Showing at the BFI's London IMAX cinema The Old Man and the Sea is reportedly the first ever large-format animated feature. Adapted from the novel by Ernest Hemingway, the 22-minute film tells the tale of an old sailor's epic struggle with a giant 18-foot fish.

It took director and two-time Oscar nominee Alexander Petrov over two years to create the film's 29,000+ frames. He used the technique of slow-drying oil paints on glass, a method apparently only a few have been able to master.

The Old Man and the Sea is preceded by an 18-minute docu-drama entitled Hemingway: A Portrait. This is an impressionistic account of some of the key moments in the author's colourful life. It is also a homage to Citizen Kane, with a newsreel obituary opening and intercut scenes of journalists discussing the man's legacy. We see Hemingway as a boy as one with nature in the Michigan forests, attempting to save a fellow soldier in the middle of World War One, and witness the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, Spain. This latter sequence is by far the most effective of the film. Probably because it's the most unnerving - a vast herd stampeding on a screen the height of five double-decker buses.

By comparison, the animated half of the double feature feels a little static. While the paintings themselves are very impressive, the movement within each scene is not very smooth, and often seems arbitrary - for instance, while palm trees sway in the foreground, the sea behind them sits perfectly still. Very rarely do the visuals induce sea-sickness, which will be a comfort to some, but rather a disappointment for others wanting to feel more involved. The story is dramatic enough - (if vaguely Freudian, with its old seaman who hasn't caught anything in 84 days, vainly jabbing his harpoon into the deep), and with the novelty of the IMAX screen, seeing virtually anything on it is an experience - even John Cleese in the pre-feature demonstration.

Apart from Charlie Chaplin, Hitchcock is undoubtedly the most famous and widely-recognised filmmaker in cinema history. Even those young movie-goers who, according to a recent newspaper article, had never even heard of Stanley Kubrick, have surely heard of 'Hitch'.

Until the 1950s he was regarded as simply a supremely skilful and popular filmmaker who had the knack of maintaining suspense, humour, and excitement throughout a film. The French critics took him up (Chabrol, Rohmer, Truffaut and co.), turning him into an auteur par excellence. Since then he has been the subject of innumerable learned books and articles; entire books have been written about a single film (Vertigo, Psycho), art installations have recently been devoted to the same two films, and there was even a 100-page magazine article on the somewhat esoteric subject of Oedipal references in North by Northwest.

A career of over 50 films is bound to have produced a few turkeys (Jamaica Inn, The Paradine Case), and others about which critics have disagreed (such as Rope and Under Capricorn, both of which I personally admire). But few will doubt that Hitchcock created half-a-dozen masterpieces: take your pick from The 39 Steps, The Lady Vanishes, Shadow of a Doubt, Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Rear Window, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds. Some would go for his two 'heavy' films on Catholic themes, I Confess and The Wrong Man, and others for very early or late films like Blackmail and Marnie.

To my mind Vertigo is the supreme achievement not just of Alfred Hitchcock, but of the whole of Hollywood cinema, not excluding the critics' favourite Citizen Kane. Unlike Kane it is not a seminal film; it didn't lead cinema in new directions. Based on a French novel (by the authors of Les Diaboliques) which, it is said, was written specially in the hope that Hitchcock would take it up, it is a haunting, hypnotic flash of supreme brilliance which demands to be seen over and over again and which can reveal new depths of meaning at each viewing. Here I just want to add a few rather random comments to all that others have written about it. I'm assuming that readers are familiar with the film, if not, and you don't like knowing plots beforehand, stop reading now!

The initial impact of my first viewing Vertigo made an indelible impression, partly because of the circumstances: This was at its first (legal) screening in Britain for 14 years, at the 1983 London Film Festival on a big screen in London's Queen Elizabeth Hall. It received prolonged applause, and many of us emerged shaking into the night after what is arguably the bleakest ending of any major film, with the possible exceptions of Kiss Me Deadly and Dr Strangelove. As one critic has said, Psycho is rich comedy by comparison.

It was only after about four viewings that I realised what, as much as anything, makes Vertigo so exceptional; Bernard Herrmann's superb score, partly based on themes from Wagner. Vertigo without the music would be a far inferior product. The only other film scores which, for me, bear any comparison are Morricone's for Once Upon a Time in the West and Preisner's for the last few films of Krzysztof Kieslowski.

