhal
11. L'uccello/Gatto

menção especial: 12/10/11, Trauma

2011-12-20T14:01:00.002-02:00

2011-12-20T02:27:00.002-02:00

For better or worse, Cimino has in abundance the quality Scorsese largely lacks: idealism and the will to believe—a rare (unique?) quality in modern Hollywood cinema, with which the knowing pseudo-innocence of a Spielberg or a Lucas should never be confused. Scorsese’s intelligent skepticism produces a ﬁgure who fuses the western hero with the horror ﬁlm monster in the context of urban ﬁlm noir; Cimino’s idealism produces a lament for a ﬁgure contemporary civilization has rendered obsolete but to which is still attributed a nobility and purity. If Travis Bickle derives primarily from the Wayne of The Searchers (the hero as near-psychopath is not an invention of the 70s), Mike relates rather to the Wayne of Rio Bravo, in his moral infallibility, both its grandeur and its human disadvantages.

(...)

The parallel with Rio Bravo can be developed further. Both ﬁlms are built upon the relationship between the strong, morally infallible hero and the weaker man whom he strives to save, both by example and direct intervention. In both, the director’s commitment to the strong character is scarcely in question; yet the ﬁlms’ complexity arises partly from the way in which the weak character is used subtly to comment upon the strong one, consistently exposing the latter’s limitations. Hawks admitted that Rio Bravo was really Dean Martin’s ﬁlm; a similar case can be made for suggesting that The Deer Hunter is really Christopher Walken’s, and Cimino might be taken as conﬁrming this by having Walken appear ﬁrst in the retrospective end credits, his image summoned up by the ﬁnal toast “to Nick” and the intercut shots of Mike and Linda, the two people who loved him. This is not, of course, to suggest that the ﬁlm endorses Nick’s capitulation to Vietnam, any more than Rio Bravo could be read as an endorsement of alcoholism. Yet the use of Nick to criticize Mike is consistent throughout the ﬁlm. His sense of Mike’s archaism is introduced near the beginning (“I don’t think much about ‘one shot’ any more”); his sense of the presumption inherent in Mike’s attitude erupts in the Vietcong camp (“Who do you think you are—God?” in response to Mike’s abrupt decision that the only thing to do about Steven is to “forget him”). Finally, his suicide at the Russian Roulette table amounts to a demonstration to Mike of the irrelevance of “one shot” within a chaotic reality beyond the control of anybody.

2011-12-19T03:06:00.000-02:00

2011-12-13T00:00:00.000-02:00

2011

2011-12-12T00:29:00.002-02:00

2011-12-08T23:31:00.002-02:00

Georges Méliès faz 150 anos prostituído por um carcamano institucionalizado.

Neste importante dia para o cinema mundial, desejo que o sr. Martin Scorsese se foda.

2011-12-06T18:49:00.002-02:00

Sacha Guitry com legendas para download (via Jesús).

2011-12-06T00:47:00.003-02:00

Descobrimos imediatamente no cinema a realização concreta das intuições filosóficas que floresciam no final do século XIX. Ele projeta a duração nos limites planos do espaço. O que estou dizendo? Ele faz da duração uma dimensão do espaço, o que confere ao espaço uma nova e imensa significação de colaborador ativo, e não mais passivo do espírito.

2011-12-05T17:18:00.003-02:00

Bien que notre travail sur le découpage ait consisté principalement à effacer toute trace d'intentions, d'expression, je peux dire par exemple ce que ma femme a éprouvé en dactylographiant le découpage sur des stencils, que ce serait simplement un film sur la mort. Mais ce sera aussi - j'espère que ce ne sera plus dedans alors, et pourtant encore dedans - un film sur un « homme libre », comme dirait Bernanos. Bach est pour moi l'un des derniers personnages de l'histoire de la culture allemande chez lequel il n'y a pas encore divorce entre ce qu'on appelle artiste et intellectuel; on ne trouve pas trace chez lui de romantisme - on sait ce qui est en partie sorti du romantisme allemand; il n'y a pas chez lui la moindre séparation entre l'intelligence, l'art et la vie, pas de conflit non plus entre la musique « profane » et « sacrée », chez lui tout était sur le même plan. Pour moi Bach c'est le contraire de Goethe.

