Director–
Jean-Luc Godard
Writer - François Truffaut
Cast
Characters
Jean
Seburg … Patricia Franchini
Jean-Paul
Belmondo … Michel Poiccard / Laszlo Kovacs
Daniel
Boulanger … Police Inspector Vital
Henri-Jacques
Huet … Antonio Berrutti
Roger
Hanin … Carl Zubart
Van
Doude … Himself
Claude
Mansard … Claudius Mansard
Plot
A small-time thief steals a car and
impulsively murders a motorcycle policeman. Wanted by the authorities, he
reunites with a hip American journalism student and attempts to persuade her to
run away with him to Italy. –IMDB.com
Introduction
to French New Wave Facts
The
French New Wave was consisted of two parts: the Cahiers group of
critics-turned-directors (Claude Chabrol, Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Rivette,
Eric Rohmer, and Francois Truffaut) and the “Left Bank” group has often been
characterized as taking literature, philosophy, politics, and the possibilities
of documentary more seriously than the Cahiers group. They were also more
professionally experienced filmmakers, and Varda’s La Pointe Courte (shot and
privately premiered in 1954, released in 1956 and edited by Resnais) has been
called by some the first New Wave film; it is certainly the precursor, as
Ossessione prepared the way for Neorealism. (Mast Kawin 347)
Furthermore
“To like Godard for Breathless is perhaps to wish he were another Truffaut. But
even in Breathless the unique Godard
devices – the logical assault against logic, the sudden and abrupt event, the
detachment of the viewer from the illusion of the film – control the work. As
Michel drives the stolen car, his lengthy monologue on life and the countryside
is addressed directly to us, an artifice that Godard emphasizes with his jump
cutting, which destroys – or excitingly charges the visual continuity of time
and space. (Mast Kawin 352)
One
technique that Godard is famous for is that of Breaking the Fourth Wall. This
is seen is his film Band of Outsiders.
It is jarring and abrasive and gets your attention.
Thoughts
The film
Breathless begins with Jean-Paul
Belmondo looking at a sexy pin-up in a tabloid newspaper. You’ll see him stroke
his lips a habit supposedly Humphrey Bogart had. “Breathless uses the famous techniques of the French New Wave:
location shooting, improvised dialogue, and a loose narrative form. In addition
Godard uses his characteristic jump cuts, deliberate “mismatches” between
shots, and references to the history of cinema, art, and music. Much of the
film’s vigor comes from collisions between popular and high culture: Godard
shows us pinups and portraits of women by Picasso and Renoir, and the
soundtrack includes both Mozart’s clarinet concerto and snippets of French pop
radio.” (ThePirateBay)
“Breathless (À Bout de Souffle) was a
“New Wave” film released in 1960 France and was directed by Jean-Luc Godard.
The script was written by Godard and François Truffaut, both of whom were
writers for the Cahiers du Cinéma, a journal for cinema.” (Film…And All Its
Goodness)
Michel steals a car and is off. He breaks
the fourth wall by talking to camera. He says if you don’t like the shore,
mountains or city then get stuffed. He aims to the sun with his gun and we hear
gunshots. The gunshots are not from the gun itself. As the editing continues as
he is driving there is a cut on sound which gets your attention. The cops chase him and he kills one escaping
on foot through a field. When Michel is at a girlfriend’s apartment there is
natural lighting and a wall light but it is shot seemingly without key, fill
lights and back lighting. This gives it a rawer more individual and auteur
look. “A tiny room in the Hotel de Suede
was used as the room where Patricia lived. It was so small there was only about
eight inches of floor space around the bed. Jean-Luc Godard, Raoul Coutard, and the actors all had to cram into the space, with the
focus puller standing on the bed and the script supervisor watching through the
door. "It was a relief not to have lights," Coutard later said.”
(IMDB.com)
An interesting trivia fact is that “the
story is based on the real life criminal, Michel Portail, who Truffaut had
collected clippings back in 1952” (IMDB.com) Michel goes to a movie theatre and
sees a picture of Humphrey Bogart and strokes his lips the way that Bogart
seemingly does. Humphrey Bogart was a symbol of masculine power and Michel
tries to emulate that.
Godard’s status was cemented with the
greats as this movie came out despite it’s unorthodox editing. This parodic
re-appropriation of a classical thriller (dedicated to Monogram Pictures, the
American B-movie production company) turned budgetary constraints to its
advantage by using outdoor locations, natural lighting, a hand-held camera and
a crew reduced to a minimum to create the impression of a more authentic, if
stylized, approach to reality.” (Fotiade 12)
What is basically said in the last
citation is that the budgetary constraints were an asset to the film adding
forced methods of creativity for Godard to use. These are part of the reasons
that this is a landmark film.
