129 Le trou

Discuss releases by Criterion and the films on them. Threads may contain spoilers!
Message
Author
User avatar
FrauBlucher
Joined: Mon Jul 15, 2013 8:28 pm
Location: Greenwich Village

Re:

#26 Post by FrauBlucher » Mon Jul 17, 2017 7:03 am

I watched the new restoration (and a good one). Which was my very first viewing of this brilliant film. As Zedz posted, the tension of the inmates digging and moving around the underbelly of the prison leading to the sewer system was as palpable as one can experience watching a film. The film was tight which helped keep the tension going throughout. I did recall Bresson's A Man Escaped, but also the theft scene from Rififi was also rolling around my head. This is crying out for a return to Criterion.

Jean Keraudy (non actor) was terrific as Roland Darban. It left me curious as to how he eventually got out, especially after the attempted jail break.
SpoilerShow
I have to say I was disappointed that they did not get to escape. Does that make me a bad person? :)
zedz wrote:(when will modern filmmakers realise that you can often create more tension by not cutting away?)
Your post is from 2005, it's safe to say lesson not learned.
Svevan wrote:Anyone else think this film is a coded homo fuckfest? Muscly dudes, two of whom are obviously in love, with the newbie adjusting to the erotic friendship surrounding him. I got the distinct impression that the
SpoilerShow
guy who betrays them at the end committed the double sin of rejecting his gay brothers on top of sabotaging their plan.

Not to mention all the metaphorical pounding, pounding, pounding. It's not just me, is it?
No, it's definitely all you.

User avatar
mfunk9786
Under Chris' Protection
Joined: Fri May 16, 2008 4:43 pm
Location: Philadelphia, PA

Re: Re:

#27 Post by mfunk9786 » Mon Jul 17, 2017 11:51 am

Svevan wrote:coded homo fuckfest
If we ever have a big forum meetup and need to name it something, this is the leader in the clubhouse for me

User avatar
Mr Sausage
Joined: Wed Nov 03, 2004 9:02 pm
Location: Canada

Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#28 Post by Mr Sausage » Mon Mar 28, 2022 6:05 pm

DISCUSSION ENDS MONDAY, April, 11th

Members have a two week period in which to discuss the film before it's moved to its dedicated thread in The Criterion Collection subforum. Please read the Rules and Procedures.

This thread is not spoiler free. This is a discussion thread; you should expect plot points of the individual films under discussion to be discussed openly. See: spoiler rules.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

I encourage members to submit questions, either those designed to elicit discussion and point out interesting things to keep an eye on, or just something you want answered. This will be extremely helpful in getting discussion started. Starting is always the hardest part, all the more so if it's unguided. Questions can be submitted to me via PM.

User avatar
colinr0380
Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:30 pm
Location: Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, UK

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#29 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Mar 30, 2022 2:53 pm

I will have to go back to re-watch the film, which I have not viewed in a number of years, but I really like thinking of this in relation to A Man Escaped. While both are procedural films about the labour intensive process of planning and executing a prison break, the Bresson film is much more austere and eventually transcendent (which interestingly bears comparison to Bresson's film The Trial of Joan of Arc in 1962), whilst Le Trou is, for lack of a better phrase, grittier. Both are about the minutiae of action but whilst the main drama of A Man Escaped is about a single figure and his plans until a cellmate is foisted upon him, leading to an interesting tense relationship of trust developing over how much to reveal and the danger of doing so (which perhaps ties into the Jean Genet homosexual tension aspect of Un Chant D'amour), in Le Trou the tensions are more group dynamic related and more homo-social where the similar element of trust and whether there is a possibility of betrayal is still present but interestingly takes the approach of inclusion or exclusion from groups as its main focus. Everyone may be sharing a cell, but some will never be cellmates. And does that exclusion mean that they will naturally turn to ratting out to the guards, or has that character been forced to because they are tragically trapped between two groups that will never accept them, but will be the first to pay the price during any escape attempt.