Sur « Chronique d'Anna Magdalena Bach », par Jean-Marie Straub, Cahiers du Cinéma nº 193, setembro 1967, p. 58

2011-12-05T01:59:00.002-02:00

Note ajoutée: L'histoire du cinéma est loin d'être achevée - à peine commencée en réalité. Trois domaines à mon avis devraient tenter les futurs historiens du cinéma. Je les indique brièvement: 1) le cinéma français d'avant-guerre: un cinéma qui a beaucoup demandé à des gens qui n'étaient pas exactement gens de cinéma, surtout gens de théâtre - acteurs, dramaturges - et qui, en conséquence, a beaucoup reçu d'eux; un cinéma dont les buts, les méthodes, l'esprit sont presque aussi différents de ceux du cinéma français d'après-guerre que s'il s'agissait de deux cinémas de nationalité différente. Avec le sourire (1936), film écrit par Louis Verneuil et mis en scène par Maurice Tourneur est, par son invention, sa vivacité, son cynisme, son expressivité à tous les niveaux (en particulier social et moral) un film typique de cette période, où le cinéma français fut peut-être le premier du monde. Bien mièvres et bien scolaires en tous cas nous paraissent aujourd'hui, à côté de ce film, les meilleures comédies américaines de l'époque. Il est sûr qu'il y a là tout un domaine à explorer et à recenser avec, comme on dit, « un regard neuf »; 2) le courant comique dans le cinéma italien des débuts du parlant à nos jours (de la clownerie pure à la plus virulente satire sociale) est un filon sans doute intéressant lui aussi; 3) le troisième domaine est peut-être le plus important: il s'agirait d'examiner, dans une perspective historique, le rôle de chacune des principales firmes américaines. Cette étude n'est pas à mener, comme certains le croient, d'une manière hostile à la notion d'auteur. Ses conclusions au contraire mettraient on ne peut mieux en valeur l'importance et le talent respectifs des grands du cinéma U.S.

Jacques Lourcelles, Journal de 1966, Présence du Cinéma n° 24-25, outono 1967, p. 79

2011-12-05T01:52:00.002-02:00

2011-12-03T23:13:00.000-02:00

"Fiz um filme com sobretudos e chapéus, logo é uma produção do Val Lewton."

2011-12-01T00:47:00.002-02:00

Le premier et le seul entre tous nos moyens d’expression, le cinéma ne se contente pas de réintégrer l’homme dans l’univers, de lui rendre ses rapports réels et permanents avec le temps, l’espace, l’atmosphère, la lumière, la forme et le mouvement. Il ne se borne pas, depuis que la captation des bruits et des souffles du monde lui permet de réaliser l’orchestration symphonique de nos sensations auditives et de nos sensations visuelles, à nous marquer notre place de Maître d’œuvre au centre commun de réception et de commandement de la symphonie universelle. Il nous apprend peu à peu à replonger notre voix même dans la totalité de l’Être comme l’une des plus humbles – puisque condamnée à obéir consciemment à son rôle – entre les sonorités et les images innombrables qui font de l’Être même une incantation multitudinaire où il se cherche dans sa propre exaltation. D’abord surpris, quand il a disposé de la voix humaine, le cinéma a reculé de plusieurs étapes, comme pour prendre un champ nouveau. Il s’est trop rapproché du théâtre, s’éloignant d’autant de la sculpture, de la peinture, de la musique et de la danse qu’il doit se garder de perdre de vue, car elles lui interdisent, sous peine de mort, de jamais oublier la forme, le passage, le rythme et le mouvement. Mais il porte en lui sa délivrance. Le seul fait d’exister revendique pour lui cette formidable puissance, qu’il est seul à posséder, d’être et de devenir chaque jour un peu plus la langue universelle des hommes, que la parole n’est pas encore, et ne sera peut-être jamais.

