In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

This is not a movie. It's God itself in every frame from beginning to end. Bresson did the impossible. To "see it", it takes the eyes of the heart and the light within us.In cinema there are 3 things:1- Bresson: He is everything and above all things; "He" is like Fight Club, you don't talk about it.2 - The best movie ever made: Reservoir Dogs.3 - The Only Movie that exists: Blade Runner.Please, talk about the "normal" movies and choose this and that and say "Wow". Thank You.

gentle. fascinating. honest. lesson. about sacrifice, personal world and circles of existences. a movie as a surgery act. precise, cold, out of definitions. because the novel of Bernanos is hunting cut by hunter. carefully, patiently, as reconstruction of final thing. nothing strange, nothing forced. a religious film but more that. a profound reflection of way to be, portrait of a community, Dostoievsky scene of conversion, and impressive Claude Laydu in role of priest of Ambricourt.ladder of nuances, cruel exploration of reality, shadow of a delicate work, image of lost place, a cast out of tricks and air of a society who remains a huge prey animal. poetry of feelings, crumbs from Don Quijote and Werther, a kind of Prince Myshkin and death as revelation. All is grace. it is a conclusion and a verdict . and heart of a long travel. because it is not story of a Catholic priest. but drawing of a form of escape behind insignificant things. for be more than piece of a gray puzzle.

In one word: excruciating. I was advised to read some articles about this film's philosophical meanings afterward, but, having sat through the movie's interminable 115 minutes and being slowly crushed beneath its bloated symbolism and lava-flowing oppressiveness, it seemed better to just report my reactions to the movie. After all, who goes to see a movie with a syllabus in hand? And this flick was dismal. Lead actor Claude Laydu, from the film's opening to its end, wears the same wearying and annoying mask of agony as to be practically indistinguishable from the film's eternal, dreary voice-over. Filming one over the other might have worked better than subjecting an audience to both, as they basically say the same thing: The priest of Ambricourt is a wretched human being. The story, about a persecuted priest who tries to help out a troubled rich family, does nothing toward making its characters remotely interesting or sympathetic, as the family are a bunch of unpleasant weirdos, and the priest, himself, comes across as a nosy pest. The last 30 minutes suggests some breath-taking message about grace and one man's suffering equaling that of others, but due to all the indulgent close-ups of a suffering Laydu and the vague subtext in Robert Bresson's script, all I felt was, Finally, it's over, let's have some ice-cream. Interesting for fans of Bresson fanatic Paul Schrader, just to see how many elements of character and setting Schrader carried into in his own scripts and movies, especially "Taxidriver", "Raging Bull" and "Light Sleeper".

This one is one of the most novelistic films I've ever seen. I haven't read the source material, yet, but I feel that it's been adapted almost word-by-word. Even the scenery, the landscapes, the interiors, the characters' faces appear to be like pictures, imaginations you have in your mind when you read a novel and experience the story through the subjectivity of the main protagonist - dreamlike, mysterious, vague, greyish, dark, incomprehensible. Every scene in the film shows a moment in the life of the young, idealistic priest as a depiction of his being, his disease, his questions and his silence. These bits and facets slowly come together for the viewer - just as for the protagonist himself. The last shot of the cross is the summary and the extension of the film: grey, hazy, crooked, almost without contours it is not a sign of victory and redemption, but a remembrance of the endlessness of the grey landscapes, the dark buildings, the incomprehensible gestures, recalling the suffering and immense loneliness of the priest. It recapitulates his pain and is a sign of torment. Now that I've seen one film by Bresson made before this one and several made after this week, Journal is a transition in the filmography and contains seeds of almost every moment in Bressons later works, especially the typical Bressonian techniques of sound editing, and, of course, the unique monotony and brilliant coherence of the images.