(, meaning "money") is a 1983 French

tragedy A tragedy is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a tragic hero, main character or cast of characters. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy is to invoke an accompanying catharsi ...

film written and directed by

Robert Bresson Robert Bresson (; 25 September 1901 – 18 December 1999) was a French film director. Known for his ascetic approach, Bresson made a notable contribution to the art of cinema; his non-professional actors, Ellipsis (narrative device), ellipses, an ...

. The film is loosely inspired by the first part of

Leo Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using Reforms of Russian orthography#The post-revolution re ...

's posthumously published 1911

novella A novella is a narrative prose fiction whose length is shorter than most novels, but longer than most novelettes and short stories. The English word ''novella'' derives from the Italian meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) ...

'' The Forged Coupon''. It was Bresson's last film and won the Director's Prize at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival.

Plot

A young man, Norbert, enters his father's study to claim his monthly allowance. His father obliges, but Norbert presses for more, citing a debt he owes a schoolmate. The father dismisses him, and an appeal to his mother fails. Norbert tries to pawn his watch to a friend, who instead gives him a

forged Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compression (physics), compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die (manufacturing), die. Forging is often classif ...

500-

franc The franc is any of various units of currency. One franc is typically divided into 100 centimes. The name is said to derive from the Latin inscription ''francorum rex'' (King of the Franks) used on early French coins and until the 18th century ...

note. The boys take the counterfeit to a photo shop and use it to purchase a picture frame. When the store's co-manager finds out, he scolds his partner for her gullibility. She chides him in return for having accepted two forged notes the previous week. He then decides to pass off all three forged notes at the next opportunity. He uses them to pay Yvon for delivering heating oil. Yvon tries to pay his restaurant tab with the forged notes, but the waiter recognizes them as counterfeit. Yvon is arrested, and the photo shop people lie at his court trial. Yvon avoids jail time, but he loses his job. One of the owners of the photo shop recognizes Norbert on the street with a group of his school friends, and she approaches the school authorities and accuses him to them. When the Chaplain quizzes some of the students about the counterfeit bills, Norbert leaves the classroom. At home, his mother advises him to deny everything, and she goes to the photo shop with a bribe for the owners to let the matter rest. Lucien, the photo shop assistant who committed perjury for his employers at the trial by refusing to recognize Yvon, is revealed to have been marking up prices while his employers are out of the shop and pocketing the difference. His scam is discovered, and he is fired, but he keeps a copy of the shop's keys. He and two friends rob the shop's safe and begin an ATM card skimming operation. In need of money, Yvon acts for a friend as the driver of a getaway car for bank robbers. The police foil the robbery and arrest Yvon, who is tried and sentenced to three years in prison. While there, Yvon learns of his daughter's death and his wife's decision to start a new life without him. He unsuccessfully attempts suicide. Lucien and his accomplices are eventually caught and arrested, and Lucien is sent to the same prison as Yvon. Lucien offers to include Yvon in a prison break attempt, but Yvon refuses. Yvon blames Lucien for his troubles and wants revenge. Lucien proceeds with his escape plan, but Yvon and his cellmate hear commotion in the hallway that indicates that Lucien has been caught. Yvon's cellmate speculates that Lucien will probably be transferred to a more severe maximum-security prison. After being released from prison, Yvon murders and robs a pair of hotel keepers. He is taken in by a kind woman over the objection of her father. Some time passes, and one night Yvon kills them along with others in their house with an axe. He goes to a café, confesses to a police officer, and is arrested.

Cast

*Christian Patey as Yvon Targe *Vincent Risterucci as Lucien *Caroline Lang as Elise *Sylvie Van Den Elsen as elderly lady *Michel Briguet as father of elderly lady *Béatrice Tabourin as female photographer *Didier Baussy as male photographer *Marc Ernest Fourneau as Norbert *André Cler as Norbert's father *Claude Cler as Norbert's mother *Bruno Lapeyre as Martial

Production

Bresson first began work on the film's script in 1977. It is based on

's '' The Forged Coupon''. Bresson later said that it was the film "with which I am most satisfied—or at least it is the one where I found the most surprises when it was complete—things I had not expected."

Reception

The film was released in France on 18 May 1983 through AMLF, with subsequent releases distributed by mk2 Diffusion.

Critical response

Vincent Canby Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who was the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in 2000. ...

wrote in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', "That Robert Bresson ..is still one of the most rigorous and talented film makers of the world is evident with the appearance of his beautiful, astringent new film, . ..The filmwould stand up to Marxist analysis, yet it's anything but Marxist in outlook. It's far too poetic – too interested in the mysteries of the spirit." Tom Milne found ''L′Argent'' to be "unmistakably a masterpiece", noting "the extraordinary apotheosis of the final sequence," and the "breathless wonderment in the last shot of onlookers frozen as they gaze into the empty room from which all evidence of crime has gone." On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

, the film holds a 97% approval rating based on 33 reviews, with an average rating of 8.3/10. The critics consensus states, "Economically told and sweeping in scope, Robert Bresson's swan song is a haunting indictment of money's destructive power." On

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, the film has a score of 95 out of 100 based on six critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

Accolades

Bresson won the Director's Prize at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival, tied with

Andrei Tarkovsky Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky (, ; 4 April 1932 – 29 December 1986) was a Soviet film director and screenwriter of Russian origin. He is widely considered one of the greatest directors in cinema history. Works by Andrei Tarkovsky, His films e ...

(who admired Bresson's works) for '' Nostalghia''. was nominated for Best Sound at the César Awards 1984. It won the 1984 National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Director.

References

Bibliography

* Ciment, Michel. "I Seek Not Description But Vision: Robert Bresson on ''L’Argent''." In Quandt, ''Robert Bresson'', 2012. * Hasumi, Shigehiko. "Led by the Scarlet Pleats: Bresson’s ''L’Argent''." In Quandt, ''Robert Bresson'', 2012. * Jones, Kent. ''L’Argent''. BFI Film Classics, 1999. . * ———. "A Stranger’s Posture: Notes on Bresson’s Late Films." In Quandt, ''Robert Bresson'', 2012. * Moravia, Alberto. "''L’Argent''." In Quandt, ''Robert Bresson'', 2012. * Quandt, James, ed. ''Robert Bresson (Revised)''. Indiana UP (Cinematheque Ontario Monographs), 2012. .

Adrian Martin Adrian Martin (born 1959) is an Australian film and arts critic. He now lives in Malgrat de Mar in Spain. He is Adjunct Associate Professor in Film Culture and Theory at Monash University. His work has appeared in many magazines, journals and ...

at the

Criterion Collection The Criterion Collection, Inc. (or simply Criterion) is an American home-video distribution company that focuses on licensing, restoring and distributing "important classic and contemporary films". A "sister company" of arthouse film distributo ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Argent, L' 1983 films 1983 crime drama films Existentialist films French crime drama films Films based on works by Leo Tolstoy Films based on Russian novels Films directed by Robert Bresson Films based on novellas Films about counterfeit money 1980s French-language films 1980s French films French-language crime drama films