Cahiers Du Cinema 11
Cahiers Du Cinema 11
Cahiers Du Cinema 11
No. ll
cahiers du
in english
Orson Weller
lngtnar Bergman
Alain Jessua
Robert Flaherty
$1.25
and shorts
Alexander Alexeieff's
Ole Roos'
Jan Lenica's
Sandy Semel's
NFBC's
Peter Whitehead's
Derrick Knight's
Tamas Czigany's
Jiri Trnka's
. Y. 10001
1211 Polk St., San Fran., Calif. 94109
Robere Enrico's
AN OCCURRENCE AT
OWL CREEK BRIDGE
The 27-minute French short Grand Prize-winner at Cannes
and winner of the Academy Award.
Based on the short story by Ambrose Bierce, it re-creates
the tense atmosphere of the War of Secession.
A spell-binding drama of a condemned man- with an incredible denouement.
cahiers du
in english
Number 11
September 1967
Grnevirve Page.
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SADOUL-FLAHERTY
A Flaherty Mystery, by Georges Sodoul
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CAHIERS CRITIQUES
Bresson: Balthazor, by Rene Gilson (CdC # 182, Sept 1966)
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Lewis: Three on a Couch, by Jeo n-Louis Comolli (CdC # 186, Jon 1967)
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Groulx: Cat in the Sock, by Jacques Levy (CdC # 187, Feb 1967)
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Space Soles Represen ta tive: Cl Associates, 49 Morton St., N. Y., N. Y. 10014, AL S-4n1
U.S. Distribution~ Eastern News Distributors, Inc., 155 West 15th St., N. Y., N. Y. 10011. All rights
reserved. Copyrig ht 1967 by Cohiers Publishing Company.
Jacques
Bontemps
(Cahiers)
Jean-Louis
Bory
(Arts)
Albert
Cervonl
(France
Nouvelle)
Jean
Collet
(Telerama)
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Michel
Delahaye
(Cahiers)
Jean-Andre
FleschI
(Cahiers)
Michel
Aubriant
(Candide)
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Michel
Mardore
(Pariscope)
Jean
Narboni
(Cahiers)
Georges
Sadoul
(les Lettres
Francaises)
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Welles on
~a/staff
QUESTION-In the reading, the scenario of Falstaff seemed much Jess trag.ic
than the .film that it bas become ..
ORSON WELLES-Yes, oow ir is a
very sad story. Perhaps that is a mistake on my part. Moreover I find the
film funnier in English than io Spanish.
The Spanish version is very well done,
but there were difficulties io translating
the jokes. In any case my character is
less funny than I had hoped. But the
more I srudied the pan, the le~s funny
it appeared to me. This problem preoccupied me during the entire shooting.
I played the role three times on the
stage before filming it, and Falstaff
appeared to me more witty than funny. I don't think very highly of
those moments in which I am only
amusing. It seems to me that Falstaff
is. a man of wit rather than a clown.
I directed everything, played every
thing, in the perspective of the last
scene. So that the relationship berween
Falstaff and the Prince is no longer the
simple comic one that one finds in
Shakespeare's Hettry IV Part I. It is a
foretelling, a preparation for the tragic
ending. The farewell scene is. foretold
four times in the .film. The death of
the Prince, the King in his castle, the
death of Hotspur, which is that of
Chivalry, the poverty and illness of Falstaff, are presented throughout the entire .film and must darken it. I do not
believe that comedy should dominate in
such a film. Yet Falstaff representS a
positive spirit, io many respeCtS courageous, aod even when be makes fun
of his cowardice. He is a man who
representS a virtue in the process of dis,.
appearing. He wages a struggJe lost in
advance. I don't believe be is ~ccking
anything. He represents a value; he is
goodnes;. He is the character in whom
I believe the most, the most entirely
good man in all drama. His faults are
trivial and h e makes the most enormous jokes from them . . . His goodness is like bread, like wine. That is
why I lost the comic side of his character a little; the more I played him,
the more I felt that I represented goodness, purity.
