Directed by Roberto Rossellini
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(DVD, Criterion Eclipse)
The life of scientist and philosopher Blaise Pascal in Renaissance France is told mostly through long scenes heavy on dialogue and short on drama. However, this is a slightly better than the other "history" films of Rossellini. A scene in which a woman is tried for witchcraft could have come straight from a Hammer horror film. Later, Pascal gives a brilliant critique of Descartes directly to his face, the subject of the next film in the series. However, there are also long, boring scenes dealing with his experiments in measuring atmospheric pressure and trying to explain a "vacuum" without offending powerful theologians.
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