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A Man Escaped

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A Man Escaped
Directed byRobert Bresson
Written byRobert Bresson
Based ona memoir
byAndré Devigny
Produced byAlain Poiré
Jean Thuillier
StarringFrançois Leterrier
Charles Le Clainche
Maurice Beerblock
Roland Monod
CinematographyLéonce-Henri Burel
Edited byRaymond Lamy
Music byWolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Production
company
Distributed byGaumont Film Company
Release date
  • 11 November 1956(1956-11-11)
Running time
99 minutes
CountryFrance
LanguagesFrench, German

A Man Escaped or The Wind Bloweth Where It Listeth(French:Un condamné à mort s'est échappé ou Le Vent souffle où il veut,which literally translates as: "A man condemned to death has escaped or The wind blows where it wants"; the subtitle is a quote fromJohn 3:8) is a 1956 Frenchprison filmdirected byRobert Bresson.It is based on amemoirbyAndré Devigny,a member of theFrench Resistancewho was held inMontluc prisonduringWorld War IIby theoccupying Germans,though the protagonist of the film was given a different name.

The film was screened in competition at the1957 Cannes Film Festival,[1]and it has been one of Bresson's most renowned works since its initial release.[2]

Plot

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InLyonin 1943, Fontaine, a member of theFrench Resistance,jumps out of the car that is taking him toMontluc prison.He is immediately apprehended, and his German captors handcuff him, beat him, and lock him up. Throughout his time in prison, Fontaine regularly hears gunfire as other inmates are executed.

At first, Fontaine is placed in a cell on the ground floor of Montluc. He communicates with his neighbor by tapping on the wall and is regularly able to talk to Terry, a member of a small group that is allowed to exercise in a courtyard unsupervised, from his window. Terry takes Fontaine's letters to his family and superiors in the Resistance and gets him a safety pin so he can remove his handcuffs.

After fifteen days, Fontaine is moved to a cell on the top floor of Montluc, and he is no longer made to wear handcuffs. His new neighbor, Blanchet, is an elderly man who refuses to respond to his taps on the wall, but he gets to know several other inmates on his daily trips to empty his slop bucket and wash his face, even though the guards regularly admonish them for talking. After Blanchet faints while emptying his slop bucket, he and Fontaine begin to talk to each other at their windows.

Fontaine notices the wooden door of his cell is made up of thick boards joined together by a softer wood, so he sharpens the end of a spoon and begins to chisel away at the joints. After weeks of slow, silent, meticulous work, which involves keeping track of and disposing of every wood shaving and camouflaging the damage he is doing to the door, he is able to get out of his cell into the hallway at will. He then makes some rope using most of his linens and the wire from his bed frame.

Some of Fontaine's fellow inmates begin to believe he may actually have found a way to escape from Montluc, and Orsini, who helped alert Fontaine to approaching guards while he was chiseling at his door, asks to come along. Fontaine shares his plan with Orsini, but Orsini thinks it is too complicated and instead tries to make a run for it one day as the inmates walk to empty their slop buckets. He is caught and returned to his cell to await execution, and he tells Fontaine to fashion hooks to scale the prison walls from the frame of the lighting fixture in his cell.

Fontaine makes more rope out of some cloth items he receives in a package, and Blanchet even donates a blanket to his escape effort. As time goes on, however, the other inmates begin to doubt Fontaine will ever really try to escape, and another prisoner refuses to join his plan, calling it unrealistic.

Shortly after learning he has been sentenced to death, Fontaine is given a cellmate. The young soldier, François Jost, says he has been convicted of desertion, but Fontaine suspects he may have been planted by the Nazis to get information. Fontaine spends time feeling Jost out and ultimately decides to trust the boy and escape with him, knowing he would have to kill him otherwise.

One day, Fontaine says his goodbyes and tells Jost his plan. Jost realizes he does not really have a choice, so he agrees and helps make some more rope. The pair go into the hallway that night and reach the roof via a skylight. Fontaine slowly leads the way across the roof, taking advantage of the auditory cover provided by passing trains, and descends into a courtyard, where he kills a German guard. He and Jost climb a building and hook a rope across the gap between the inner and outer walls of the prison compound, but Fontaine loses his nerve and just sits there. Hours later, he finally shimmies across the rope and drops down into the streets of Lyon, and he and Jost walk away from Montluc undetected.

