A Man Escaped Film Analysis

Robert Bresson was one of the most popular and successful French filmmakers in the 20th century. He is best known for his films Pickpocket and A Man Escaped, which are both great examples of Bresson’s cinematic style. In his film, A Man Escaped, Bresson takes great lengths to show the relationship between sight and sound in cinema. Before talkies were established, silent films were all the world knew. Society did not feel the need to hear the actors talk or hear what sounds were going on throughout the scenes. People used their minds and read the words on the screen when the film cut to written dialogue to help the story along. After talkies were created, the world exploded with sound and new effects and society has run with this invention. The world went from silent

This is not always the case because there are people who are fascinated and have a passion for silent films but most of today’s society has not been introduced to those films. In A Man Escaped, Bresson uses sound in unique ways to show how important it can be, even if used simply. Bresson works a great deal on playing around with using sounds over sight when it helps the film and vis versa. In A Man Escaped, when the main character is trying to work on the cell door and scratching off pieces of the wood with a spoon, Bresson focuses your attention to the sounds that are going on. You become more self-aware of the sounds the main character is hearing. You listen for the footsteps of the guards just like the main man is. You hear the coughs, moans and scuffs of the men in the other cells. You do not focus as much on the action he is doing because it stays the same and it is not very interesting. The sounds from around him become more important to the viewer. When people who are watching this film use their ears more than their eyes, they fall into exactly what Bresson wanted to accomplish. In an excerpt from Bresson called