So rather than entirely being about the detailed minutiae of the escape, Le Trou is as much about the social dynamics and how a group of men come together to work as a team, each with their defined roles (which I wonder calls back to something like the celebrated heist sequence in Rififi, and looks forward to a film like Escape From Alcatraz). And the moment that felt particularly impactful was of that one character briefly surfacing in the outside world and enjoying the feeling of liberation outside of the prison for a moment, before having to return back to captivity in order to wait for the escape attempt with the full gang to occur, which is a moment quite different from the way that A Man Escaped (and Escape From Alcatraz!) prevent their characters from accessing that final leap into freedom until their climactic moments. Whilst A Man Escaped (and Escape From Alcatraz) ends with an open-ended sense of the escapees literally disappearing into the fog (or harbour) to an uncertain fate whilst the film remains in the confines of the world of the prison, in Le Trou that moment gets at the strange, almost institutionalised, ambivalence of wanting to escape but knowing that there is nothing out there to escape to but the world that led them into captivity in the first place! The proof of escape is almost enough for at least that one character - the knowledge that they have a route out they can take whenever they may want - that makes existing in prison more palatable. Forbidden knowledge that can be shared between the cognoscenti of those deemed suitable within their peer group.

(And in Le Trou there is that opening scene with a character talking about their experiences whilst in jail now that they are out of it and seemingly back on the straight and narrow, which feels as if it makes the main narrative seem more like a nostalgic reminiscence about a group of guys engaged on a job as much as a story about confinement. Almost something like Auf Wiedersehen, Pet except with a prison setting!)

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#30 Post by ando » Wed Apr 06, 2022 11:54 am

colinr0380 wrote:
Wed Mar 30, 2022 2:53 pm
I will have to go back to re-watch the film, which I have not viewed in a number of years, but I really like thinking of this in relation to A Man Escaped. While both are procedural films about the labour intensive process of planning and executing a prison break, the Bresson film is much more austere and eventually transcendent (which interestingly bears comparison to Bresson's film The Trial of Joan of Arc in 1962), whilst Le Trou is, for lack of a better phrase, grittier. Both are about the minutiae of action but whilst the main drama of A Man Escaped is about a single figure and his plans until a cellmate is foisted upon him, leading to an interesting tense relationship of trust developing over how much to reveal and the danger of doing so (which perhaps ties into the Jean Genet homosexual tension aspect of Un Chant D'amour), in Le Trou the tensions are more group dynamic related and more homo-social where the similar element of trust and whether there is a possibility of betrayal is still present but interestingly takes the approach of inclusion or exclusion from groups as its main focus. Everyone may be sharing a cell, but some will never be cellmates. And does that exclusion mean that they will naturally turn to ratting out to the guards, or has that character been forced to because they are tragically trapped between two groups that will never accept them, but will be the first to pay the price during any escape attempt.

So rather than entirely being about the detailed minutiae of the escape, Le Trou is as much about the social dynamics and how a group of men come together to work as a team, each with their defined roles (which I wonder calls back to something like the celebrated heist sequence in Rififi, and looks forward to a film like Escape From Alcatraz). And the moment that felt particularly impactful was of that one character briefly surfacing in the outside world and enjoying the feeling of liberation outside of the prison for a moment, before having to return back to captivity in order to wait for the escape attempt with the full gang to occur, which is a moment quite different from the way that A Man Escaped (and Escape From Alcatraz!) prevent their characters from accessing that final leap into freedom until their climactic moments. Whilst A Man Escaped (and Escape From Alcatraz) ends with an open-ended sense of the escapees literally disappearing into the fog (or harbour) to an uncertain fate whilst the film remains in the confines of the world of the prison, in Le Trou that moment gets at the strange, almost institutionalized, ambivalence of wanting to escape but knowing that there is nothing out there to escape to but the world that led them into captivity in the first place! The proof of escape is almost enough for at least that one character - the knowledge that they have a route out they can take whenever they may want - that makes existing in prison more palatable. Forbidden knowledge that can be shared between the cognoscenti of those deemed suitable within their peer group.

