Today was a lovely day - beautiful day, full of fun things. It was hard to come inside and watch a film, especially a sad, contemplative sort of film. It was a wonderful movie, but it certainly wasn't a light or easy movie to watch. I watched Au Hasard Balthazar, directed in 1966 by Robert Bresson (who also directed Pickpocket, which I loved). I really love Bresson's style. It's very restrained, but it works really well. I really enjoyed how subtle this movie was - how much meaning and emotion I felt while watching it even though the moments were so small.The film is about two lives as they run parallel. One is Marie, a young farm girl, who grows up over the course of the film. The other is Balthazar, a donkey that Marie takes care of. She is separated from him for much of the movie, and many people in the village own him. Some are kind, some are very cruel (and by some I mean most). They cross paths every now and then, and she is always tender and kind to him. People are not very kind to her either, in her life. It's hard to watch people be cruel, especially when Balthazar is so stoic.
