Pickpocket - Criterion Collection (1959)

"Pickpocket" (1959), directed by Robert Bresson, is inspired in a novel written by Dostoievsky, "Crime and punishment". This film tells us the story of Michel (Martin LaSalle), a young and very self-absorbed man that becomes a thief not out of need, but rather seduced by the possibility of being one.

Bresson follows Michel's path, and allows us to be privy to his thoughts, as he tries to decide what to do with his life, and how to avoid being captured by the police. Michel has an opportunity of redemption, but will he take it?

In my opinion, watching "Pickpocket" is worth your time, because it is a film that convincingly depicts how a young man justifies his criminal leanings, and the ever-present possibility of change, if we care enough to take it.

Belen Alcat

"Pickpocket" is considered one of Bresson's best films and it's certainly a concise précis of his vision. The story concerns the inner transformation of a young, clever man of the poorer classes who decides to prove his superiority by flouting law and convention through a life of petty crime. The deliberately flat, monotone acting shifts the narrative burden almost entirely to the character's face--the shots of his impassive expression as he lifts wallets in a crowd are some of the film's most memorable. The 'dance of hands' as Michel and his accomplices practice their trade is also a visual stand-out.

Bresson seems obsessed with filming the unseen & inexplicable aspects of human character; pickpocketing--the tricky attempt to bring something hidden into visibility without disturbing the victim--is a kind of metaphor for his entire approach to film. Although many scenes take place outdoors, much of the action unfolds in the dark, confining, geometric interiors that mirror Michel's inner state. It makes perfect sense that the climax (and only love scene) in the movie takes place with metal bars between the actors.

Bresson shows rather than explains: just WHY Michel finally turns around remains as much of a mystery as why he rejected his mother or turned to crime. This makes for a frustrating narrative style that almost perversely defies your effort to figure out exactly what's going on and why. The contrast with Godard's "Breathless," which came out a year later and also concerns a young rebel/criminal, shows the openness that the 60s would bring to the existential gloom of postwar Europe, which Bresson captures here in all its moody glory.

I am sure that what is frequently described as coldness and austerity in Bresson's work is merely the extraordinary precision of his compositions combined with his refusal to play the childish make-believe games of conventional cinema. There is certainly a genuinely austere aspect to Bresson's style, but it has nothing to do with morals or a lack of sensual sensitivity. This masterpiece, Pickpocket, which Louis Malle correctly described as history-making, is actually almost frightening in its sensuality. If this film is watched carefully it is almost embarrassing in how intimately the camera brings the viewer into contact with the bodies of strangers. And precisely what is disconcerting about it is that this contact is completely lacking in feeling, sensitivity, or respect. The embarrassment that the viewer feels is that which the pickpocket, Michel, should feel, but doesn't. And it reveals why Bresson has always steered clear of eroticism and pornography in his work: because what gives sensuality its deeper meaning and value is the mysterious spiritual connecting quality that is possessed by Jeanne, the young woman who cares for Michel's invalid mother and whom Michel, in his blindness, calls "very naive". The absence of this quality in sensuality gives a false sense of power and security and it reduces sensuality to being merely a form of invasion and theft, just as if one were a pickpocket! Michel, "in his weakness," goes to the bottom of this illusion and finds himself in real jail. Then he understands that what he was really seeking, in his darkness which he mistook for light, in his countless, highly-skilled violations of other people, was freely offered to him by Jeanne. But what is really amazing here is that Bresson gives this story of redemption not in a novel or a play, nor in a filmed imitation of these things, but in a precise sequence of sound accented images that define true cinematic art and reveal again why Bresson is The Master.