Tag: godard

A Woman is a Woman

A Woman is a Woman is a 1961 movie directed by Jean-Luc Godard.

WHAT HAPPENS?

A young woman wants to have a baby with her boyfriend, whose interests lie elsewhere. His friend is brought into the relationship, which only leads to complicated feelings.

ONE LINE REVIEW

A Woman is a Woman sees Godard take on the absurdity of relationships.

THE ACTORS

Anna Karina stars in her first Godard feature and it’s obvious the director is infatuated with her. Karina’s big, expressive eyes and range of emotion are continually highlighted throughout. Her character, Angela, possesses little depth beyond her main motivation, yet Godard accentuates her naivety and allows her style to emerge.

Jean-Claude Brialy and Jean-Paul Belmondo play Emile and Alfred, Angela’s potential suitors. The prolific Brialy is efficient as the cynical and often cold Emile – he continually shoots down Angela’s desire for a baby. Belmondo breezes through his performance as the cavalier Alfred.

THE DIRECTOR

A Woman is a Woman fits into a unique place in Godard’s filmography. There are few gangster references and no overt political leanings present. As such, it features a light tone. Being only his second feature, we also see the subversive experimentation that would mark his later work. Early on, Karina announces: “before acting out our little farce, let’s bow to the audience.”

Throughout the movie, Godard reminds us that we’re watching a movie. Karina makes a regular habit of winking to the camera. Meta moments abound, including Alfred mentioning that “Breathless is on TV tonight.” A police duo interrupt an argument to canvass the apartment. Emile and Angela decide not to talk to each other – instead they argue through book titles.

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Vivre Sa Vie

Vivre sa Vie is a 1962 movie directed by Jean-Luc Godard.

WHAT HAPPENS?

A young woman in Paris struggles financially and romantically and turns to prostitution. Her story is chronicled in twelve episodes.

ONE LINE REVIEW

Vivre Sa Vie chronicles a woman whose voice is lost in a world where commerce is more valuable than thought.

THE ACTORS

Much of the history of Vivre Sa Vie details how Godard’s camera was in love with Anna Karina. Watching even a few scenes confirms this idea. Karina dominates the movie, yet conveys the emptiness of a subject that is only pursued physically. We are to pity her Nana’s plight – she’s broke, homeless, alone and turns to prostitution both to survive and form an identity.

Yet, the tragedy occurs when she tries to connect with her employers and suitors on an emotional level. There is little to discuss and no one available for such contact. Her most meaningful conversation occurs with an older man and the topic only lands on the existential nature of words.

This could be Karina’s most subtle, yet expressive Godard performance. Her acting often retreats inward – she’s initially revolted by prostitution but then emerges as a caricature of her practice. This role is defined by Karina’s expressive eyes – she alternates sadness, desperation and emptiness in such a pure sense. She’s a brilliant actor and a fascinating study for Godard.

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Pierott le Fou

Pierott le Fou is a 1965 movie directed by Jean-Luc Godard.

Pierott le Fou tells the story of Ferdinand, a bored man eager to escape his Bourgeois life and Marianne, a gun smuggler on the run from terrorists. Together, they escape Paris and embark on a genre-bending adventure.

Pierret le Fou exists in an interesting space of the Godard universe. In some respects, it’s the natural follow-up to Band of Outsiders, yet also could be seen as the true culmination of Breathless. Godard blends gangster films, island adventures and spy thrillers into a subversive text that ultimately reveals itself as an ironic political statement.

Godard’s movies feature a quirky, contextual innocence – his characters seem to be trying on roles in an experimental landscape. Here, we see a familiar blueprint: a couple is on the run – they’re playing existentialist gangsters – staging car wrecks and breaking the fourth wall. Ferdinand is writing a book, Marianne throws it away.

However, a shift is occurring in the Godard universe. The subversive reassembly of culture that marked his earlier movies is still vivid, but a heaviness is looming. The second half of Pierrot le Fou issues a statement regarding an increasingly militant world. Even Godard is not immune to such sweeping societal change.

Yet, Pierrot le Fou is still a masterful dissection of culture and a really fun movie.

And it looks great.

Stylistically, this may be Godard’s most appealing movie – or at least, it’s intriguing to see him experiment with color.

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Breathless and Un Flic

Breathless is Jean-Luc Godard’s first feature movie. Un Flic is Jean-Pierre Melville’s final movie. Both directors are considered essential figures in French New Wave Cinema.

Breathless is to 1960’s French culture what Pulp Fiction was to its 1990’s American counterpart – a purely original work that both reinterpreted and reinvented movies. Each work represents a complete shift in how people made, watched and thought about movies. Both Godard and Tarantino present stories about crimes and gangsters, but each movie lifts the cultural subtext around them into its own powerful narrative form. There is a linear jump from Jean-Paul Belmondo’s Michel imitating a gangster to Samuel Jackson and John Travolta discussing foot rubs.