The film speaks too of the terrible
price that the Prince must pay in exchange for power. In the historical writings, there is that balancing berween the
triangle (the king, his son, and Falstaff,
who is a kind of foster father) aod
the other plot, that of Horspur, which
is much longer and intricately constructed, and very interesting. It keeps
the triangle from dominating the simacion. But in the film, which was made
essentially in order to tell the srory of
that triangle, there are necessarily elements that cannot have the same existence as in the original works. In the
face of Falstaff, the king represents responsibility. The interesting thing, in
the story is that the old king is a
murderer, he has usurped the thron e,
and yet be represents legitimacy. The
II
' ... the real must be treated like a setting.' Orson Welles: FalstafF, Keith Baxte r, John
Gielgud; Baxter, Welles.
13
16
Welles
tn
Power
by Serge Daney
Orson
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Jack le Fataliste
by Jean-Louis Comolli
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24
..
..
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can naturally have its importance, fir& of all for the artist himself.
Today the situation is Jess complex,
Jess captivating, and especially Jess alluring.
Thus, if I want to be totally sincere,
I have the feeling that art (and not
only cinematOgraphic art) is in~jgoili
cant.
Literature, painting, music, cinema
and theatre engender themselves and
are born of themselves. New mutations,
new combinations, are formed and die
out; seen from outside, the activity appears endowed with intense life-grandiose obstinacy that the artists give tO
projecting for themselves and for an
always more distracted audience, the
images of a world that no longer even
cares about their opinion. On some rare
occasions, the anise is punished, an
being comJdered as dangerous and deserving of being sti !led or controlled.
On the whole, nevertheless, art is free,
insolent, irresponsible, and, as I was saying, the movement is intense, almost
feverish; it seem~. to me that it makes
one think of a serpent's skin full of
ants. The serpent itself has been dead
a long time, devoured, devoid of its
venom, but the skin moves swollen with
a vital ardor.
Now, if I observe that I lind myself
one of these ants, I am compelled co
ask myself if there is any .reason for
pursuing my activity. The answer i;;
yes. Although I believe that the theatre
is a dear old cocol/e whose best da ys
are over. Although I li nd, and many
another with me, the western more
stimulating than an Antonioni or a
Bergman. Although the new music gives
one the impre~on of wanting to suffocate oneself in a mathematically rarelied air, although pai nti ng and sculpture
become sterile and weaken, victims of
their own petrifying freedom. Although
litrature has changed iota an enormous
rock of words without profound sig.nilicance or dangerous consequence.
There arc poetS who will never write
verse ro the exrent that they shape
their existence in the man ner of a poem,
actors who wil l never appear on stage,
but interpret their Jives as so many
singular dramas. There are painters
who will never paint, since they close
their eyes, and, in the shelter of their
closed lids imagine the purest maSterpieces. There are cineastes who live their
films and who never will squander their
ta lent to give them materiali ty, reali ty.
The same way, I believe that in our
days people can reject the theatre, since
they live in the womb of a gigantic
drama that never srops breaking out
in local tragedies. They have no need
for music, since at every moment their
ea rdrums arc und er attack by violent
sonorous hurricanes, which reach and go
beyond a tolerable intensity. They have
no need for poetry, since within the
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Belle de Jour
One of the most eagerly awaited films of the year,
luis Bunuel's Belle de Jour stars Catherine Deneuve
(seen above, left, and be low), Genevieve Page a nd
Michel Piccoli (opposite page), and Pierre Clementi
(below), as well as Jean Sorel, Macha Meril, and
Francisco Rabel. Bunuel appears in several of the
production shots on these pages.
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lilm.
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Cahiers Critiques
1. ROBERT BRESSON: Balthazar, Anne Wiazemsky.
53
My God, Wilt
Thou Forsake Me? )
Au Hasttrd Bttlthazttr French film
of Robecr Bress.on. Scenttrio: Robert
Bresson. Photography: Chislain Cloquet.
