After Au hasard Balthazar, Bresson takes on the life a young girl in the country side. She grows up too fast with a string of events in her life and struggles internally to make sense of it all. For some, the number of events she encounters seem to lack the subtlety of his previous efforts, but it is still a genius of minimalist film making.
*********SPOILERS******
The film begins by showing us a boy setting up traps to catch birds and we see a bird caught in one of the traps as it tries to set itself free. Is Bresson telling us something about the main character, is she a bird trapped unable to taste freedom?
Mouchette is a young girl, her mother is dying on the bed, her father and brother deal in illegal distribution of alcoholic beverages and there is a baby brother that needs to be cared for. Mouchette ends up being the caretaker of her mother and baby brother when she is home. Before she dies, the mother tells Mouchette to avoid lazy and drunk men.
At school, Mouchette shows up unkempt and is socially outcast without friends. She is distracted during school and is ridiculed by the teacher. Mouchette seems to be preoccupied with her home conditions that prevent her from learning and instead of compassion is further humiliated by her teacher. After school Mouchette throws dirt at the other school girls. We don't see the faces of the school girls until the final throw. It is an awkward scene where we wonder about Mouchette's moral character. She remains an ambivalent character, but her conditions make us feel a connection to her. She has been unable to emotionally connect with anyone.
Her father slaps her at the only time she seemed to be happy: flirting in the carnival bumper cars. Her father simply takes his drinks without an inkling of emotion (typical of Bresson). After school, she loses her way (or takes shelter) in the woods during a storm. She witnesses the arguments between two men and we wonder whether one of them was killed. The one that befriends her, tries to convince her to be his alibi. He ends up raping Mouchette although the scene makes it seem like she embraces the violent act as a final act of desperation when she seems to embrace the man.
The next day her mother dies and as she walks to get milk for the family she encounters three women who provide part compassion and part humiliation to Mouchette. The first woman gives her coffee and bread, but ends up calling her a slut. The second woman is obsessed with death and gives Mouchette a dress and cover for her mother. The third woman is the wife of the man thought to be dead. She tries to find out what happened to Mouchette, but the girl responds that the other man is her lover. Mouchette ends up tearing her new dress by a lake or river and starts rolling down the hill with the dress several times. The last time she rolls down the hill she falls into the water and the movie ends.
We do not know whether she lived or died, but the scene leaves the viewer rather uneasy. Part of the divisiveness of viewers on the film is that it is such a bleak story with no redeeming features. It is precisely for those reasons that it is a powerful film whether one loves or hates it. Mouchette is a simple film, but disquieting and disruptive to all things we hold dear.
*********SPOILERS******
The film begins by showing us a boy setting up traps to catch birds and we see a bird caught in one of the traps as it tries to set itself free. Is Bresson telling us something about the main character, is she a bird trapped unable to taste freedom?
Mouchette is a young girl, her mother is dying on the bed, her father and brother deal in illegal distribution of alcoholic beverages and there is a baby brother that needs to be cared for. Mouchette ends up being the caretaker of her mother and baby brother when she is home. Before she dies, the mother tells Mouchette to avoid lazy and drunk men.
At school, Mouchette shows up unkempt and is socially outcast without friends. She is distracted during school and is ridiculed by the teacher. Mouchette seems to be preoccupied with her home conditions that prevent her from learning and instead of compassion is further humiliated by her teacher. After school Mouchette throws dirt at the other school girls. We don't see the faces of the school girls until the final throw. It is an awkward scene where we wonder about Mouchette's moral character. She remains an ambivalent character, but her conditions make us feel a connection to her. She has been unable to emotionally connect with anyone.
Her father slaps her at the only time she seemed to be happy: flirting in the carnival bumper cars. Her father simply takes his drinks without an inkling of emotion (typical of Bresson). After school, she loses her way (or takes shelter) in the woods during a storm. She witnesses the arguments between two men and we wonder whether one of them was killed. The one that befriends her, tries to convince her to be his alibi. He ends up raping Mouchette although the scene makes it seem like she embraces the violent act as a final act of desperation when she seems to embrace the man.
The next day her mother dies and as she walks to get milk for the family she encounters three women who provide part compassion and part humiliation to Mouchette. The first woman gives her coffee and bread, but ends up calling her a slut. The second woman is obsessed with death and gives Mouchette a dress and cover for her mother. The third woman is the wife of the man thought to be dead. She tries to find out what happened to Mouchette, but the girl responds that the other man is her lover. Mouchette ends up tearing her new dress by a lake or river and starts rolling down the hill with the dress several times. The last time she rolls down the hill she falls into the water and the movie ends.
We do not know whether she lived or died, but the scene leaves the viewer rather uneasy. Part of the divisiveness of viewers on the film is that it is such a bleak story with no redeeming features. It is precisely for those reasons that it is a powerful film whether one loves or hates it. Mouchette is a simple film, but disquieting and disruptive to all things we hold dear.