A young woman kills herself, leaving no explanation to her grief-stricken pawnbroker husband. We learn in flashback about how they met, married, and how she failed to adapt her lifestyle to his. Disgusted with his attempts to dominate her, she considered murdering him, but found herself unable to do it.
Based on a story by his constant inspiration, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, this is Robert Bresson's first film in colour. The purity of his vision remains intact, however, as he once more employs the blend of naturalistic acting and precise, symbolic composition that established him as one of cinema's most rigorous auteurs. Dominique Sanda makes a remarkable debut as the wife whose suicide prompts a sequence of flashbacks, as her pawnbroker husband Guy Frangin seeks clues to her despair. Open to any number of possible interpretations, this is more pessimistic than Bresson's earlier works, but the essential humanism is still evident.
| role | name |
|---|---|
| The wife | Dominique Sanda |
| The husband | Guy Frangin |
| Anna | Jane Lobre |
| role | name |
|---|---|
| Director | Robert Bresson |
