CINEMATOGRAHY
My notes from, “Notes on Cinematography” By: Robert Bresson
[Robert Bresson uses the term ‘Cinematography’ in a special, holistic sense embodying the entire evocative power of the visual component of Cinema. Perhaps the turn of phrase in French language has its own connotation that does not become clear in English language translation of this very important, ‘sutra’ form of writing which makes a slim volume; ought to be the most cherished possession of filmmakers who wish to have the ‘Realization’ (again, as in French, something beyond mere Direction).]
01/ Rid myself of accumulated errors and untruths. Get to know my resources, make sure of them.
02/ Master precision. Be a precision instrument myself.
03/ Not have the soul of an ‘executant’ (of my own projects).
04/ Find, for each shot, a new pungency, over & above what I had imagined.
05/ Invention (re-invention on the spot.)
06/ No actors (no directing of actors)
07/ No parts (no learning of parts)
08/ No staging.
09/ But, the use of working models, taken from life.
10/ BEING instead of SEEMING (actors)
11/ HUMAN MODELS.
12/ Cinema: moves from exterior to interior
13/ Actor: moves from interior to exterior. The thing that matters is not what they show me but what they hide from me; above all, what they do not suspect is in them.
14/ TWO TYPES OF FILM: those who employ the resources of the Theatre (Actors, Direction etc.) and use the camera in order to reproduce; & THOSE: that employ the resources of Cinematography and use the Camera to create.
15/ An ‘actor’ I Cinematography might as well be in a foreign country. He does not speak its language.
16/ “…without lacking naturalness ‘they’ lack nature”, - Chateaubriand.
17/ NATURE: what the dramatic art suppresses in favor of a naturalness, that is learned and maintained by exercise.
18/ Nothing rings more false in a film than that natural tone of the theatre copying life; traced over studied sentiments.
19/ Respect man’s nature without wishing it more palpable than it is.
20// IMAGE: If an image, looked at by itself, expresses something sharply, if it involves an interpretation, it will not be transformed on contact with other images. The other images will have no power over it, and it will have no power over other images. Neither action nor reactions. It is definitive and unusable in the Cinematographer’s system. A system does not regulate everything, it is a bait for something.
21/ Apply myself to the insignificant (non-significant) images.
22/ Flatten the images (as if ironing them), without attenuating them.
23/ ON LOOKS: the ejaculatory force of the eye.
24/ To set up a film is to bind persons to each other and to objects by ‘looks’.
25/ My movie is born first in my head, dies on paper, is resuscitated by the living persons and the real objects I use, which are killed on film but, placed in a certain order and projected onto a screen, come to life again like flowers in water.
26/ To create is not to deform or invent persons and things. It is to tie new relationships between persons and things which are, and as they are.
27/ RADICALLY SUPRESS ‘INTENTIONS’ IN YOUR MODEL.
28/ SHOOTING: PUT YOURSELF INTO A STATE OF INTENSE IGNORANCE & CURIOSITY, AND YET SEE THINGS IN ADVANCE.
29/ CINEMATOGRAPHY: a military art. Prepare a film like a battle.
30/ To shoot ex-tempore, with un-known models, in un-foreseen places of the right kind for keeping me in an intense state of alert.
31/ Let it be the intimate union of Images that charges them with emotion.
32/ Catch instants, spontaneity, freshness.
33/ A sigh, a silence, a word, a sentence, a din, a hand, the whole of your model, his face, in repose, in movement, in profile, full face, an immense view, a restricted space….each thing exactly in its place: Your Only Resources.
Rahatavalokit
Caca654.reading
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