_Four Nights of a Dreamer_

[septimus_...@q.com]

Not much time right now, but I should mention the
sheer cinematic beauty that is Bresson's lost film,
_Four Nights of a Dreamer_. There is a Bresson
retrospective touring the U.S. now. I saw the brand
new print at the Pacific Film Archive, and the colors
of the night scenes (in Paris, over the Seine_ are
unbelievable.

Made between _A Gentle Woman_ and _Lancelot
of the Lake_, _Four Nights_ is far more light-hearted
than Bresson's color films; it may start with an
attempted suicide but ends with farce. It anticipates
_The Devil, Probably_ in its depiction of the long-haired,
guitar strumming hippies. It could be called _A Gentle
Man_, with the hapless artist-protagonist in love with
every woman he sees, and gets involved with the
suicidal Marthe. Played by Isabelle Weingarten, the
actress is one of the few of Bresson's models who
go on to have a cinematic career; she was in _The
State of Things_ and _The Mother and the Whore_,
and when done with acting, continued to work as still
photographers on the set of notable films like _Alias
Betty_ and _Les Voleurs_.

[septimus_...@q.com]