Journal d'un Cure de Campagne (Diary Of A Country Priest)

Robert Bresson - 1951
One of Bresson's masterpieces.
Short scenes open here, meaning the longer ones later give extra weight, make us watch them with extra care and attention.
The repetition of the word, in writing, speech, and action, gives a solidity and materiality to the action; the flesh.
The pains that rise up, the malevolence of the village, the music (not used as ascetically as in say 'A Man Escaped') are the moments when something else arises, material but not material. The priest must confron these. Perhaps Bresson uses some halo lighting in these moments. Not quite as beautiful (greys) as 'Pickpocket'; this is a darker film, slightly heavier shapes than 'Pickpocket's' remarkable floating effect.
The Priest's facial expression barely ever changes. Kuleshov to an extent, but also a critical view of the audience. Not a test of if words match image, but asking; 'what can a word, or an image, tell us about a feeling' (what can eyes and ears tell us, as the priest asks).
Bresson as, mostly, sound (including language) in dialectic with image; key questions of Godard and Resnais. Through footsteps (echoing), gravel, dogs, we have a complete location, though there are no establishing shots. The repetition of the gate's squeaks.
Little camera movements in, through sparseness generally the power of a reverse-shot. Concentration (the white of the bicycle tyre-guard) gives a more powerful sense of flesh, materiality. No lies in Bresson; this is a man, of flesh, saying these words.
How is the word made flesh, what is it for sound and image to come together? Which is life, which is death? Which is both? Cinema? Is Cinema grace? The final shot here, echoes of Dreyer ('Joan', 'Ordet') as materiality of cross and transcedence of world, distilled as one.