L'argent

At the age of 83, Robert Bresson made his final film (though he would go on to live for another 16 years), and it is one that seems made by someone a quarter his age. It has a remarkable vitality and perception of the youth culture. In some ways it is a film about the fall of man and how evil is primarily precipitated by ordinary, well-intentioned people. Based on a novella by Tolstoy, it begins with a couple of young, well-off boys who forge and pass on a significant bank note. It is then passed on to an unsuspecting truck driver named Yvon who is arrested when he attempts to use it to pay for his meal at a cafe. Thanks to the testimony of one of the forgers, the hapless truck driver is sent to prison where he begins his downfall. Evil is symbolized by the bill (L'argent is French for "money"), and it gets passed on from person to person who are only interested in themselves and that which relates to them, and not the world at large. Bresson was concerned with spiritual and moral decay of society which is clearly seen here. After Yvon is released from prison he decends into a life of crime which leads to a shocking and brutal climax. Like his previous film, The Devil, Probably, it is an intensely cynical film, yet one that is clearly made by a filmmaker who understands the nature of living in a fallen world and desperately seeks to shake his audience out of spiritual apathy and start caring about what is happening at the world at large. Remember the words of Jesus when he said that "the love of money is the root of all evil."