Elie Faure, Ombres solides, « Introduction à la mystique du cinéma », 1934

2011-11-29T21:55:00.000-02:00

Voir un Bauer à l’ère du numérique, de la 3D, de la mocap, etc, n’a rien de scandaleux, c’est même plutôt salutaire, c’est comme contempler un Masaccio après avoir passé une journée à la Fiac...

2011-11-29T21:48:00.000-02:00

2011-11-29T20:54:00.000-02:00

CONVERSATIONS WITH JAMES GRAY

2011-11-29T20:52:00.000-02:00

2011-11-26T06:01:00.001-02:00

2011-11-23T22:28:00.004-02:00

2011-11-23T22:21:00.000-02:00

Moullet sobre Time Without Pity

2011-11-23T22:12:00.000-02:00

Sur la télévision
de Louis Skorecki

2011-11-22T12:58:00.001-02:00

"Os governos devem auxiliar o cinema mas não como um favor, mas como uma obrigação, porque o cinema é o espelho da vida", afirmou, recordando as palavras de um realizador chileno e, à saída da cerimónia, foi mesmo ao ponto de afirmar que atividade não pode parar, porque isso seria sinónimo "de o país morrer".

2011-11-22T00:30:00.002-02:00

2011-11-19T13:36:00.000-02:00

Outro dia lendo um pouco o blog do Girish e cia.

A coisa mais chata e sisuda deste mundo.

2011-11-19T00:08:00.003-02:00

Dorogoy tsenoy no rutracker para download (registro aqui).

2011-11-18T20:07:00.002-02:00

Grécia e Itália, eternos contos de advertência da civilização ocidental.

Em outras palavras: merda à vista.

Boa noite

2011-11-16T04:13:00.003-02:00

2011-11-15T16:53:00.000-02:00

2011-11-14T05:23:00.000-02:00

2011-11-14T01:18:00.000-02:00

Duro de Matar - A Vingança passando na Globo. Filmaço.

2011-11-13T15:22:00.001-02:00

2011-11-13T15:12:00.001-02:00

Visto que considero a impressão transmitida ao artista pela natureza como a coisa mais importante para traduzir, não será necessário que este esteja armado de antemão de todos os mais rápidos meios de tradução?

Eugène Delacroix, um idealista?

2011-11-13T15:03:00.003-02:00

É o fim perceber que os elogios a filmes circunstanciais mais parecem pedidos de desculpa pela falta de filmes arrebatadores que qualquer outra coisa.

2011-11-07T22:23:00.004-02:00

(...) O termo "superar" deve ser tomado aqui no seu sentido hegeliano, dialético, que implica que tudo o que é válido nas posições superadas é conservado nas posições novas.

2011-11-04T23:55:00.006-02:00

2011-11-04T16:43:00.004-02:00

"O Cahiers incluiu a Sony nos agradecimentos da edição deste mês?", um amigo meu perguntou.

2011-11-03T02:26:00.002-02:00

M E M O

(For the Internet)

CLINT EASTWOOD'S HOOVER BIO

STARRING DeCAPRIO

GETS IT ALL WRONG

2011-11-02T20:35:00.001-02:00

Beleza, a gente se fala daqui a 32.000 anos.

2011-11-02T13:02:00.003-02:00

2011-10-31T05:07:00.010-02:00

2011-10-30T06:06:00.005-02:00

“Que importam as flores e as árvores, o fogo e a pedra, se não amo e não tenho lar? É preciso ser dois - ou, pelo menos, ai de nós, ter sido dois - para compreender um céu azul, para invocar uma aurora. As coisas infinitas, como o céu, a floresta e a luz só acham nome no coração daquele que ama. A brisa das planuras, na sua doçura e mansidão, é o eco de um suspiro enternecido. Por isso, a alma humana, enriquecida por um amor eleito, anima as grandes coisas entre as pequenas. E pode tratar por tu o universo, porque conhece a embriaguez humana do tu.”