Like other films of Hitchcock's, Vertigo's plot is, frankly, ludicrous and full of holes. For example, how could Elster possibly have known with confidence that Scottie (James Stewart) would attempt to chase Madeleine (Kim Novak) up the tower and fail to make it to the top? How does Scottie escape from what seems to be certain death at the end of the very first scene? And how is Madeleine's mysterious disappearance from McKittrick's Hotel, even to the extent of not been seen by the woman at the counter, to be explained? In Hitchcock films these things don't matter; he always said he had no interest in plot subtleties or in mystery; just in suspense.

On first viewing, we are within James Stewart's consciousness virtually throughout. On second viewing, we are instinctively within Kim Novak's, knowing that she is really the rather brash Judy pretending to be the totally different dreamlike Madeleine until her first 'death', and then towards the end pretending to be Judy-playing-at-being-Madeleine. Snatches of dialogue take on a whole new meaning second time round: (Madeleine's "it wasn't meant to be like this" just before her fake death), as do actions (Scottie's undressing and putting to bed of the apparently unconscious Madeleine).

Scottie is, of course, something of a deranged character for allowing himself to become so totally besotted, to the extent of wanting to recreate, or 'clone' as we might say today, a woman who is not just dead, but never actually existed (which he doesn't know). Even after discovering the truth he is able to say "I loved you so, Madeleine". The main theme of the film might in fact be taken as the dangers of romantic obsession. Hitchcock's own private obsessions have, of course, been extensively written about by Donald Spoto and others, and Kim Novak was one of dozens of icy blondes who populate his films.

The acting in Vertigo is outstanding. Stewart, one of the true 'greats', proved that he was not restricted to the 'simple nice guy' roles of his early films like Mr Smith Goes to Washington, nor even to the controlled anger shown in his Anthony Mann Westerns. In Vertigo he really gets beneath the skin of a deranged romantic obsessive who develops actute melancholia. Novak was not Hitchcock's first choice (he wanted Vera Miles from The Wrong Man, and probably still hankered after Grace Kelly from Rear Window), but she is perfect as the dreamlike Madeleine, while her Judy is a sufficiently brash contrast. Also ideal is Barbara Bel Geddes as Midge, Scottie's one-time girlfriend who now sees herself as a mother-figure to him (listen to the dialogue for proof of this).

This disturbing, voyeuristic, dreamlike film demands repeated viewing and repays extended analysis. Few who are familiar with it will disagree.

The art of film is ideal for conveying magical and supernatural themes, stories, ideas and images. We, as members of the audience, willingly and easily suspend our usual grasp on reality in the darkness of the cinema. Here, the best film directors dazzle and entertain us by their manipulation of our senses through the medium of light and sound.

Film directors are illusionists who play with and bring to life our innermost dreams and nightmares. Frederico Fellini's films are supreme examples of how such effects are achieved.

Fellini (1920 - 1993) was a deeply superstitious person. He always paid attention to omens and for many years he regularly consulted astrologers and indulged in seances. These predilections increasingly influenced the content and look of his films.

JUNG AT HEART

Fellini discovered the writings of Carl Jung in the latter part of 1960, and he was liberated by the idea that dreams were a creative well-spring. He had long been afflicted by guilt instilled by his Catholic upbringing combined with an awareness that he had a poor formal education. Jung gave his psychic life a meaning and worth that obliterated what had previously been regarded as bad shortcomings. In addition, his belief in omens and coincidences was validated by Jung's essay 'On Synchronicity'.

As a result of this interest he had regular meetings with Rome's top Jungian, Dr. Ernest Bernhard. This led him to keep a regular dream diary that had a great influence on the content of his films. He was now able to justify, validate and portray his unconscious and subjective view of the world in his films. He no longer felt constrained, as a film director, by the chains of reality.

One early, and important dream was of him being an airport administrator who cannot decide whether to allow an Asian man in grey robes to stay or not. The scene shifts to him being a ringmaster forcing a rodent, to swim in circles, with a whip.

Otto e mezzo (1964) was to contain some of the elements of this dream, and it certainly devolved into Fellini's unconscious world. The very start of the film shows the male protagonist (Guido Anselmi, played by Marcello Mastroianni)) in a traffic jam being choked by fumes. He floats out of his car as easily as if he were an astronaut walking in space, then he falls towards a beach. Just as he is about to hit the ground he wakes to find himself in bed.