(And in Le Trou there is that opening scene with a character talking about their experiences whilst in jail now that they are out of it and seemingly back on the straight and narrow, which feels as if it makes the main narrative seem more like a nostalgic reminiscence about a group of guys engaged on a job as much as a story about confinement. Almost something like Auf Wiedersehen, Pet except with a prison setting!)
Colin, you make a few interesting points in regard to Le Trou, chief of which is the comparison to A Man Escaped. I'm going in another viewing of LT with scenes from Renoir's Grand Illusion in my head, mainly due to the spirit of comradery among the inmates or their "work as team", as you suggest. With the Renoir film, of course, French patriotism and WWI is the background and setting of the inmates' activity where the Bresson and Becker films are absent of this factor as a coalescing force behind the prison escape. Now, Renoir presents scenes as, essentially, composites or representations of the outside world. It makes the viewer question the meaning of "freedom" and "confinement", especially imo, as the subject of rehabilitation is not even considered in any of the three films. There doesn't seem to be any question of the inmates being fit to return to civilian life. The question isn't even broached. You may say rehabilitation is beyond the purview of the prison film (at least in the 20th century) but I'd argue that films like Shawshank Redemption present the alternative, even if it's merely a talking point within the narrative. Is it that the collective activity of the escape is the good in the earlier films, eliminating any notion of reform being the ideal social condition? Or is prison what we inevitably make of aspects of our condition that we refuse to confront? It's hard to avoid these kinds of questions with any prison film, imo. Just wanted to make a note of my initial thoughts before another viewing of LT.

User avatar
colinr0380
Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:30 pm
Location: Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, UK

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#31 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Apr 06, 2022 12:46 pm

That is a very interesting question ando, and I tend to bracket A Man Escaped with Le trou mostly because of their relative down to earth qualities and being made near in time to each other, but there could certainly be a shared lineage from the Renoir too. Though the contrast may be that the Renoir film feels as if it presents camaraderie (even bickering, clashing in culture yet social class compatible camaraderie as in the magnificent final on the run section of Grand Illusion) as being the most important aspect of all, with perhaps the contrasting upper class gentleman pairing of de Bouldieu and von Rauffenstein ending with one having to kill the other underlining von Rauffenstein's loss (and loss of a comrade purely based on where they fell on arbitrary divisions based on nationality that overrode what could have been deeper bonds) more than his failure of letting the other prisoners escape.

In a way Shawshank Redemption is the same, where the tragedy of Brooks is not just that he was institutionalised by spending so long in prison but that with his release he had whatever structure he had built up within those walls brutally removed from him all over again, and was completely alone in the world outside. The main storyline there takes on a grander quality of not just being about escaping, but about escaping before your ability to begin your life over again on your terms has been taken from you. The escape is not about (or not only about) trying to right wrongs or escape harsh brutality as a convict but also about the need to assert oneself rather than accepting the restrictions of others. Andy never has that knocked out of him because he is single-minded in his goals, but Red's story turns out to be the most moving of the two because he is on the same trajectory as Brooks, and likely would have joined him without the motivation of seeing an old friend again on offer.

One recent prison-set film that I could not find a way to organically work into my previous post but comes to mind with your discussion about the meaning of freedom and confinement was the 2002 Japanese film Doing Time. That film does not involve any escape attempts (and no real rehabilitation is on offer, more mindless labour. But the mindless labour turns out to have a kind of Zen appeal to it!) but more delineates the minutiae of the daily routines to such an extent that it makes the various prisoners seem as if they finally have a defined place and role in the world once again, as compared to some of the brief flashbacks we get to why they came to be there. Its perhaps about human adaptability more than human assertion in that sense, but I enjoyed it very much (and have to thank Finch for selling me his DVD copy of it back in the day so that I could see it!)

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#32 Post by ando » Wed Apr 06, 2022 6:52 pm

I'll have to check out Doing Time. Your points about Shawshank, the other films considered and the subject of personal/collective agency denied, shaped and/or inspired by imprisonment I'll address in a bit. Funny though, that Becker turns out to have had a formative working relationship with Renoir and, specifically, with Grand Illusion (as this short doc shows): he plays the British soldier objecting to being mauled by the Boche. I wonder if GI served as a kind of template for Becker in developing Le Trou.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#33 Post by ando » Fri Apr 08, 2022 8:59 am

Actually, any notion of personal agency seems to be squashed in Le Trou. Characters are either aligned with a shared resistance to authority or they're collaborators. In any case there seems to be no escape from considerations of the group even when "freedom" is closest. The inmates entertain the thought of individual freedom but it's always conditioned by the group or collective good. It's the oddest aspect of this film. I don't feel that force of the collective or group in Shawshank, A Man Escaped or Grand Illusion; in GI I think it's fair to say that de Bouldieu sacrifices himself more for the French cause than for the liberation of his lower ranked (class/status) fellow officers, specifically. The pointedly platonic male bond that is threatened by the arrival of Gaspard is at the heart of Le Trou. This male pack is not given the kind of near reverence in any of the other film's we've considered, to my mind. To the contrary, Renoir and Bresson are constantly upending considerations of its validity, much less its cohesion. Becker's expose of manhood seems to trump, if not altogether eliminate, any wider social or (certainly, pat) existential considerations of being incarcerated.