Gaston Bachelard, prefácio de Ich und Du de Martin Buber

2011-10-29T19:20:00.001-02:00

Cinema brasileiro, anos 2000, dez anos, duas questões: bóia ou afunda?

2011-10-29T19:11:00.001-02:00

Sobre Fulci

2011-10-26T06:07:00.002-02:00

Godard señaló que la gente a veces va a ver «una antigua película de Lubitsch», pero nunca leen «un antiguo libro de Céline». Con la misma contemporaneidad, la historia del cine resulta más cercana que la historia de la literatura. Hay una obra que parece, sin embargo, venir de muy lejos: no se va a ver «una película antigua de Dwan».

(...)

Las razones históricas o estratégicas de este olvido, sin embargo, no son sino el indicio de un secreto agazapado en las propias películas. Si Tourneur es el cineasta nocturno del secreto, donde gobierna la inquietud, Dwan es el cineasta diurno del secreto, donde la serenidad acecha

2011-10-26T04:27:00.004-02:00

2011-10-26T03:20:00.001-02:00

2011-10-05T00:40:00.004-03:00

Argento. Película (15 no total). CCBB Rio. 7 a 23 de outubro.

2011-10-02T20:12:00.001-03:00

Anos 2000, ou A MERDA.

PÁRA TUDO!!!

2011-10-01T16:16:00.004-03:00

Kylie Minogue is filming Holly Motors with Juliette Binoche in Paris with director Leos Carax

2011-09-25T23:20:00.001-03:00

Há uma diferença entre um romântico, um passional e um clichê.

2011-09-25T16:31:00.001-03:00

Festival du film maudit, Biarritz, France, July–August 1949

2011-09-25T00:27:00.001-03:00

Dossier Fulvia Film

2011-09-25T00:26:00.006-03:00

2011-09-22T02:34:00.001-03:00

"Cet homme a tourné quelques-uns des plus beaux films d'Hollywood..."

2011-09-21T18:16:00.001-03:00

" Il me manque encore quelques haines.
Je suis certain qu'elles existent. "

2011-09-17T20:18:00.002-03:00

2011-09-05T23:26:00.001-03:00

De morte natural nunca ninguém morreu.
Não foi para morrer que nós nascemos,
não foi só para a morte que dos tempos
chega até nós esse murmúrio cavo,
inconsolado, uivante, estertorado,
desde que anfíbios viemos a uma praia
e quadrumanos nos erguemos. Não.
Não foi para morrermos que falámos,
que descobrimos a ternura e o fogo,
e a pintura, a escrita, a doce música.
Não foi para morrer que nós sonhámos
ser imortais, ter alma, reviver,
ou que sonhámos deuses que por nós
fossem mais imortais que sonharíamos.
Não foi. Quando aceitamos como natural,
dentro da ordem das coisas ou dos anjos,
o inominável fim da nossa carne; quando
ante ele nos curvamos como se ele fora
inescapável fome de infinito; quando
vontade o imaginamos de outros deuses
que são rostos de um só; quando que a dor
é um erro humano a que na dor nos damos
porque de nós se perde algo nos outros, vamos
traindo esta ascensão, esta vitória, isto
que é ser-se humano, passo a passo, mais.

A morte é natural na natureza. Mas
nós somos o que nega a natureza. Somos
esse negar da espécie, esse negar do que
nos liga ainda ao Sol, à terra, às águas.
Para emergir nascemos. Contra tudo e além
de quanto seja o ser-se sempre o mesmo
que nasce e morre, nasce e morre, acaba
como uma espécie extinta de outras eras.
Para emergirmos livres foi que a morte
nos deu um medo que é nosso destino.
Tudo se fez para escapar-lhe, tudo
se imaginou para iludi-la, tudo
até coragem, desapego, amor,
tudo para que a morte fosse natural.