This trick on the viewer warns us that this film will play around with 'real' and 'unreal' events, it also harks back to the traditional narrative of silent movies where fantastic events occur but are revealed to be 'only a dream' at the end. The same trick was played on us when an whole series of the TV soap opera, Dallas, was revealed to be a dream! Whitley Strieber's filmed version of Communion also includes dreams that have the theme of illusion, magic and trickery which have more relevance to Fellini than ufology.

In Otto e mezzo, Guido is revealed to be a screenwriter who is making a science fiction film. His intention is to show a spaceship saving humanity from obliteration by H-bombs. Church leaders guide the population of Earth onto the ship. Fellini had two huge towers built to show these scenes but at some stage he decided against using them as much as he had planned. It's possible that Fellini intended to make the film that Guido is shown to be involved with. Like most of Fellini's heroes, Guido is Fellini's alter-ego and the story is about Fellini.

For a film that plays fast and loose with reality and dreams, it's appropriate that Fellini deliberately stopped shooting the film on 14 October 1963 rather than on the unlucky 13th.

DREAMING FILMS

Dreams and superstitions fuelled Fellini's imagination and made his films distinctive. The same factors also inhibited him and stifled his creative juices. He was told by a medium that his next two films after Otto e mezzo would be flops, and this came true. Possibly a belief in this prediction brought about these calamities?

Whatever his fears, one of these doomed movies was Giulietta degli spiriti (1965). This came about because Fellini wanted to make a film about a female psychic. His wife, Giulietta Masina, played the main role. This is Fellini's first feature to use colour film, and he tried to use it as a visual language which would reflect Masina's troubled psyche.

One of the script writers, Tullio Pinelli, said the film intended to show a woman with "peculiar supernatural sensations, but in a realistic way. That is, she was disturbed by these strange capacities of hers. Then, we started to have problems."

The basic problem was characteristic of Fellini, his fictional work became increasingly personal and autobiographical. Fellini described the story and main characters in a manner that could easily be compared with his own lifestyle and relationship with his wife.

"Giulietta is the soul of my film; it's her film...Her character is a woman about thirty-five, a tranquil petite bourgeoise, calm, traditional and superstitious, full of prejudices, but all in all...good. Her husband, Giorgio, is a businessman, surrounded by bizarre people: painters, sculptors, actresses, mediums, fortune-tellers; in short, a gang of crazies." (1)

Guilietta's interest in the occult was stronger than Fellini's, and she was known to mutter "We are not alone" in the middle of conversations. When Fellini wanted her to attend a seance, prior to shooting Giulietta degli spiriti, she declined the offer because, "I believe in it and am considered a good medium, but that's why I don't want to do it. It reveals a fascinating world and a dangerous one." (2)

The dangers of entering the alternative realities of our dreams and fantasies are depicted by Fellini with gusto. We are shown the woman seeking some meaning to her life but she is overwhelmed by her increasingly weird inner visions. It is only when she liberates a figure of her child self from its bonds that she is able to walk free of her psychic burdens. Fellini's script outline explains that Giulietta is 'now in complete harmony with the fabulous spectacle of life which is so vastly and so delightfully more rich, magical and supernatural when it accepts in an easy and simple rhythm the miracle of every day.'

The filming of Giulietta degli spiriti did not go well, Fellini had many shouting matches with his wife about her role, and many who were involved with the production were confused. At one point one of actors said he couldn't carry on because "Everything around me is fake." Fellini's neat and rather cynical reply was, "Just like in life."

FLASH FELLINI

There was a small sf element in Otto e mezzo, but in his next project he wanted to make a film version of Fredric Brown's What Mad Universe? In this novel an sf magazine editor is blasted into an alternative universe by an electrical explosion. This universe is based on the fantasies of one of the magazine's teenage fans, so not surprisingly it has planet Earth fighting an interstellar battle with Arcturian invaders. The novel was a satire on the fantasies and stories depicted in the garish pulp sf magazines of the 1940s. Fellini had always had an interest in the Flash Gordon comic-strip stories. He even claimed that in 1938 he had produced a bootleg Gordon strip which had him seduced by the high priestess of Phoebus and abducted to a planet populated by hawk-men. This claim like many of his claims about his early life was a total fabrication and the story he is supposed to have invented is based on the 1936 movie serial. Therefore, this Assurdo universo project seemed like the ideal medium for Fellini's imagination.

