Charles drifts through politics, religion and psychoanalysis, rejecting them all. Once he realises the depth of his disgust with the moral and physical decline of the society he lives in, he decides that suicide is the only option...
Direction
Bresson's 'actor-model' technique creates unbearable emotional flatness.
Cinematography
Paris as wasteland—garbage dumps have never looked so beautiful.
Editing
Those cutaways to hands, feet, objects—pure Bressonian obsession.
Director
Robert Bresson
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Antoine Monnier, who plays Charles, was a non-professional and grandson of a famous art collector. Bresson found him at a party.
The title quotes a letter from Dostoevsky's 'The Possessed': 'The devil, probably, is leading me by the nose.' Bresson strips away the 'probably'—here the devil is certainty itself.
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