User avatar
Red Screamer
Joined: Tue Jul 16, 2013 12:34 pm
Location: Tativille, IA

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#34 Post by Red Screamer » Fri Apr 08, 2022 2:14 pm

For me, Le Trou is primarily a film of textures. Rocks, dust, concrete, dirt, twisted metal; a guard’s grimy knife slicing through a bar of soap and a dried fish before swishing around some pudding in a jar. The most extreme example of this, and maybe the peak of the entire prison break genre, comes in the long take of the prisoners first breaking ground, a medium shot of their hands hammering away at the floor of their cell and passing the tool back and forth to take turns. The actors are actually driving metal into concrete, and in real time. It’s a simple technique but the effect is mind-boggling. The documentary quality of this shot creates a rupture in Le Trou and Becker lets it echo throughout the many other logistical action scenes in the film, recalling its effect without needing to dilate everything to the same extent. Colin, I see the connection to Un Chant d’amour in the importance of objects in each film, the way that objects get fetishized and can even seem like physical extensions of your body when you live such a limited life. For Genet the objects become sexual extremities; for Becker they’re tools, objects for work, a handful of keys to a hundred locks. I’d argue that the prisoner’s physical labor is the main action of the movie here and the interpersonal drama is secondary. Escape From Alcatraz fulfills more of the genre’s expectations despite being a stripped-down stylistic tour de force in its own right. It raises the dramatic stakes with an evil guard, a rival prisoner, a tragic death, and so on, while Le Trou probably has less than a dozen scenes that aren’t directly portraying the action of the prison break. Gaspard’s treachery is incredibly frustrating not only because he betrays his pals but because he betrays all their work, which Becker has made us feel so intensely from the beginning.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#35 Post by ando » Fri Apr 08, 2022 2:55 pm

Image

Tough to separate the great sound/visuals from the storyline. Wouldn't rewatch it for either, exclusively.

User avatar
DarkImbecile
Ask me about my visible cat breasts
Joined: Mon Dec 09, 2013 6:24 pm
Location: Albuquerque, NM

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#36 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri Apr 08, 2022 5:15 pm

Red Screamer wrote:
Fri Apr 08, 2022 2:14 pm
For me, Le Trou is primarily a film of textures. Rocks, dust, concrete, dirt, twisted metal; a guard’s grimy knife slicing through a bar of soap and a dried fish before swishing around some pudding in a jar. The most extreme example of this, and maybe the peak of the entire prison break genre, comes in the long take of the prisoners first breaking ground, a medium shot of their hands hammering away at the floor of their cell and passing the tool back and forth to take turns. The actors are actually driving metal into concrete, and in real time. It’s a simple technique but the effect is mind-boggling. The documentary quality of this shot creates a rupture in Le Trou and Becker lets it echo throughout the many other logistical action scenes in the film, recalling its effect without needing to dilate everything to the same extent. Colin, I see the connection to Un Chant d’amour in the importance of objects in each film, the way that objects get fetishized and can even seem like physical extensions of your body when you live such a limited life. For Genet the objects become sexual extremities; for Becker they’re tools, objects for work, a handful of keys to a hundred locks. I’d argue that the prisoner’s physical labor is the main action of the movie here and the interpersonal drama is secondary. Escape From Alcatraz fulfills more of the genre’s expectations despite being a stripped-down stylistic tour de force in its own right. It raises the dramatic stakes with an evil guard, a rival prisoner, a tragic death, and so on, while Le Trou probably has less than a dozen scenes that aren’t directly portraying the action of the prison break. Gaspard’s treachery is incredibly frustrating not only because he betrays his pals but because he betrays all their work, which Becker has made us feel so intensely from the beginning.
Well said, and very much what I liked so much about it. To your point about the visceral simplicity of the visual and aural depiction of the prisoner’s work, my five-year-old daughter wandered in while I watched this the other afternoon, drawn by the harsh clang of the makeshift tools on concrete. With maybe two sentences of information about who these men were, what they were trying to do, and why they weren’t speaking English, she sat with me and watched the central hour of the film, captivated by the mechanics of their work and efforts to hide it from the guards.