In the course of events that project was dropped in favour of a film about the afterlife. This was to be called Il viaggio/The Voyager and was to have a protagonist who suffers an accident but doesn't immediately realise that they have been killed. Even then (1964) the idea wasn't that original, but as we can see from the recent successes of Ghost and Truly Madly Deeply the idea has substantial staying power.

Significantly he started having dreams of execution by firing squad, customs barriers and railway level-crossings as the shooting date got closer. Then he had what was originally thought to be a heart attack. In hospital he was given drugs which gave him hallucinations - one was of black walls swallowing eggs! He did not respond to his treatment and he was close to death before an old doctor friend of his identified his rare condition. This diagnosis changed his treatment and saved his life.

This brush with death gave Fellini an excuse not to make Il viaggio for producer Dino de Laurentis. Instead the property was bought-up by Alberto Grimaldi who had made a fortune with such films as A Fistful of Dollars. Fellini's own superstitions, fuelled by his psychic advisors, led him to other projects and he never did make Il viaggio.

Nevertheless he kept an interest in all sorts of Fortean topics. The Bermuda Triangle mystery, for example, inspired him to make E la nave va/And the Ship Sails On (1983). After that he even had an encounter with Carlos Castaneda, whose mystical novels he greatly admired. On the strength of this Grimaldi bought the film rights to the novels with the hope (never fulfilled) that Fellini would turn them into cinematic gold. Fellini alleged that he, Castaneda, a couple of mediums, an actor and a parapsychologist had gone on an expedition to explore ancient Mayan sites. This resulted in a script, never filmed but published as Voyage to Tulum.

Instances of weirdness are certainly prevalent throughout Fellini's films, indeed one could call it a madness. This is a madness of accommodation to a mad world. One who can remain sane in the face of the daily diet of war, terrorism, inflation, unemployment, murder, corruption, etc. on the TV news is madder than any asylum inmate. Fellini was scared of these outside demons, as well of the demons of his dreams and nightmares. This is what makes his films carnivals of fear and terror populated by clowns, freaks and madmen. In Fellini's view these are the subjectively sane responses to the madness and cruelty of the scientific and objective world. He creates nightmare worlds that are perversely safe retreats from the horrors outside the cinema and Fellini's mind.

La voce della luna (1990) amply shows how weird Fellini could get. This features a village dominated by TV moguls. Giant TV screens are erected in the village to show the moon captured by a massive machine. Local intellectuals consider what questions to ask it, but a cardinal dismisses this action because "We know everything". The main protagonist is Ivo an uncured lunatic who is fascinated by the moon and hears voices in his head. It is only the lunatic that thinks that "if things were a little quieter, we might understand something."

Thirty years earlier several Fortean themes shaped his most successful and best-remembered film, La dolce vita. Tabloid stories of visions of the Madonna, influenced him in his choice of showing a statue of Christ being helicoptered over Rome in the opening sequence. The central story of the affluent partygoers is concluded when, at dawn, they see a sea monster which interrupts their sex party. A large plaster model, draped in tripe was produced but Fellini only used this in a long shot. A close up of a real giant ray was combined to create what Fellini called "an expression of absurdity, irrationality." (3) The monster could also be seen as a symbol of doom which will fall upon society as it descends into decadence, decay and decline. The partygoers shudder at the sight of the monster, thus it could be regarded as the working classes waiting out-there to crush them, or it could be a shudder of self-recognition? The image is ambiguous enough for us to read what we like into it. Like Ivo the lunatic, we should mull over these events but not come to instant conclusions as to what they really mean, if they mean anything at all. This is after all an absurd and irrational universe. Most probably the answer is that there is no answer, but Fellini's films make us ponder many questions...

CONCLUSION

Fellini was an unsophisticated yet complicated character. He turned the night demons of his dreams into weird cinematic images that transcended the lines between reality and fiction. This opened the door for other filmmakers to explore this territory. Woody Allen's Stardust Memories and Paul Mazursky's Alex in Wonderland, for example, owe more than a little to Otto e mezzo. Allen admitted that, "Fellini is an utter magician but he has no heart. I'm knocked out by his technique but his films bore me." (4)

Fellini was prepared to accept that this is a strange world where 'reality' is not as fixed as we would like to believe. He realised that the world of the imagination and its manipulation through film art (or any other means for that matter) was just as valid as the 'real' world. Indeed, Fellini proved the fluidity of reality by constantly re-creating and changing his past. Like a Hollywood bio-pic he smoothed out the rough-edges of his childhood, upbringing and the means by which he eventually became a film director. His predilection was for a good story rather than for the pedantic details so beloved of biographers.