Cast

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  • François Leterrieras Lieutenant Fontaine
  • Charles Le Clainche as François Jost
  • Maurice Beerblock as Blanchet
  • Roland Monod as Pastor Deleyris
  • Jacques Ertaudas Orsini
  • Jean-Paul Delhumeau as Hebrard
  • Roger Treherne as Terry
  • Jean-Philippe Delamarre as Prisoner 110
  • César Gattegno as Prisoner X
  • Jacques Oerlemans as the head guard
  • Klaus Detlef Grevenhorst as theAbwehrofficer
  • Leonhard Schmidt as the escort guard

Production

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The film is based on the memoirs ofAndré Devigny,a member of the French Resistance who escaped from Montluc prison inLyonin 1943.[3]Bresson had also been held by the Germans during WWII, though as aprisoner of war.

In an interview, Bresson said that, withA Man Escaped,he "wanted to achieve a great purity, a greater asceticism than inDiary of a Country Priest",noting his use of nonprofessional actors.[4]The music that appears several times in the film is theKyriefromMozart'sGreat Mass in C minor,K. 427.[5]

Reception and legacy

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Bresson wonBest Directorat the1957 Cannes Film Festival,[6]and the film was named by theNational Board of Reviewas one of the best foreign films of 1956.[2]Today, the work is sometimes considered Bresson's masterpiece,[7][8][9][10]and it came 69th in the 2012Sight & Soundcritics' poll.[11]Roger Ebertwrote: "Watching a film likeA Man Escapedis like a lesson in the cinema. It teaches by demonstration all the sorts of things that are not necessary in a movie. By implication, it suggests most of the things we're accustomed to are superfluous. I can't think of a single unnecessary shot inA Man Escaped."[12]

Polish filmmakerKrzysztof Kieslowskiwas influenced by the film and ranked it as one of the top ten films that "affected" him the most.[13]British-American filmmakerChristopher Nolanwas influenced by the film (along withPickpocket) when makingDunkirk(2017).[14]Benny Safdieof theSafdie Brothersnamed the film as his favorite of all time.[15]American-British singerScott Walkeralso listed the film as one of his all-time favorites.[16]

On thereview aggregatorwebsiteRotten Tomatoes,100%of 40 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 9.3/10. The website's consensus reads: "A Man Escapedis blockbuster Bresson, a well-acted POW drama that builds with subtle, seat-gripping tension. "[17]

Home video releases

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New Yorker Videoreleased the film on Region 1 DVD in 2004 (this release is currentlyout of print).Artificial Eyeput out a Region 2 release in the UK in April 2008, which contains a superior audio/video presentation and features the 1984 Dutch documentaryThe Road to Bressonas an extra.Madman Entertainmentreleased a Region 4 Australian DVD in July 2009, which contains a scholarlyaudio commentaryby Professor Ross Gibson of theSydney College of the Arts,University of Sydney.

Gaumontreleased the film onBlu-rayin France in November 2010.[18]

The film was released byThe Criterion Collectionin March 2013 on Region A Blu-ray and Region 1 DVD. Supplementary features included with this release include "Bresson: Without a Trace", the 1965 episode of the French television programCinéastes de notre tempsthat features the director's first on-camera interview;The Road to Bresson,which features interviews with filmmakersAndrei Tarkovsky,Louis Malle,andPaul Schrader;The Essence of Forms,a 2010 French documentary in which collaborators and admirers of Bresson, including actorFrançois Leterrierand directorBruno Dumont,share their thoughts about the director and his work; and "Functions of Film Sound", a visual essay on the use of sound inA Man Escaped,which features narration taken from a chapter about the film inFilm Art: An Introductionby film scholarsDavid BordwellandKristin Thompson.[19]

