ABSTRACT
The chapter focuses on Perceval in C. G. Crisp's 1988 monograph on Rohmer's films is as negative as most of the reviews in English; Crisp ignores both Chretien's text and Rohmer's published script, stresses production problems, and concludes by quoting approvingly the judgment of Fabrice Luchine, the actor who played Perceval, that the film is 'a scholarly project, touched with insanity'. Chretien's romance contains a large amount of direct speech, but like most stories it is chiefly third-person narrative. In these opening lines the initial third-person narrative is sung by a small chorus, accompanied by a few medieval instruments. The result in Rohmer's script and film is certainly a more balanced structure, something like the first two acts of a drama. Rohmer's 'Act III', the Gauvain adventures and Perceval's Good Friday encounter, corresponds remarkably in its proportions to Chretien's parallel text.