1. Baxter, John. Fellini, Fourth Estate, London, 1994, paperback, page 198.

2. Ibid., page 199.

3. Ibid., page 161.

4. Ibid., page 316.

It's not a masterpiece - of course not. You know Steven Spielberg won't be handing the director's award to his pal George at next year's Oscars. Yet Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a fine entertainment, a remarkable piece of craftsmanship and certainly the best summer blockbuster in aeons.

Criticisms first. It's odd to have a 'story so far' opening crawl for what is supposed to be the start of the story. (Episode I, remember?) Director/writer/demigod George Lucas has a penchant for kicking off in media res, but it would have been more fitting here to have a real sense of beginning. (Perhaps Episode 0.5 is in the offing...) Ewan McGregor, as young Jedi apprentice Obi-Wan Kenobi, is miscast. Why give the role of such a serious-minded subordinate to such a vibrant, cocksure performer? The accent doesn't help - while occasionally offering an uncanny evocation of Alec Guinness as the OAP Obi-Wan, McGregor more often sounds embarrassed and embarrassing. Which brings us to the dialogue: it's the worst you'll ever hear, but it's been a lot sparkier in other Star Wars films, most notably the one Lucas didn't have a hand in writing, The Empire Strikes Back. Which rather tells us something.

The film's midsection might have been tightened a tad, or boosted with a couple more bursts of action. There's a fair amount of chat for a large proportion of under-15s in the audience. The Tatooine podrace, where future tyrant Anakin Skywalker (Jake Lloyd) demonstrates abilities somewhat beyond your average ten-year-old, is an astounding technical achievement. However, it doesn't quite feel fully realised; it could have been wackier still, rendered at a more lunatic pace, with a few decent pile-ups and a spot of Jawa roadkill.

On to what's good. This is Star Wars - it looks and sounds fabulous. The scale, complexity and definition of Lucas' visuals consistently look lightyears beyond any of the other sci-fi/FX movies that have swamped our screens of late - and that includes The Matrix. You can catch a whiff of other films in some of the set pieces - Ben-Hur in the podrace, Braveheart, Jurassic Park and Triumph of the Will in the epic final showdown between the battle droids and the frog-faced Gungans - but the scent of freshness and originality is stronger, the most salient reference points simply being the original trilogy. John Williams' new score probably won't stand as a definitive work, but it does its job effectively in reinforcing mood, character and action, particularly during the strong climactic scenes.

As the film's central figure, 'Master Jedi' (as opposed to Jedi Master) Qui-Gon Jinn, Liam Neeson copes exceedingly well with some of that cumbersome dialogue and strikes a laudable balance between down-to-earth and larger-than-life. Like McGregor, Natalie Portman is saddled (for the most part) with an awkward accent in her role as the extraordinarily fashion conscious Queen Amidala, but makes a convincing teen monarch and will hopefully go some way to matching her performances in Leon and Beautiful Girls in future instalments. It's hard to believe the butter-wouldn't-melt face of Jake Lloyd is one day going to be encased in the monstrous metal visage of Darth Vader. Still, he's fine as the pre-dark side Anakin, taking galactic warfare and intimidating three-foot Jedi Masters in his stride, the way any kid would.

The Phantom Menace is an apt title, as there's a dearth of clammy, seductive evil in this film. Senator Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) - aka Return of the Jedi's Emperor - perhaps seems more sinister than plain oleaginous because we know what he's really up to. Only Darth Maul (Ray Park), looking as much like a roadie for Kiss as the Devil's spawn, conveys any real threat. He doesn't feature much, but makes a great impression in the ferocious final lightsabre bout - a real heart-pounder, where McGregor also has his best moments.

In all, it's an unquestionably worthwhile cinematic experience, a thoroughly engrossing two hours in a vividly detailed universe that - like the original Star Wars - expands the boundaries of the possible. There are some lows - if Lucas was as good a director and scriptwriter as he is producer, then the results would truly be earth-shattering - but enough highs to keep you happy that the Jedi have finally returned. Now, where does the queue for Episode II start?