1\lusic: Franz Schubert, Jean Wiener.
Decors: Pierre Charbonnier. Editor: R ay
mood Lamy. Sound: Antoine Archim
baud, Jacques Carr ere. Assisttmts: J acques Kebadian, Sven Frostenson. Cast:
Anne Wiazemsky (Made), Fran~ois La
farge (Gerard), Philippe Asselin (the
schoolmaster), Natalie ) o)aut (Marie's
mother), Walter Green (Jacques), J.C.
Guilbert (Arnold), Fran~is Sullerot
(the baker), M.C. Fremont (the baker's
wife), Pierre Kloss.owsky (the grain
merchant), Jean Remigoard (the notary),
Jacques Sorbets (the captain of the
gendarmes) Tord Paag (Louis), Jean-Joel
Barbier (the dean), Remy Brozeck (Mar
eel), Mylene Weyergans (the nurse),
Guy Brejac (the veterinary), Sven ProstenseD and Roger Fjellstrom (the young
hoodlums.) Producer: Mag. Bodard. Produciu.g Convpat1'ies: Argos-Films, Pare
Film, Athos Films (Paris)-SvenskFilm
indusrri, Jnstitut Suedois du film (Stock
holm), 1965. Distributor: Athos Films.
Length: 1 hr. 30 min.
This is not " Prayer to go to Paradise
with the donkeys." But who has been
ab le really to take Bresson for a Francis
Jammes? Since Diary of <l Cotmtry
Priest, the work of Robert Bresson has
sown doubt ro harvest faith, for not
to dare to doubt is that not to
believe not enough? That doubt soon
because becomes strength and not weak
ness, but the harvest is evaded;
thank heaven, Bresson will never take
up the sickle of a definitive message;
there are too many tares in Bresson's
field, and God himself cannot be certain
of recognizing His ow11 there, nor of
considering the ttuteur of Pickpocket as
one of them. Bresson's writing, formally
singular, is more than ever in Au hasard
Baltbazttr chat of a plural work, writing
that opens a poem's truth, a poem, one
must say, without "ineffable poetry,"
without effusion, a geometer's poem, a
paraboJa.and-parable poem. If one asks
que.s tions of this film- some seaso11s in
Bresson's bell-the answer is the very
one that Arthur Rimbaud gave in con
nectioD with his own Sais011 en enfer"I t says what it says, literally and in
every s.ense."
Si11ce Comttry Priest, Robert Bresso11
strikes a lways at the same point, under
the same angle of vision. But it is not a
matter of a point of departure style; that
is conquered, and, vulnerable and fragile
like every conquest, always put again
in quest, as it is in this film, in wh!ch
there is no appearance that is not
refused.
54
Everything began with the Diary. Before that there were strangers, Cocceau,
Pcce Bruckberger, and in th e mise etz
scene, the old theatre foe Les Dames
tltt Bois de Bo11logne, the old ci11ema
for Les A nges d, peche. With the Diary
Bresson begins, and it is by virtue of
high treason, in making of the Bernanos
novel an itinerary of dereliction. If God
is dead, it is in the universe of Bresson
and not in that of Bergman, and indeed
it appears that that death does not move
him. But as be refuses emodo11 in his
aesthetics, it cao11ot be otherwise in his
ethics. So I conu:adict myself, that is ro
say that the work pmhes me to contra
diction, or to conceal again its own con
tradictions. Enough has never been said
of the importance of the repeated presence of the dittry in the Country Priest,
of irs materiality, or that of the lines
written by the young priest in his
~~hoolboy's notebook, which a novel
could not make one feel. I t is to this
diary that the young man gives him
self, too, so to himself, and it is him
self that be seeks, his own fulfillment,
i11 his maladroit aposrolate. The film is
neither mystical nor Christian according
to the norms. Never did one really feel
in it, as sometimes "r:t RosselliDi, an
impulse, a11 elevation of the soul to
God, therefore a pra~ ~ r. The search
for a St>irituality, yes } " f ::veryone passes
by at the side. The d\Jnor professing
atheism approaches a ~pi.o.ua lit). The
old priest pcofe<osing faith h soundness
of soul, ther ~'r e virtue according to
Plato, convicuon, ,;;;pericnce, pcofes
sional knowledge.. All that is well and
good from aD ea.r thly point of view
and clearly Christian. Visibly, it does
not satisfy Bresson. Much has been said
of the spirituality of A Mttn Esuvped
and of Pickpocket. That was the periop
of the eyes' gaze. Then came his Trittl
of ]otttJ of Arc, expected, inevitable. But
one would seek there in vain an image
of mystical love like that of Joan receiving the hose in Dreyer.
