Description: 'Un metteur en ordre: Robert Bresson' is from a 1966 French television broadcast of 'Pour le Plaisir', a cultural television program. The phrase 'Un metteur en ordre' translates loosely to 'An Imposer of Order'. When you watch the program, you'll see that its title comes from the filmmaker's response to the interviewer's question: 'What's Robert Bresson's profession?' This episode concentrates on 'Au Hasard Balthazar' and includes interviews with Robert Bresson, Jean-Luc Godard, Louis Malle, and members of the film's cast. Bresson explains the origin of the film's title, while his contemporaries describe their reactions to the film. Several extensive clips from the film are presented, after which Bresson and his cast members offer their opinions of the meaning or consequences of those scenes. The heart of the program is an interview with Bresson, during which he talks specifically about this film. He also gives his ideas on filmmaking in general. For example, here's how he wants his performers to learn their dialogue: 'I ask them to learn their lines ignoring their meaning, as if they didn't have a meaning, as if the words were just syllables. As if sentences weren't made of words but of syllables.'

This documentary is available on the Criterion Collection release of 'Mouchette' (1967).

Featuring interviews with the likes of Hitchcock, Kurosawa, Robert Bresson and David Lynch, What is Cinema? is documentarian Chuck Workman’s engrossing visual essay about mastery of cinematic form. Our world premiere will be followed by a live conversation with Workman.

A Dutch documentary about legendary French filmmaker Robert Bresson.