A PROFILE OF ROBERT BRESSON BY JAAP MEES

"A great non-virtuoso pianist, of the Dinu Lipatti kind, strikes notes that are rigorously equal: minims, each the same length, same intensity, quavers, semi quavers, likewise. He doesn't slap emotion on to the keys. He waits for it. It comes and fills his fingers, the piano, him, the audience."* This quote is from the French film director Robert Bresson, who is one of the truly great filmmakers of the 20th century. The quote is representative of Bresson's own work. Like his fellow spiritual filmmakers Ingmar Bergman, Andrei Tarkovski, Carl Dryer, Krzystof Kieslovski and Alexander Sokurov, he is mainly interested in the inner life of his characters. Robet Bresson was born in Bromont-Lamothe, Puy-de-Dome in 1907. His father was an officer. Initially Bresson worked for ashort time as a painter, but turned to film in theearly thirties. In 1932 he made hisfirst short film, the comical farce 'Les Affaires Publique'. After this film Bresson worked with artists like Antoine de Saint Exupery and Rene Clair. In 1949 he started a film magazine, which later on became the well known 'Le Cahier du Cinema', together with Roger Leenhardt and Jean Cocteau. Bresson made thirteen feature films altogether.

His films were often based on books by heavyweight writers like Dostoevsky (Une Femme Douce, Four Nights of a Dreamer) and Barnanos (Mouchette and Au Hasard, Balthazar). His frequently returning themes are suffering often ending suicide; grace andredemption. What makes his films so unique? Bresson calls his work cinematography, not film, which is more photographed theatre in his opinion. In his vision a film only gets meaning when the individual shots are connected to each other. His second feature Les Dames de Bois de Boulonge was the last film in which he worked with professional actors. Since then he has worked with what he calls models. They are not allowed to act, because Bresson detests theatrical acting. He says: "One must not act either somebody else or oneself. One must notact anybody." And: "Models are mechanised externally, but internally free. On their faces nothing wilful. Theconstant, the eternal beneath the accidental." This approach to directing models, I find disputable, Bresson thinks every emotion displayed by an actor is acted, thus false. But in refusing to allow a model any expression, he thinks that the inner quality of the model will reveal itself, though he will take away that person's authenticity and spontaneity. This results in a certain liveliness/stillness in hischaracters.

Another characteristic of his work is a great sense of economy. Every single shot is there for a reason. He shows you the essence of what he wants to tell you and cuts out everything that is superfluous. Bresson is one of the first filmmakers who emphasises the importance of sound in his films. A good example is two cars crashing in Au Hasard, Balthazar; some oil is put on the street by a gang, the first car slides and spins around, of the second one we just hear the crash, so you can make your own image in your head. Bresson says: "When a sound can replace an image, cut the image or neutralise it. The ear goes more towards the within, the eye towards the outer." An essential quality of Bresson is his sharp and refined eye for detail. You can see he has been a painter, because he not just makes the spectator look at things, but really makes you see them.

He is also a master of casting fascinating and genuinely spiritual looking people. His most well known film is arguably Pickpocket (1959). It's about Michel a professional pickpocket, who thinks he is above the law, because he feels himself spiritually superior. The film has a lot of close ups of hands disappearing into pockets, which is typical Bresson. The thief goes abroad for a couple of years, when he returns he is sent to prison, where Jeanne, his former neighbour visits him. They fall in love. My personal favourite Bresson films are Au Hasard, Balthazar (1965), Mouchette (1966), A Man Escaped (1956), and Diary of a Country Priest (1950).

A Man Escaped is based on the true story of Andre Devigny, a French resistance militant who escaped from a Gestapo prison in 1943, with the help of a spoon, which he uses as a file. Bresson himself was a prisoner of war for 18 months, an experience that had a profound influence on his further life and work. Both Au Hasard, Balthazar and Mouchette are stories of individual suffering and crucifixion. In Bathazar the main character is a donkey, who is more humane than most of the people in the film. He is brutalised and exploited by most of them. Only the local girl Marie loves the hardworking and loyal animal. The final scene in which the donkey is killed and dies among aflock of grazing sheep is extremely moving. In Mouchette, based on Georges Bernanos novel, a fourteen year old girl has to put up with a drunk father, she is bullied at school and has to look after herterminally ill mother. One afternoon this lonely girl is raped in the woods. When Mouchette comes home nobody shows any interest in her and sometime later her mother dies. Nobody shows any compassion, in complete despair she drowns herself, after three attempts, in a pond. Both Balthazar and Mouchette are Christ-like figures, who are being crucified in an uncaring and cruel society. Diary of a Country Priest has a protagonist, a country priest, who suffers from severe stomach cramp. He has to put up with the distrust and hostility of the local people. He leads a lonely life and keeps a record of his experiences in his diary. One of the people he visits is a Duchess who has become a cynical atheist, after the death of her son. The priest reconciles her with her fate, eventually she dies peacefully. The priest suffers more and more from stomach cancer, which eventually causes his death. His last words are: "All is grace."