I’m kind of glad her sister distracted her toward the end, because I think she would have felt the frustration you describe very intensely at the resolution. That final turn of the toothbrush-mirror is such a brilliant shock, and the gradual deescalation from the chaos of that moment to Gaspard’s walk to his solitary cell is really powerful. Glad to have had an excuse to finally catch this one!

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#37 Post by therewillbeblus » Fri Apr 08, 2022 7:16 pm

I think both readings are concurrent informing the other without one being 'primary' or 'secondary' per se, and think the climax lends more to Colin's take on social context and interpersonal dynamics as the key meditation. The comparison to A Man Escaped is a good one, because while that film is consumed with the internal dialog of a man alone, the bitterness of Le Trou's ending is an acknowledgment that regardless of the collective work, moral identification, and experiential intimacy, this crew has forged in the process, there prevails a sense of isolation born from fearful self-preservation, which serves as an obstacle to absolutist trust beyond the self. Once one member is offered a more tangible exchange of hope, he grasps it as an individualist. This doesn't negate the value of the collective will in favor of a didactic advocacy or rejection of personal will, for the film's greatest asset is in allowing these to be meaningful in mutual exclusivity under the tragic umbrella that one must be sacrificed for the other. Gaspard's action is viewed as ambiguously derided and understandable, and we're asked to hold them together in an impossible-to-relate situation.

If Gaspard had not turned on his cellmates, he would be gambling on the collective wills' ability to contest with a system, when he can only issue control over a fraction of that process. At least when taking a risk alone, he has total control over the outcome. It's a devastating film about reverting to that ingrained feeling of isolation, even in groups. We may rely on social support to boost our own will power to face acute situations, but conversely, we can only protect ourselves when the acuity blurs our peripheral morals with survivalism. That final exchange of the men being searched and making indirect eye contact with their informant is brutal, and in one sideways form of nonverbal communication states the denouement of the themes perfectly. This "interaction" at once conveys the space of unknowability and distance between men that expresses exactly why Gaspard did what he did, and also suffocates us with palpable compassion for consequences that violate humanistic affinity, and expresses exactly why Gaspard's actions are so harmful, reinforcing this social alienation against what they sought so hard to accomplish for themselves in unison.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#38 Post by ando » Sat Apr 09, 2022 11:03 am

therewillbeblus wrote:
Fri Apr 08, 2022 7:16 pm
Once one member is offered a more tangible exchange of hope, he grasps it as an individualist. This doesn't negate the value of the collective will in favor of a didactic advocacy or rejection of personal will, for the film's greatest asset is in allowing these to be meaningful in mutual exclusivity under the tragic umbrella that one must be sacrificed for the other. Gaspard's action is viewed as ambiguously derided and understandable, and we're asked to hold them together in an impossible-to-relate situation.
Gaspard doesn’t get it. There can be no successful individual agency in this environment. The long timers know it and it’s precisely why they’re initially suspect of his inclusion, initially. His background of privilege amongst men of decidedly lower rank is reminiscent of de Boeldieu among his mates in Grand Illusion. Gaspard’s position is reversed, being the youngest and least experienced. de Boeldieu’s manner and bearing are an asset in an environment where the collective will of the inmates requires sacrifice. Gaspard’s similar manner of gentility and exclusivity (especially in the relief of masculine ingenuity and prowess) is seen as a weakness and not relatable in an environment where the collective will of the inmates requires individual sacrifice. Gaspard is the ultimate dupe, being manipulated by the prison authorities and his cell mates rendering any notion of individual agency as meaningless as opposed to de Boeldieu, who’s individual agency is given meaning as his deliberate sacrifice results in the successful liberation of his cell mates. I can help but see this as a nod and deliberate retort of Becker who actually participated in Renoir’s earlier film.

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#39 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Apr 09, 2022 11:59 am

That's a fair point and I'll concede that Gaspard’s character is certainly seen as the weak link here, but the film also validates that there are so many structurally and naturally-alienating forces that keep someone -who is in this naive and afraid position from inexperience- static. Ultimately they can collectively amalgamate their wills towards a communal goal they are all customers for, but this requires faith in friction with these abrasive systems. We can't expect Gaspard to nosedive into blind trust against the grain of these deep-rooted social dividers, while the other inmates have learned through withered experience, so even if he is the dupe and in the wrong, Becker seems to understand why that would be based on his social context- it's a tragedy all around.

