Many thanks to Gloria Monti for reprinting the AP obit of Bresson.  Up
until reading it I had a mental note of him as a one-film (and what an
astounding film it is) wonder - UN CONDAMNE A MORT S'ECHAPPE - but even
this summary of his life  shows how much of a grey area French cinema
between the end of WWII and the mid-60s is.  I have long wanted to see a
detailed, analytical biography of Henri-Georges Clouzot (ever since I was
called upon to do an impromptu commentary for an unsubtitled print of LE
CORBEAU) because (i) it seems that like Clouzot, Bresson can't be
pigeonholed into an easy generic or authorial category, and (ii) I I felt
that the progress of his career would start to address some of these
issues.  What this obit suggests is that Bresson's career is just as
interesting.

Another recent film industry death: Jill Craigie, the British political
documentary producer and director, last Sunday.  The films she'll mainly be
remembered for (among a very small number of survivors from the period), I
guess, are OUT OF CHAOS (UK 1943), about Henry Moore and the Blitz, THE WAY
WE LIVE (1946) on the town planning movement and the reconstruction of
Plymouth after WWII (during filming she met Michael Foot, her husband and
former leader of the Labour party in the 1980s, who was the Labour
candidate for a Plymouth constituency in the 1945 general election), and
BLUE SCAR (1949), on the nationalisation of the British coal industry.  My
PhD thesis, on 'The Non-Fiction Film in Britain, 1945-51',  discusses her
work in some detail.  I knew she was still alive when I started researching
and always had it in mind to try and make contact, but never made the
effort to do so.

L

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Leo Enticknap
Projection and sound engineer - City Screen Cinemas Ltd.
Tel. 0410 417383
email: [log in to unmask]

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