Robert Breson is a unique and extraordinary film director. Seeing his films are experiences you don't forget easily. In all of his work he underlines the importance of the saying 'less is more', so essential in good filmmaking. Or in his own words: "you don't create by adding, but by taking away." In modern cinema your senses are often bombarded with brutal images and blatant sound. Too much music, too much (over) acting and too much domination, especially in mainstream cinema, of special effects. It's a breath of fresh air to see the oeuvre of a true artist like Robert Bresson, who stays loyal to his inner vision and doesn't compromise. This is also clear in the following Bresson quote: "The future of cinematography belongs to a new race of young individuals, who will shoot films by putting their last penny in to it, and who will not be taken in by the material routines of the trade."

* All quotes are taken from 'Notes on the Cinematographer' by Robert Bresson.

CENTRAL STATION A PEARL IN THE CINEMA BY JAAP MEES

Choosing the right cast is fifty percent of making a good film. Some filmmakers who excel in casting are Bergman, Kieslovski, Polanski, Minghella, to name a few. Anthony Minghella is a good example, in his films, The English Patient an The Talented Mr Ripley, he worked with some of the most exciting and talented actors of the1990s: Juliette Binoche, Ralph Finnes, Cate Blanchett, Matt Damon, Gwyneth Paltrow and Jude Law.

Walter Salles (45) from Brazil is another outstanding casting director. He directed Central Station, which was nominated and should have won the Oscar for best foreign film, although to compensate it got the Bafta best foreign film award. Salles comes from a documentary background and made his first feature film in 1990: The Great Art (with Peter Coyote). He followed thiswith Foreign Land in 1995 which he co-directed with Daniela Thomas.

Central Station is about a 9-year-old boy Josue (Vinicius de Oliveira) who lost his mother and is looked after by Dora (Fernanda Montenegro), a 68-year-old schoolteacher, who writes letters for illiterate passengers in Rio de Janeiro's Central Station. After some initial objection from Josue, who wants to be left alone, she takes him home to look after him. The next day she brings him to an adoption office, which sellsadopted kids to rich families in Europe. From the money she buys a colour television. After some alarming stories from her best friend, who tells her that these adoption institutes sometimes kill the kids and sell their organs for hard cash, Dora takes the boy abruptly back. Together they embark on a quest to find Josue's father. Initially they don't get on very well. The boy wants his own mother back instead of this slightly odd old woman and she doesn't want this kid to interrupt her steady life. Halfway through the bus journey, Dora tries to sneak out of the bus and leave him behind. But she underestimates this shrewd young boy.

You have to see Central Station for yourself to see how the journey ends. For director Walter Salles the film is about thisquest for your roots, but he also deals with important themes like companionship, friendship and understanding. Salles commented: "these values are not really appreciated in today's very competitive society, where efficiency is everything. This might also be one of the clues to why people respond to the film in such an emotional way. It talks about things that are not perceived as being important, but are extremely essential for our survival."

Vinicius de Oliveira with his handsome and intelligent face, was found by Salles at an airport in Rio de Janeiro. He worked there as a shoeshine boy. Vinicius asked for some money to buy a sandwich and promised to pay Salles back when he returned. The film director was immediately impressed by Vinicius' face and his dignity. The boy had never seen a film in a cinema in his life. He is certainly a natural talent, who worked very well with Fernanda Montenegro, who is a respected star in Brazil, comparable to such actresses as Gena Rowlands and Simone Signoret.

Central Station is one of those pearls in contemporary cinema: skillfully directed with great love and attention, truthfully acted and shot with an eye for beauty and detail combined with an assured understanding of moving pictures. Salles, who made a documentary on Federico Fellini at the early stages of his career, talks about the Italian Maestro: "Fellini used to say that the beauty of film for him was the possibility to come in to the theatre, as you enter a chapel and have the experience of sharing, by watching a film with a great number of people that you have never met. That common experience is very rare today." It is even more rare to find excellent filmmakers like Walter Salles. He combines a fine eye with a deep humanism and has the gift to get the best out of his actors. Cinema is a richer place with people like Walter Salles.