L'Argent

Bresson's last film, about what one counterfeit banknote sets off. Two schoolboys spend a forged five-hundred-franc note in a photography shop. The owner notices, but does not keep the note; he passes it to Yvon, who is delivering fuel oil. Yvon uses it in a cafe without knowing and is arrested. In court the shop owner and his employee say they do not know him. Yvon loses his job, then goes to prison, and from there it goes further down. The method is to explain nothing. No one's interior is described, the actors show no emotion, and the camera mostly looks at hands, doors and objects. The result of an event is usually not shown on screen, only given in sound. The source is a story by Tolstoy; Bresson moved it to contemporary France. None of the performers are professionals; the director used that method throughout his career. The film won the directing prize at Cannes, shared that year with Tarkovsky. A powerful work closing his career, for anyone who likes Bresson's film language and stripped-down storytelling. For a viewer expecting an emotional narrative, the film is deliberately cold and its ending offers no consolation.