On a technical note “Coutard had no
difficulties in adapting to Godard’s unconventional methods, and went along
with the young director’s suggestion of using hypersensitive film stock (Ilford
HPS and Agfa Record) for night shoots, which up until then had been the
preserve of still photographers and documentary filmmakers. A different stock
(Gervaert 36) was used for day shooting.” (Fotiade 32)
When Michel insists that Patricia sleep
with him that night she basically turns him down. In the car there are many
jump cuts probably to eliminate boring dialogue between Patricia and Michel as
stated by Fotiade. The dolly shots I read were accomplished by a cameraman
being pushed on a wheelchair. Creative. He scene in which Patricia and Michel
talk in her room has natural lighting which gives the film a documentary type
look. It adds realism as well as the outside location shooting. Patricia
presumably sleeps with the man giving her articles to write which angers Michel
understandably. Michel philosophizes women and what they want and is angry that
Patricia doesn’t know if she loves him yet. He asks her if she thinks about
death. He says he does all the time.
Fitting since death will await him at the end of the film. She tells him
she’s pregnant. Every time he touches her butt she slaps him. Patricia says she
wants to know what’s behind his face. Michel says he’s not much of a looker but
he is quite the boxer. Jean-Paul
Belmondo was a amateur boxer in real life. “The scene establishes an
idiosyncratic non-verbal bond between characters that are otherwise constantly
plagued by cultural misperceptions and linguistic quid pro quo.” (Fotiade 47)
Michel
steals a Ford which he likes. Jean-Luc Godard can be seen spotting Michel and
he is the one who informs the police on him. Michel takes the car to a chop
shop but they rip him off on the price of the car. “Cutting between dialogue
and splicing the shots of only one interlocutor ‘as if it was a single take’
(during Michel’s conversation with Patricia in the car) provides an example of
stylistic innovation that helped solve a practical editing problem.” (Fotiade
63) These jump cuts make for a fluid conversation and scene as Michel asks her
question and a time lapse is not really detected.
Jump cut
after jump cut of Michel cursing the taxi driver to speed up and pass cars
shows his rude side as he now knows police are pursuing him. Antonio Berruti
owes him money and he left 5 minutes ago as Michel tries to find him.
Continuity
was a funny thing in the film. “At times Godard’s resentment of classical continuity
rules went as far as to exclude Susanne Faye (the continuity girl) from the
shooting, which led to glaring inconsistencies in the actors’ costumes, such as
Patricia’s sudden change from a short-sleeved striped top to a long-sleeved
sailor top in consecutive shots during the bedroom sequence.” (Fotiade 74)
Inspector
Vital asks Patricia if she’s seen the man on the front page, Michel. She says
no. The guy warns her not to mess with Paris Police.
“It is
worthwhile noting in this context that the American thriller and film noir genre was, generally speaking,
a male preserve, with the occasional intervention of leading female characters
who acted as temptresses, double agents or objects of desire (if not
combinations of such roles), deflecting the protagonist from his course and, in
some cases, determining his downfall.” (Fotiade 77) It can be said that the
masculine and feminine are always fighting with each other in the film even in
seduction. Patricia is chased to the movies where she tries to hide. It is
clever that the cinema a form of escapism is physically an escape for Patricia.
They steal a Cadillac and search for Antonio to get some money he owes Michel.
He meets with him and agrees to call him tomorrow. At the hideout Patricia and
Michel stay the night. The next on Michel’s orders she buys some milk and a
newspaper. She then calls the police on Michel, the one who gave Patricia his
number. His name is Inspector Vital. She tells Michel she doesn’t want to be in
love with him. That is why she called the police. Instead of running they both
philosophize about love. On the street Antonio throws Michel a gun and the
police shoot him. He calls Patricia a louse.
At the
end of the movie there is “Patricia impersonating Bogart (a sign of complicity
with Michel). (Fotiade 83)
Works
Cited
Fotiade,
Ramona. A bout de soufflé. New York: I.B. Tauris, 2013
Mast,
Gerald and Kawin, Bruce. A Short History of the Movies. 2000
Thepiratebay.org
Proud,
Alexandra. Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless: The revelation of
filmmaking as cinephilia. Edith Cowan
University
imdb.com
No comments:
Post a Comment