The Trial of ]oatt is eDtirely made on
an object-text, and I have had the idea
that that sublime text bad evidently been
written after the trial by a poet-clerk
who was at the trial and who, according
to the old medieval tradition, did not
sign his work. But it is Bresson's film
that made me think of that. His JoaD is
the least saintly of all the Joan~, if one
excepts obviously the Saint-Joan of that
confounded Preminger. Spirituality, with
Bresson, is not saintliness. So his film
is made on an object-the text-and on
faces immobilized once and for all in
only one appearance, that of innoce11ce
or of guilt; a film made on four other
material appearances-feet, bare i11 saD
55
Le M edecin
Malgre Lui
Three on tl Cou ch. American film in
techn icolor of J erry Lewis. Scet10rio:
Bob Ross and Samuel A. Taylor, from a
story of Arne Sultan and Marvin Worth .
Photography: W. Wallace Kelley. Camerama/1: Dick Johnson. M11sic: Louis
Brown. S011g: " A Now and a Later
Love," sung by Danny Costello. Decors:
Leo K. Kuter and Howard Bristol.
AssistaiJt: Rusry Meek. Cast: J erry Lewis
(Christopher Pride, and Warren, Ringo,
Ruth erford
Heather)
Janet
Leigh
(Doctor Elizabeth Accord), Jam es Best
(Doctor Ben Mizer), Mary Ann Mobley
(Susan Manning) Gila Golan (Anna
Jaque), Leslie Parrish (Mary Lou
Mauve), Kathleen Freeman (Murphy),
Jill Donohue, Buddy Lester (the drunk),
R enzo Cesaaa (the ambassador), Fritz
Feld (attache at the embassy). Producers:
Howard Pine and Joe S. Stabile. Productiol~ CompatJy: J erry Lewis, 1965. D isl,ribttlor: Columbia Pictures. Le11gth: 2
hr~.
There are fewer mysteries and unsettled zones at the frontier of the spectacle aod of the dream (those rwo paranormal universes whose conju nction
forms perhaps the normal one) than in
The Patsy; fewer lures and tracks offered to Jerry Lewis' inquiry, always recommenced, on himself, the li mits of his
powers and the other side of his magic,
than in The Family Jewels; it is under
the complementary signs of explanation
and of frustration rbat Three on a
Couch places itself. To the double multipliciry of questions (The Patsy) and of
possible responses (The Family Jewels),
this third panel of a true comic trilogy,
the first of its genre, replies only by an
explanation, necessarily frustrating in
that perhaps the thousand questions o f
The Patsy did not call for one, and rhat
in any case the thousand responses
(eight, exactly) of The Family Jewels
could not be brought together into only
one, Three ou a Couch presents itself
as the last and synthetic phase of a dialecrical operation whose first two terms
could appear contradictory and unresolved - The Patsy, birter interrogation on the nature of comic entertainment; The 'Family Jewels, disenchanted
exploration of the very powers and duties of the entertainer cowards his privileged spectator. I n fact, everything happeas for Jerry Lewis as if, after the
double and sublime assertion of himself, in Ladies' M an as inspired manipulator, through the most awkward and
57
Broken Traces
Le Chat dtriiS 1~ sac (Cttt i 11 the Sack).
