20 Facts About Robert Bresson

1.

Robert Bresson is among the most highly regarded filmmakers of all time.

2.

Robert Bresson was born at Bromont-Lamothe, Puy-de-Dome, the son of Marie-Elisabeth and Leon Robert Bresson.

3.

Robert Bresson was educated at Lycee Lakanal in Sceaux, Hauts-de-Seine, close to Paris, and turned to painting after graduating.

4.

Robert Bresson lived in Paris, France, in the Ile Saint-Louis.

5.

Furthermore, in a 1983 interview for TSR's Special Cinema, Robert Bresson declared that he had been interested in making a film based on the Book of Genesis, although he believed such a production would be too costly and time-consuming.

6.

Robert Bresson died on a Saturday in December 1999, at his home in Droue-sur-Drouette southwest of Paris.

7.

For Robert Bresson, then, acting is, like mood music and expressive camera work, just one more way of deforming reality or inventing that has to be avoided.

8.

Some feel that Robert Bresson's Catholic upbringing and belief system lie behind the thematic structures of most of his films.

9.

Robert Bresson's films are critiques of French society and the wider world, with each revealing the director's sympathetic, if unsentimental, view of society's victims.

10.

Robert Bresson is found everywhere: wars, concentration camps, tortures, assassinations.

11.

Robert Bresson published Notes on the Cinematographer in 1975, in which he argues for a unique sense of the term "cinematography".

12.

Robert Bresson is often referred to as a "patron saint" of cinema, not only for the strong Catholic themes found throughout his oeuvre, but for his notable contributions to the art of film.

13.

Robert Bresson is often listed as one of the main figures who influenced them.

14.

New Wave pioneers praised Robert Bresson and posited him as a prototype for or precursor to the movement.

15.

However, Robert Bresson was neither as overtly experimental nor as outwardly political as the New Wave filmmakers, and his religious views were not attractive to most of the filmmakers associated with the movement.

16.

Robert Bresson has influenced a number of other filmmakers, including Andrei Tarkovsky, Chantal Akerman, Jean Eustache, Abel Ferrara, Philippe Garrel, Hal Hartley, Monte Hellman, Jim Jarmusch, Louis Malle, Michael Haneke, Olivier Assayas, Atom Egoyan, the Dardenne brothers, Aki Kaurismaki, and Paul Schrader, whose book Transcendental Style in Film: Ozu, Robert Bresson, Dreyer includes a detailed critical analysis.

17.

The Hungarian filmmaker Bela Tarr was influenced by Robert Bresson and listed Robert Bresson film Au Hasard Balthazar on his top ten films of all time.

18.

The Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami was highly influenced by Robert Bresson and mentioned the personal importance of Robert Bresson's book, Notes on the Cinematographer.

19.

The German filmmaker Rainer Werner Fassbinder was influenced by Robert Bresson and championed and paid homage to Robert Bresson's film The Devil Probably with his film The Third Generation.

20.

When Fassbinder was a member of the jury in the 1977 Berlin Film Festival, he even went so far as to threaten to leave the jury unless his appreciation for Robert Bresson's film was made known to the public.