Não é. Como, se o fôra, há tantos milhões de anos
a conhecemos, a sofremos, a vivemos,
e mesmo assassinando a não queremos?
Como nunca ninguém a recebeu
senão cansado de viver? Como a ninguém
sequer é concebível para quem lhe seja
um ente amado, um ser diverso, um corpo
que mais amamos que a nós próprios? Como
será que os animais, junto de nós,
a mostram na amargura de um olhar
que lânguido esmorece rebelado?

E desde sempre se morreu. Que prova?
Morrem os astros, porque acabam. Morre
tudo o que acaba, diz-se. Mas que prova?
Só prova que se morre de universo pouco,
do pouco de universo conquistado.

Não há limites para a Vida. Não
aquela que de um salto se formou
lá onde um dia alguns cristais comeram;
nem bem aquela que, animal ou planta,
foi sendo pelo mundo este morrer constante
de vidas que outras vidas alimentam
para que novas vidas surjam que
como primárias células se absorvam.

A Vida Humana, sim, a respirada,
suada, segregada, circulada,
a que é excremento e sangue, a que é semente
e é gozo e é dor e pele que palpita
ligeiramente fria sob ardentes dedos.
Não há limites para ela. É uma injustiça
que sempre se morresse, quando agora
de tanto que matava se não morre.
É o pouco de universo a que se agarram,
para morrer, os que possuem tudo.
O pouco que não basta e que nos mata,
quando como ele a Vida não se amplia,
e é como a pele do ónagro, que se encolhe,
retráctil e submissa, conformada.
É uma injustiça a morte. É cobardia
que alguém a aceite resignadamente.
O estado natural é complacência eterna,
é uma traição ao medo por que somos,
áquilo que nos cabe: ser o espírito
sempre mais vasto do Universo infindo.

O Sol, a Via Láctea, as nebulosas,
teremos e veremos até que
a Vida seja de imortais que somos
no instante em que da morte nos soltamos.
A Morte é deste mundo em que o pecado,
a queda, a falta originária, o mal
é aceitar seja o que for, rendidos.

E Deus não quer que nós, nenhum de nós,
nenhum aceite nada. Ele espera,
como um juiz na meta da corrida
torcendo as mãos de desespero e angústia,
porque nada pode fazer nada e vê
que os corredores desistem, se acomodam,
ou vão tombar exaustos no caminho.
De nós se acresce ele mesmo que será
o espírito que formos, o saber e a força.
Não é nos braços dele que repousamos,
mas ele se encontrará nos nossos braços
quando chegarmos mais além do que ele.
Não nos aguarda – a mim, a ti, a quem amaste,
a quem te amou, a quem te deu o ser –
não nos aguarda, não. Por cada morte
a que nos entregamos ele se vê roubado,
roído pelos ratos do demónio,
o homem natural que aceita a morte,
a natureza que de morte é feita.

Quando a hora chegar em que já tudo
na terra foi humano — carne e sangue —,
não haverá quem sopre nas trombetas
clamando o globo a um corpo só, informe,
um só desejo, um só amor, um sexo.
Fechados sobre a terra, ela nos sendo
e sendo ela nós todos, a ressurreição
é morte desse Deus que nos espera
para espírito seu e carne do Universo.
Para emergir nascemos. O pavor nos traça
este destino claramente visto:
podem os mundos acabar, que a Vida,
voando nos espaços, outros mundos,
há-de encontrar em que se continui.
E, quando o infinito não mais fosse,
e o encontro houvesse de um limite dele,
a Vida com seus punhos levá-lo-á na frente,
para que em Espaço caiba a Eternidade.

Assis, 1 de Abril de 1961, sábado de Aleluia

- Jorge de Sena

2011-09-05T20:34:00.000-03:00

No front do cinema, Jean-Claude Brisseau está filmando.

2011-09-04T20:54:00.002-03:00

Cahiers edição especial mumblecore.