User avatar
Red Screamer
Joined: Tue Jul 16, 2013 12:34 pm
Location: Tativille, IA

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#40 Post by Red Screamer » Sat Apr 09, 2022 1:25 pm

Gaspard comes off as a bit of a weasel even before we get to the ending. He always plays the victim and at every chance he gets he leaves out any details about himself that could make him look bad. His desire to be liked by everyone, including prison guards and other authorities, should have been our first clue. His gentility as you put it ando is seen as a possible weakness (I say possible because in the eyes of the other inmates he proves himself early on) not only because of his potential avoidance of work or individualist mindset or rule-following nature but because that gentility could be a mask of politesse that he cleverly hides his true face behind. Which it is.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#41 Post by ando » Sat Apr 09, 2022 1:53 pm

Oh, I'm not putting the onus on Gaspard, particularly, merely observing how Becker uses the character (though now I'm intrigued to read José Giovanni's 1957 novel, supposedly based on an actual failed escape attempt). I love the moment in the scene when Manu and Gaspard surface from the manhole where, of course, it would be Gaspard who quips, "... a taxi. We might have taken it!" Becker didn't have to take such a perspective, which brings up an interesting question; from whose perspective do we see the film? It isn't an easy, or at least, clear one to answer. But it's one I have problems with if only because I was often frustrated with what Becker did or didn't choose to reveal to the audience (like the truncated Gaspard final interrogation/"interview" scene) for suspense/dramatic purposes. Becker's definitely manipulates the audience with selective revealing which further complicates any easy moral interpretation.

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#42 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Apr 09, 2022 2:28 pm

ando wrote:
Sat Apr 09, 2022 1:53 pm
Becker didn't have to take such a perspective, which brings up an interesting question; from whose perspective do we see the film? It isn't an easy, or at least, clear one to answer. But it's one I have problems with if only because I was often frustrated with what Becker did or didn't choose to reveal to the audience (like the truncated Gaspard final interrogation/"interview" scene) for suspense/dramatic purposes. Becker's definitely manipulates the audience with selective revealing which further complicates any easy moral interpretation.
I hear you, though I think it’s an interestingly reflexive manipulation whereby this withholding of information mirrors the inherent distrust even the group members who ride on this faith in their collective potential (that Gaspard can’t allow himself to access when posed with that ethical dilemma) revert back to holding. That’s a form of self-preservation, but it still occupies that grey space in the question of how much do we entertain that voice to isolate and trust only thy self?

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#43 Post by ando » Sat Apr 09, 2022 4:51 pm

therewillbeblus wrote:
Sat Apr 09, 2022 2:28 pm
… it still occupies that grey space in the question of how much do we entertain that voice to isolate and trust only thy self?
If that’s the case the self, in the figure of Gaspard, is not to be trusted. I’m strongly suspecting that Becker is suggesting that there IS no self and ONLY the collective, particularly with this enterprise. Either you’re a part of the collective escape endeavor or you’re a prison authority collaborator. There seems to be no room for fence sitting.

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#44 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Apr 09, 2022 5:50 pm

I think you're right but that's what makes this even more complex- there is no place for fence-sitting, and yet there are clear sensations of feeling individualistically imprisoned that Becker is meditating on, serving as obstacles to that collective need, which is the only hope! He makes us feel this in the long scene where Gaspard is in the room with the warden at the end. which is stretched out for a reason- if Gaspard's (or his ultimate decision's) worth was didactically minimized, there it would be a quick scene to negate the personal value in entertaining such hopes. However, Becker allows the value of this hope to pulsate in a drawn-out exchange, even if it is a mirage and a threat to the collective need. In this moment, Becker understands the allure to this hope, and its relationship to the barriers to trust the collective success. He's not weighing that against the value of collectivism in terms of a moral stance, but rather with sympathy for how imprisoned we all are in these moments alone (in our minds, in our cells, in these small rooms with the wardens giving segments of unreliable information) and the steep hills we need to climb to latch onto collective will with faith.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#45 Post by ando » Sat Apr 09, 2022 6:36 pm

