Spotlight on Robert Bresson: Four Nights of a Dreamer

Film Independent at LACMA presents two films by revered postwar French director Robert Bresson, both screening in brand new 35mm prints and available for the first time in fourteen years thanks to the TIFF Cinematheque.

Jacques, a cloistered painter, labors in his loft over semi-abstract, cool-hued canvasses and yearns for the “pure and innocent” love of medieval times. When he finds Marthe, poised to jump from the Pont Neuf, on one of his nightly strolls, his fantasy of courtship from the Middle Ages appears to have sprung to life. Four Nights of a Dreamer is perhaps the rarest of Bresson’s films, having never been available in the U.S. on DVD or VHS. Without abandoning his visual precision, Bresson and cinematographer Pierre Lhomme (Army of Shadows, Sweet Movie) succumb to the hypnotic beauty of the Parisian after-dark—its bateaux mouches glistening on the Seine, the hippie-troubadours who strum along its quays, and the iridescent hues of its neon signs.

“The transformation of Paris at night into a dream landscape pulsing with electric mystery is reminiscent of Minnelli, although the economy of expression is clearly Bresson’s. A very beautiful and essential film.”—Dave Kehr

Bing Theater | Admission included with ticket to A Man Escaped | New 35mm print!