Canadian film of Gilles Groulx.
Scenario: Gilles Groulx. Ph otography:
J ean-Claude Labrecque. Music: J ohn
Coltrane Vivaldi, Couperin. S otmd:
Marcel Carriere. Cast: Barbara U lrich
(Barbara), Claude Godbout (Claude),
Manon Blain (Manon j'sais-pas-qui),
Veronica Vilbert (Veronique), Jean-Paul
Bernier (Jean-Paul), Andre Leblanc
(Toulouse), Paul-Marie Lapointe, J ean
Dufresne, Pierre Maheu. Producer:
Jacques Baber, ONF Canada, Montreal
1964. Distributor: O.N.F. Paris. Length:
1 hr. 15 min.
'Echoes
Of Silence )
Recentl y banned by the French
cens,ors, Ecboes of Sile1~ce seems to provoke the spectator not because Peter
Emanuel Goldman shows a somewhat
tarnished g irl who sells herself to a
fat old man, or a boy who caresses the
ch~.t of a male friend , or his hero
Miguel discarding a girl with whom be
no longer wants to make love- scenes
that one could ver y well find again,
with complaisance besides, with many
New York film makers; but because,
pursuing faces obstinately, hesitating
often from one to another, seeking the
slightest traces of muteness even in
dirty bands, grasped pieces of mirror,
hair in disorder, Goldman pushes away
the customary points of support. intrigue,
clarified unfolding of a lived mixture,
commentary by double exposure (only
Peter Emanuel G oldman: Echoes of Silence, J a cquetta La mpson, Miguel Cha cour.
cartoons sometimes designate the situa
tions), and so on.
The order and number of sequences
seem ro matter little, to us as to him;
there exist two different priors of the
film w ithout one's being able co char
acterize them differently than by variations of duration and of lighting. I t
scarcely matters either chat the musical
sequences are r epeated; they are there to
pr olong a sta te, as in the endless drawings-out, fishing for tuna or ascension,
with R ossellini. Each chapter, or canvas,
interrupts. itself by vir tue of continuing
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10022.
61
bl
"More than routine interest?" Simone Signoret in scintillating stills from Curtis
Harrington's Games. At left, Harrington directs Signoret.
65
THE FILMS OF
JOSEF VON
STERNBERG
by Andrew Sarri s
Museum of Modern Art
66
l:Z S w . 41 st.
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From Film to Film by Satyajit Ray- Blake Edwards Interview Roman Polanski Interview - Eisenstein on Pot~mlein - JeanLuc
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Michel Mardore - Marritd Wom"n and Alph11~illt.
Carl Dreyer Interview - Luis Bunuel: Angel and the Beas~ Jerry Lewis Interview and 4 Views of Ft1111ily }twtiJ - Ne"''
Canadian Cinema: 10 Questions to 5 Directors.
Truffaut's Jou rnal of Fahrenheit 451 , Part 1 - Visits With Fellini
by Pierre least - Orson \'17elles: Voyage to Don Quixoteland Leni Riefenstahl Interview - Richard Brooks on In Cold Blood.
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Goda rd-Delahaye Dialogue - Pasolini a t Pesaro: T he Cinema of
Poetry - Testament of Balthazar by MerleauPonty and Godard l\!eetmg With Mai Zcttcrling - 4th N .Y. Film Festival by Roger
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tervicw and Biofilmogrophy - Lilith and I by Jean Seberg - Leo
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I enclose ..................... ..
NAME ..............................................................................-..............................................
uWHOLLY EXTRAORDINARY!
Aclassic thriller! An astoundingly perfect performance by
TERENCE STAMP! Atribute to
WilliAM WYLER! The artistry
of WYLER and STAMP place the
picture on atimeless level!"
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WYLER'S
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