Resta abrir uma Original, colocar Paris nous appartient no tocador de DVDs e esperar que alguém tome uma decisão sensata e feche os Cahiers de uma vez por todas.

2011-09-04T18:03:00.000-03:00

Tem alguma coisa menos Robert Capa que o cinema de hoje em dia?

2011-09-04T17:08:00.003-03:00

2011-09-03T21:45:00.002-03:00

Denise Dumont - Rio Babilonia

2011-09-03T21:36:00.002-03:00

Mystères de Ruiz

1
2
3

2011-09-03T19:59:00.001-03:00

«O espírito das formas é uno. Circula no interior delas como o fogo central que se revolve no centro dos planetas e determina a altura e o perfil das suas montanhas consoante o grau de resistência e a constituição do solo. As imagens dos deuses são tão instáveis quanto possível, mesmo que se trate de deuses de um mesmo povo, precisamente porque elas representam, no mundo das aparências, a circulação invisível de uma força permanente e decidida a quebrar ou a deformar os obstáculos, que percorre as suas artérias, anima os seus nervos, solda e fortalece os seus ossos desde a origem do homem. É a permanência desta força que se trata de encontrar e salientar sob a diversidade e a variabilidade dos símbolos que a dissimulam.»

Élie Faure

Os nostálgicos também amam

2011-08-27T17:08:00.013-03:00

Alguém aí lembra do Bizarro, que passava na Warner Channel na madrugada de sexta para sábado (ou de sábado para domingo, não lembro ao certo)?

Imaginem um Cine Trash sem o Mojica. Era muito do caralho, dois ou três filmes fantásticos exibidos um atrás do outro. Para se ter uma idéia, mais ou menos na mesma época o Telecine 5 era um canal muito bom. Se não me engano passaram numa noite It Lives Again e Island of the Alive (não lembro se passaram o primeiro); o Island vinha praticamente no embalo de Lives Again.

O esquema era sempre esse de double bill, e quase sempre só com coisas muito boas, de filmes da Toho à Hammer - The Devil Rides Out, Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed e acho que também Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell e Witchfinder General (na época raridades).

Provavelmente a última boa atração de cinema na televisão, pelo menos dentre as que conheci de lá pra cá. Tem o cara da Futura que programa Truffaut, Resnais, Bresson, Don Weis, mas ao invés de pesos-pesados como Giovanna Antonelli, Leandra Leal e Marjorie Estiano comentando o filme nos intervalos do programa, o Bizarro contava com as ilustres presenças de Godzilla e Mothra - o que o tornava incomparavelmente mais simpático.

2011-08-27T07:55:00.000-03:00

ASSIM SE FAZ A REVOLUÇÃO NO CINEMA 70

2011-08-27T04:41:00.005-03:00

Por sinal, falei do Jacopetti sem saber que ele morreu no último dia 17 - sabe como é, pessoal tirando atraso com o Ruiz, principalmente os que passaram as últimas duas décadas sem mencioná-lo.

Bem que podia pintar uns textos do Moullet, que adora ambos.

2011-08-27T04:15:00.002-03:00

2011-08-27T03:35:00.000-03:00

Intuição = sensibilidade + método

2011-08-27T02:35:00.000-03:00

Il selvaggio e l’architetto: le due anime del cinema di Dario Argento

2011-08-26T23:07:00.003-03:00

2011-08-26T21:04:00.000-03:00

Film, baby, powerful tool for love or laughter, fantastic weapon to create violence or ward it off, is in your hands. The only possible chance you've got in our round thing is not to bitch about injustice or break windows, but to make a concerted effort to have a loud voice. The loudest voice known to man is on thousand-foot reels. Campus chants about war are not going to help two peasants in a rice paddy on Tuesday. However, something might be said on emulsion that will stop a soldier from firing into nine children somewhere, sometime. Now; next year; five years from now. Try emulsion instead of rocks for race relations and ecology. That, and love and laughter, has to be what it's all about. Then you'll survive. Maybe we'll all survive. Maybe.