Rosalie (1966) User Reviews (2)

Prudent Rosalie.

[morrison-dylan-fan · 8/10 · 10 November 2020]

Taking part in a poll for the best films of 1966,I decided to check if the Arrow short films of Walerian Borowczyk box set had any titles from the year. Recently seeing the terrific Guy de Maupassant adaptation Chez Maupassant: Le petit fut (2008-also reviewed) by fellow auteur Claude Chabrol, I got set to see the "Boro" take on Maupassant.

View on the film:

The last (non-TV) short film she would appear in before moving to features,Ligia Branice gives a heart-wrenching performance as Rosalie.

Standing in front of a plain white backdrop and a simple structure giving the impression of a witness stand, Branice makes each line in her monologue carry a heaviness of Rosalie baring it all in court, where each glance she makes to the floor away from the camera, allowing the raw emotion to hang in the air.

Toning down the free-flowing nature of his past shorts, writer/directing auteur Walerian Borowczyk superbly adapts Guy de Maupassant's short story Prudent Rosalie into a monologue form, drawing thumbnail sketches of the events which led to Rosalie killing her newborn twins, whilst holding the focus on the broken soul current state of Rosealie.

Slowly panning the camera up objects as his wife Ligia/ Rosalie sobs, "Boro" continues to brilliantly expand upon his stop-motion animation styling which had played a prominent part in his earlier shorts.

Borowczyk displays objects such as a newspaper being torn and knitting being unwound,which get changed from the abstract, disconnected objects they would have been in his earlier shorts, to being representative textures inter-cut in the tale of Rosalie.

Well-Made Drama from Borowczyk

[Michael_Elliott · 30 April 2017]

Rosalie (1966)

*** (out of 4)

As the film opens the title card informs us that Rosalie (Ligia Branice), a maid, has murdered her child after birth and buried it in a garden. The camera then pans to Rosalie who is on trial and then explains why she did the crime. This Walerian Borowczyk short clocks in at 15-minutes and it's certainly a well-made film. The film was shot with a bright white background and I really loved the look and feel of the picture. The subject matter is obviously a dark one and we get to see the actress give a good performance as she explains what happened leading up to the murder. While she is speaking we get other scenes edited in to show bits and pieces of the evidence from the crime. This was really a well-made picture and one that holds the viewers attention throughout. It's a very stark and serious bit of filmmaking but the director does a good job with it.