“Nothing can fix the finite which lies between the two infinities that enclose and flee from it.” In a text previously published on Sabzian, Boris Lehman frames Edmond Bernhard’s (1919-2001) cinema with this Pascal quote. The complete oeuvre of this Belgian filmmaker, “the most brilliant,” according to Lehman, consists of “only” five short films made between 1954 and 1972, two of which screen on Tuesday at Cinema RITCS: Dimanche (1963) and Échecs (1972). Bernhard was a self-taught filmmaker whose work began with careful observations of the everyday, which he transformed into meditative reflections on time, rituals, and meaning. He taught at INSAS in Brussels, where he had a significant influence on multiple generations of filmmakers, cinematographers, and editors (including Lehman, Jean-Jacques Andrien, Thierry Knauff, Olivier Smolders, and the French filmmaker Philippe Grandrieux). He combined a reserved artistic life with a sharp, philosophically informed film practice. Lehman aptly characterizes Bernhard’s approach: “While others wear themselves out making films without thinking, Bernhard questions himself like a yogi, his camera participating in his questioning.”
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