L'Argent (1983 film)

L'argent
Theatrical release poster
Directed by Robert Bresson
Produced by Jean-Marc Henchoz
Daniel Toscan du Plantier
Written by Robert Bresson
Based on The Forged Coupon
by Leo Tolstoy
Starring Christian Patey
Béatrice Tabourin
Didier Baussy
Vincent Visterucci
Cinematography Pasqualino De Santis
Emmanuel Machuel
Edited by Jean-François Naudon
Distributed by MK2 Diffusion
Release date
  • 18 May 1983 (1983-05-18) (France)
Running time
 83 minutes
Country France
Switzerland
Language French

L'argent (French pronunciation: ​[laʁ.ʒɑ̃], meaning "Money") is a 1983 French drama film written and directed by Robert Bresson. The film is loosely inspired by the first part of Leo Tolstoy's novella The Forged Coupon. It was Bresson's last film and won the Director's Prize at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival.

Plot

A young man enters his father's study to claim his monthly allowance. His father obliges, but the son presses for more, citing a debt he owes a schoolmate. The father dismisses him and an appeal to his mother fails. He tries to pawn his watch to a friend, who instead gives him a forged 500-franc note.

The boys take the counterfeit to a photo shop and use it to purchase a picture frame. When the store's co-manager finds out, he scolds his partner for her gullibility. She chides him in return for having accepted two forged notes the previous week. He then vows to pass off all three forged notes at the next opportunity. He uses them to pay Yvon for delivering heating oil.

Model Role
Christian Patey Yvon Targe
Vincent Risterucci Lucien
Caroline Lang Elise
Sylvie Van Den Elsen The Little Old Lady
Michel Brigue Father of the Little Old Lady
Béatrice Tabourin The Female Photographer
Didier Baussy The Male Photographer
Marc Ernest Fourneau Norbert
André Cler Father Norbert
Claude Cler Mother Norbert
Bruno Lapeyre Martial

Yvon tries to pay his restaurant tab with the forged notes, but the waiter recognizes them as counterfeit. Yvon is arrested and at his trial the photo shop people lie. Yvon avoids jail time, but he loses his job. In need of money, he acts for a friend as the driver of a getaway car for bank robbers. The police foil the robbery and arrest Yvon, who is tried and sentenced to prison for three years. While in prison, he learns of his daughter's death and his wife's decision to start a new life without him. He fails in an attempt to commit suicide.

Released from prison, Yvon promptly murders and robs a pair of hotel keepers. He is taken in by a kind woman over the objection of her father. Some time passes, and one night Yvon kills them along with others in their house with an axe. He goes to a restaurant, confesses to a police officer, and is arrested.

Production

Bresson first began work on the film's script in 1977. It is based on Leo Tolstoy's The Forged Coupon. Bresson later said that it was the film "with which I am most satisfied—or at least it is the one where I found the most surprises when it was complete—things I had not expected."[1]

Reception

The film was released in France on 18 May 1983 through MK2 Diffusion.[2]

Critical response

Vincent Canby wrote in The New York Times, "that Robert Bresson [...] is still one of the most rigorous and talented film makers of the world is evident with the appearance of his beautiful, astringent new film, L'Argent. [...The film] would stand up to Marxist analysis, yet it's anything but Marxist in outlook. It's far too poetic – too interested in the mysteries of the spirit."[3]

Tom Milne found L′Argent to be "unmistakably a masterpiece", noting "the extraordinary apotheosis of the final sequence," and the "breathless wonderment in the last shot of onlookers frozen as they gaze into the empty room from which all evidence of crime has gone."[4]

Accolades

Bresson received the Director's Prize at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival, tied with Andrei Tarkovsky for Nostalghia.[5] L'Argent was nominated for Best Sound at the César Awards 1984.[6] It won the 1984 National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Director.[7]

References

  1. ↑ John Wakeman, World Film Directors, Volume 1. The H. W. Wilson Company, 1987. ISBN 0-8242-0757-2, 62.
  2. ↑ "L'Argent". AlloCiné (in French). Tiger Global. Retrieved 14 October 2011.
  3. ↑ Vincent Canby, "Film Festival; 'L'Argent,' 13th feature by Bresson," The New York Times, September 24, 1983.
  4. ↑ Wakeman, World Film Directors, 62.
  5. ↑ "Festival de Cannes: Awards 1983". festival-cannes.com. Cannes Film Festival. Retrieved 14 October 2011.
  6. ↑ "L'Argent – Prix et nominations". AlloCiné (in French). Tiger Global. Retrieved 14 October 2011.
  7. ↑ "Past Awards". nationalsocietyoffilmcritics.com. National Society of Film Critics. Archived from the original on 8 August 2011. Retrieved 14 October 2011.

Bibliography

  • Ciment, Michel. "I Seek Not Description But Vision: Robert Bresson on L’Argent." In Quandt, Robert Bresson, 2012.
  • Hasumi, Shigehiko. "Led by the Scarlet Pleats: Bresson’s L’Argent." In Quandt, Robert Bresson, 2012.
  • Jones, Kent. L’Argent. BFI Film Classics, 1999. ISBN 978-0-85170-733-4.
  •  ———. "A Stranger’s Posture: Notes on Bresson’s Late Films." In Quandt, Robert Bresson, 2012.
  • Moravia, Alberto. "L’Argent." In Quandt, Robert Bresson, 2012.
  • Quandt, James, ed. Robert Bresson (Revised). Indiana UP (Cinematheque Ontario Monographs), 2012. ISBN 978-0-9682969-5-0.
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