While there were occasional surprises in the years before Breathless and Pulp Fiction, nothing represented the jolt of energy these movies produced. Even 60 and 30 years later respectively, the two works remain relevant, instantly re-watchable and endlessly copied.

Breathless tells the story of Michel, a small-time crook who impulsively kills a French policeman. He is pursued by French authorities – along the way, he tries to convince American student Patricia to run away with him to Italy. The plot is nearly superfluous, as Godard focuses on the existential roles his lead characters assume. Patricia is sent to Paris by her parents to attend the Sorbonne – she wants to be independent, Michel is a wanted criminal – he wants to be Humphrey Bogart.

At its core, Breathless is a story about youth. Michel and Patricia are vibrant and driven by pure energy: Patricia’s thoughts form a lyric stream of consciousness, Michel is always moving and laser focused on his goals – getting his money and trying to sleep with Patricia. Each is focused on the moment in front of them and the electric vibe of Paris seems to reflect this.

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The Tarantino Influences: The Rankings

The goal of this Tarantino project is to explore the movies that inspired the director. What I quickly realized is that this project could be infinite – given that thousands of movie references color Tarantino’s works. I’m stopping at 15 direct influences – fully knowing that these movies may not even be the best representations. Kill Bill alone likely features over 30 kung fu movie influences.

I think at the least, I represented enough different genres to make the project meaningful.

More importantly, I’m excited that these movies will naturally lead to further discoveries. For instance, I was not a huge fan of Branded to Kill – but I do want to explore more Japanese New Wave movies. Likewise, after watching The Great Silence and Django, I’m fully invested in Spaghetti Westerns. The next phase of this project will ultimately lead to a new writer/director, but for now I want to chase down the movies, directors, actors and genres that stem from this original group.

As for this collection of movies, here are my ratings – which again are based on my own preferences and personal enjoyment. I take into account technical aspects but I am unqualified to judge such things. But I also know that Kowalski is the most boring anti-hero in movie history and the Ecstasy of Gold scene is exhilarating. All fifteen of these movies offer something exceptional and likely shaped some small part of a Tarantino movie.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly – 4.5/5

Band of Outsiders – 4.5/5

These are two movies that essentially changed movies. The Good, The Bad and The Ugly was the best of a classic Sergio Leone series that proved the traditional American Western could be revitalized under a European lens. Yet in doing so, the movie created an American icon in Clint Eastwood and probably the most copied movie of its genre and time. Leone creates a beautiful, expansive atmosphere to drop his classic, archetypal characters into and they represent a struggle for morality that is brilliant and layered.

Band of Outsiders continues the guerrilla, self-referential ethos Jean-Luc Godard established with 1960’s Breathless. Godard’s story of would be teenage robbers is both an inventive homage to American crime movies and photograph of the existential confusion of youth. It’s a tongue in cheek critique of the narrative form, which gives us beautifully odd sequences such as the dance scene, moment of silence and running through the Louvre.

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The Tarantino Influences: Band of Outsiders

Band of Outsiders is a 1964 Jean Luc Godard movie that focuses on a trio of students who attempt to pull off a robbery. Its style, attention to subtext and tone may have served as inspiration for Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction.

The most common link between Tarantino and Band of Outsiders is the movie’s famous dance scene. According to Tarantino historians, the scene was a direct inspiration for Vincent Vega and Mia Wallace’s Jack Rabbit Slims dance in Pulp Fiction. However, the subtext floating around the story’s main plot celebrating American gangster movie culture is what makes Band of Outsiders a quintessential Tarantino influence.

The story is pretty simple. Two students, Franz and Arthur, decide to rob a house. They enlist the help of Odile, who lives in the house with her Madame Victoria. It’s a strange arrangement, as both Franz and Arthur are smitten with Odile and are competing to be with her sexually. Yet, they also need her to pull off the robbery. Odile seems to be both enraptured by and scared of Arthur and Franz’s attention towards her. The relationship is often muddled, as Odile is a pawn in the overall scheme, yet also is the fulcrum of the rampant teenage emotions permeating each encounter.

Franz and Arthur were clear Tarantino inspirations in that they are consumers and actors of American pop culture. Franz in particular dresses like a 1950’s mobster and attempts to wear the menacing scowl of a movie bad guy. Arthur reads comic books and talks about X-ray vision. Both play extended games of Billy the Kid, drawing on each other with finger guns and playing out exaggerated imaginary death scenes.

However, Arthur and Franz prove to be vastly different characters. While both are playing the roles of robbers both literally and figuratively, it’s clear Arthur is better equipped to pull it off. He’s the leader of the trio and we later learn that his family appears to have real-life criminal connections. Arthur is the realist of the duo – he’s direct, purposeful and confident in his actions, while Franz sometimes exists in a more philosophical realm of being. Each is dangerous – perhaps as a result of their criminal intentions, imagination and youthful arrogance, which can lead to accidental disaster.

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