References

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  1. ^"Festival de Cannes: A Man Escaped".festival-cannes.Retrieved2009-02-08.
  2. ^abCunneen 2004,p. 59.
  3. ^Cunneen 2004,pp. 58–70.
  4. ^Cunneen 2004,p. 60.
  5. ^Richie, Donald(1998). "Bresson and Music". In Quandt, James (ed.).Robert Bresson.Toronto: Toronto International Film Festival Group. p. 300.He employed Mozart, the Kyrie Elieson [sic] of the Mass in C Minor, music which had a 'colour,' he said, matching that of the film.... The music is heard in seven sequences, in all of which the prisoners are communicating with the condemned man, when they are no longer alone.
  6. ^"UN CONDAMNE A MORT S'EST ECHAPPE - Festival de Cannes (International Film Festival)".Festival de Cannes.RetrievedFebruary 27,2017.
  7. ^"A Man Escaped: Quintessential Bresson - From the Current - The Criterion Collection".The Criterion Collection.Retrieved14 December2014.
  8. ^"A Man Escaped (Bresson, 1956)".1More Film Blog.29 June 2009.Retrieved14 December2014.
  9. ^"A Man Escaped (1956)".Stanley W. Rogouski.3 July 2014.Retrieved14 December2014.
  10. ^"DVD Review: Bresson's A Man Escaped (1956) - New Yorker Video DVD".People.ucalgary.ca.Retrieved14 December2014.
  11. ^"Votes for A Man Escaped (1956)".British Film Institute. Archived fromthe originalon February 2, 2017.RetrievedJanuary 27,2017.
  12. ^Ebert, Roger (2011-11-21)."A Man Escaped movie review & film summary (1956)".rogerebert.Retrieved2021-06-15.
  13. ^Joseph Kickasola (2004).The Films of Krzysztof Kieslowski - The Liminal Image.Bloomsbury Academic. p. 26.ISBN9780826415592.Retrieved23 June2021.
  14. ^Leonard Pearce (February 28, 2017)."Christopher Nolan Inspired by Robert Bresson and Silent Films for 'Dunkirk,' Which Has" Little Dialogue "".The Film Stage.The Film Stage, L.L.C.Retrieved23 September2021."I spent a lot of time reviewing the silent films for crowd scenes –the way extras move, evolve, how the space is staged and how the cameras capture it, the views used," Nolan tells Premiere Magazine. The director revealed that he brushed up on silent films such as Intolerance, Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans, and Greed, as well as the films of Robert Bresson (notably Pickpocket and A Man Escaped, to dissect the process of creating suspense through details), Wages of Fear, and, of course, Saving Private Ryan.
  15. ^Jacqueline Coley (January 14, 2020)."The Safdie Brothers' Five Favorite Films".Rotten Tomatoes.Fandango.Retrieved15 July2021.Benny Safdie: "Then the second one – and let's say, this was in no particular order – but A Man Escaped, the [Robert] Bresson movie. That has to be my favorite movie of all time, just because it always makes me cry at the end, because I feel like I've achieved something that the character achieves. And it tells you what happens in the title, and it makes it no less suspenseful the entire way. You're literally feeling the sound of the gravel as he puts his foot down – those shots of the foot or the spoon going into the slot. All of these things, the editing of it, the character, the way he's using these actors who you don't really know, they just – you feel like they're real people. It's just so perfectly put together, and it's something where I kind of feel like I'm going along with the escape in a way that's just done by a master. In a weird way, I feel like Bresson is the Fontaine character in that movie. But what's weird is I've watched it again recently, and I had a totally different feeling of it, where it was more about society and how people are talking to each other. And then you realize Bresson is just kind of making the same movie every time, just with different [settings and characters]. One's World War II, one's Lancelot."
  16. ^Samuel Wigley (March 26, 2019)."Scott Walker's favourite films".BFI.British Film Institute.Retrieved16 October2021.In conversation with Jarvis Cocker for Q magazine, Walker said of director Robert Bresson: 'When I see his films, it's a visual version of what I want to get. He never uses real actors. If a person is laying down their hand, he just wants you to know a human being is laying down their hand. It's the phenomenon of being human.'
  17. ^"A MAN ESCAPED".Fandango Media.Retrieved25 July2023.
  18. ^"Un condamné à mort s'est échappé (Blu-ray)".amazon.fr.Retrieved2011-03-18.
  19. ^"A Man Escaped".criterion.Retrieved2021-03-06.

Bibliography

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