therewillbeblus wrote:
Sat Apr 09, 2022 5:50 pm
I think you're right but that's what makes this even more complex- there is no place for fence-sitting, and yet there are clear sensations of feeling individualistically imprisoned that Becker is meditating on, serving as obstacles to that collective need, which is the only hope! He makes us feel this in the long scene where Gaspard is in the room with the warden at the end. which is stretched out for a reason- if Gaspard's (or his ultimate decision's) worth was didactically minimized, there it would be a quick scene to negate the personal value in entertaining such hopes. However, Becker allows the value of this hope to pulsate in a drawn-out exchange, even if it is a mirage and a threat to the collective need. In this moment, Becker understands the allure to this hope, and its relationship to the barriers to trust the collective success. He's not weighing that against the value of collectivism in terms of a moral stance, but rather with sympathy for how imprisoned we all are in these moments alone (in our minds, in our cells, in these small rooms with the wardens giving segments of unreliable information) and the steep hills we need to climb to latch onto collective will with faith.
Funny, I made a comment earlier to just the opposite effect: we are not privy to the entire conversation (which, according to Manu is over 2 hours). Also, I have trouble with your impression of Gaspard's ruminations and/or role as the voice of individuality because I don't think he's meant to represent a kind of everyman or universal man. I don't think we're meant to relate to him. We never see or hear Gaspard betray his cell mates to his interviewer despite what appears to start out as a kind of confession. To me he's no longer imprisoned in meditations of his own fate but at the point where he can reveal it to someone else, albeit, with manipulation. Still, because the conversation is truncated we're left in suspense until the final scene of the film when it becomes obvious that he has betrayed his mates. If, in fact, this is the space where Becker is considering the consequences of Gaspard's meditations on individuality his [Becker's] placement and framing of them suggests that they have little value. The point may seem minor but at least it's a key to why Becker, as Red Screamer put it, has Gaspard betray all their work and what Becker is ultimately trying to say with Le Trou.
Last edited by ando on Sat Apr 09, 2022 6:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#46 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Apr 09, 2022 6:56 pm

Those are mutually exclusive points thought. I agree with you that the ultimate intended impact is to show how Gaspard has betrayed all their work, though the withholding of information also insinuates this segregation of collectivism - using the limitations of the medium to document the limitations to cohesive perspective-taking and thus offers an avenue to at least sympathize with Gaspard's predicament. Just because we are not shown the whole of the scene doesn't negate that meditating in that space to exhibit his struggle matters and is holding space for that character's dilemma. For Becker to do that and then pivot and demonstrate the tragedy of that action as one that destroys the only possibility for individual and collective outcomes just makes this a better film. He's holding space for both and acknowledging the clearly-preferred and necessary outcome is not being followed through on- though that doesn't mean he can't stop to recognize Gaspard's plight and reasons for it on the way there. To show Gaspard entering the chambers and then cut to the final scene, or to show him being given the basics of the case and the cutting, would be far more didactic and devalue Gaspard's humanity- but Becker takes a more mature route, allowing the individual circumstances to remain grey, sympathize with the cyclical tragedy of reinforced prisons of individualism, and still come out in uncompromising favor for collective action.

User avatar
ando
Bringing Out El Duende
Joined: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:53 pm
Location: New York City

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#47 Post by ando » Sat Apr 09, 2022 7:05 pm

therewillbeblus wrote:
Sat Apr 09, 2022 6:56 pm
Just because we are not shown the whole of the scene doesn't negate that meditating in that space to exhibit his struggle matters and is holding space for that character's dilemma. the cyclical tragedy of reinforced prisons of individualism, and still come out in uncompromising favor for collective action.
Oh no, I'm not saying it negates Gaspard's struggle; the way it's handled subverts its value. Gaspard's reduced to merely a snitch. My contention is that a different director with a different perspective might have handled the narrative with a different moral reckoning. Becker chose to laud solidarity. But I can just as easily see a director with the same material emphasizing the folly of group activity and the triumph of opportunism (the winner, of course, being the warden!).

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Le Trou (Jacques Becker, 1960)

#48 Post by therewillbeblus » Sat Apr 09, 2022 10:28 pm

Yeah, I just think it's cool that Becker is so curiously attentive to all the textures of humanity - in addition to the physical work Red Screamer outlined - so that even if he does come down on that side, he acknowledges the struggle and obstacles reinforcing individualism that understandably make this challenging to work through.

This has been a great discussion from the very first post, and I'm grateful to have caught up with it at the end!

Post Reply