![]() There are also similarities here with Sam Fuller’s Pickup on Southstreet(1953) except in this case the life of a pickpocket is the extent of his existence. ![]() In this case, what results is a blue-collar crime ballet of forms. Once again it’s a deep understanding of the innumerable beautiful complexities of human movement. The arresting quality is not so much what the men pull off as this is fiction but the way in which Bresson delivers it to his audience. It becomes a wonderfully exquisite orchestration of motions combined and layered on top of one another. Michel’s eyes rove as much as his prying fingers. Instead of feet, though, hands are involved the dexterous hands and limber fingers of pickpockets. It’s striking that many of the scenes in Pickpocket are nearly silent, lacking scoring and often even dialogue, and yet they’re choreographed like the most elaborate dance in a musical. Maybe Natalie Portman has that same quality as well. It serves no real obvious purpose but to suggest her beauty and maybe even that there’s a modernness to her or better yet a timelessness behind her eyes that’s full of some sort of inexplicable power. This notion shot into my head the first time I ever viewed Pickpocket. It just takes him a long time to realize it. I cannot get it out of my head that Marika Green shares some striking resemblance to Natalie Portman. source: Criterion Collectionīut that’s what makes his neighbor Jeanne ( Marika Green) all the more fascinating because she brings something out of him. The only thing he does any with ambition is stealing. He hardly even visits his sickly mother even when she’s lying on her deathbed. He’s not looking to make friends aside from his “buddy” Jacques ( Pierre Leymarie). He hardly talks to anyone, and when he does, it’s generally brusque in nature. ![]() He watches the world with passionless eyes, lacking true purpose. He’s no adventurer with a colorful personality. He immerses himself in the pursuit, so much so that it soon becomes his livelihood as he joins forces with a couple accomplices, still honing his trade, and gleaning inspiration from the life of pickpocket socialite extraordinaire George Barrington.Įxcept Michel seems nothing like this man. With such a life as he leads -not working, with few friends and little to do aside from betting on the horses – Michel fills his idle hours learning what it is to be a pickpocket. That’s of vital importance in understanding both stories. Still, after receiving recompense for his deeds, he too achieves a kind of redemption. The difference being Michel’s crimes are more mundane and as such the outcomes are far less pronounced. In fact, he’s not far off from Raskolnikov in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Crime & Punishment. He seems altogether un-extraordinary and still, Bresson manages to tell an engaging story with such an unassuming star–not through emotions but the inverse–a complete lack of emotions replaced instead by actions stripped down to their purest elements.Īside from being a vagrant who lives in a dilapidated flat, Michel is a perennial cynic who holds a bit of a superman complex. However, there’s also some facial similarity to Henry Fonda there, except LaSalle is even more “normal” if you can go so far. ![]() The Uruguayan-French actor sports gaunt, rather severe features, thick eyebrows, a sauntering gait and a slumped posture. As was his practice, Bresson took Martin LaSalle, a non-actor to be his leading protagonist and puts a magnifying glass to his every movement. Pickpocketis an intricately staged, truly intimate character study from the imitable Robert Bresson instantly solidifying itself as one of his greatest works. ![]()
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