A bout de souffle (1960)Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Starring: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg
This week in Introduction to Cinema we are looking at Jean-Luc Godard and the French New Wave. If you are going to introduce people to the cinema of Godard it pretty much goes without saying that you do so by showing them Breathless.
Small time crook Michel Poiccard (Belmondo) steals a car and shoots dead a policeman who tries to pull him over. On the run from the law, he heads to Paris where he plans to collect a debt from an underworld figure he knows there, as well as meeting up with a young American woman, Patricia Franchini (Seberg), who he met in Nice a few weeks earlier who he wants to escape with him to Rome. Poiccard has trouble finding his underworld acquaintance, meaning his stay in Paris is longer than he had hoped with the authorities zeroing in on his whereabouts.
Jean-Luc Godard is a very celebrated director. MovieMaker magazine ranked him number four on their list of the 25 most influential directors of all time, behind only Alfred Hitchcock, D.W. Griffith and Orson Welles. But for many, it is difficult to see what all the fuss is about. The greatness of Godard's films is not as easily apparent as in the films of the other three. Like most of Godard's work, Breathless is a film which can only really be appreciated when you have an understanding of it's historical context.
The French New Wave challenged the established cinematic order in France and in the process revolutionised world cinema. Led by a small group of young film critics-turned-filmmakers including Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette and Claude Chabrol, the French New Wave sought to elevate the act of filmmaking from one of mere adaptation to one of artistic creation. They believed that up to that point in time, the films being celebrated in France had failed to fully engage the artistic potential of the cinema, but rather were too literary, merely seeking to put pictures with the words of the script. Much like Bertolt Brecht had done with the theatre, the New Wave directors sought to draw attention to the actual construction of the film. With this in mind, the polished and stylised veneer of the classical cinema was gone in exchange for a much more casual, some might even say sloppy, style of shooting. The strictly obeyed rules of continuity editing were toyed with. Longer takes were used in which actors were encouraged to improvise their dialogue. Advances in technology had made cameras more lightweight so that location shooting was now possible. This move out of the studio became a real feature of the New Wave. These lightweight cameras also enabled a the camera to be much more active. Traditionally the camera would be locked off on a tripod, but the French New Wave employed a lot of camera movement, pans and tracks, to really break down the fourth wall and bring the viewer into the scene.
While it was not the first film of the French New Wave, Godard's Breathless was seen as a kind of manifesto of the French New Wave. It perfectly encapsulated the tone and the style of this new cinematic movement. It was Godard's first film, and one he described as "the culmination of a decade's worth of filmmaking in my head."
Breathless contains all the characteristics we expect from a New Wave film. There are a number of long, moving camera shots (for example the famous scene walking up and down the Champs Elysees, and another scene in the travel agents, in which the camera follows a man in one long take as he goes from the lobby, through a series of corridors and back out to the lobby). Belmondo and Seberg were encouraged to improvise their dialogue, making for much less refined, more organic discussions between the two. There is a lot of referencing of the American films, particularly film noir, which these young film critics had been so interested in. Poiccard is fascinated by the figure of Humphrey Bogart, adopting a very noirish image (the hat, cigarette and pistol) as well as constantly mimicking Bogart's famous habit of rubbing his lip.
One of the distinct formal features in Breathless which will forever be associated with Godard is the jump cut. Time for a quick lesson in film editing. The number one rule of continuity editing is that if you want to cut two shots together they have to be different either in terms of size or vantage point. If they are sufficiently different, the cut will be seamless and the viewer will unconsciously accept it. If the shots are from a similar vantage point, some of the items within the frame appear the same, meaning that those that change create a little jump within the frame. The easiest example I can think of to make the concept of a jump cut accessible is to think of I Dream of Jeannie. The shots in which Jeannie appears or vanishes are achieved by the use of a jump cut, cutting two shots together where all the elements in the frame are the same except for the presence of Barbara Eden. As a viewer in those shots you get a little sense of a jump when some of the other characters in the scene may not be in exactly the same position as in the previous shot. Godard took this jump cut, previously a sign of bad editing, and employed it as a means of supporting the narrative. He uses it for two purposes. At some points he uses it to give the sense of the passing of time (for example the early scene looking out the windscreen from the driver's perspective we have jump cuts of different scenery to suggest the car's progress down the road). At other points he uses it to animate the state of mind of the protagonist. Michel is a bit of a flighty person. His brain goes at one hundred miles an hour. So Godard uses a lot of jump cuts mid conversations to accompany Michel's changing of thoughts. Thus, in a way that is achieving what the New Wave directors set out to demonstrate, Godard is using some of the techniques and devices available to the filmmaker to assist in the progression of his narrative and establishment of his characters. He is engaging with the previously untapped potential of the cinematic form. So there you go. You've just had a crash course in Godard101: Jump Cuts. So now you know if you get stuck in a conversation with a pretentious film nerd and the get onto Godard you just have to nod and say, "... and those jump cuts. Amazing..."
Godard's Breathless is a film with a huge reputation. However, it is important to remember that this reputation is not so much based on it being a great film, but rather it being an unprecedented film and an influential film. It is a filmmakers film, with a number of great filmmakers citing it as one of the biggest influences on their work. However, many of the techniques in the film which were so revolutionary at the time (the moving camera, the long takes, referencing of other films, improvised dialogue) have been absorbed into the mainstream, so don't amaze us. If you can try and place the film within it's historical context you can appreciate it from that perspective. If you can't do that you may struggle to see what all the fuss is about. I definitely got more out of it on my second viewing than I did when I saw it the first time.
This week in Introduction to Cinema we are looking at Jean-Luc Godard and the French New Wave. If you are going to introduce people to the cinema of Godard it pretty much goes without saying that you do so by showing them Breathless.
Small time crook Michel Poiccard (Belmondo) steals a car and shoots dead a policeman who tries to pull him over. On the run from the law, he heads to Paris where he plans to collect a debt from an underworld figure he knows there, as well as meeting up with a young American woman, Patricia Franchini (Seberg), who he met in Nice a few weeks earlier who he wants to escape with him to Rome. Poiccard has trouble finding his underworld acquaintance, meaning his stay in Paris is longer than he had hoped with the authorities zeroing in on his whereabouts.
Jean-Luc Godard is a very celebrated director. MovieMaker magazine ranked him number four on their list of the 25 most influential directors of all time, behind only Alfred Hitchcock, D.W. Griffith and Orson Welles. But for many, it is difficult to see what all the fuss is about. The greatness of Godard's films is not as easily apparent as in the films of the other three. Like most of Godard's work, Breathless is a film which can only really be appreciated when you have an understanding of it's historical context.
The French New Wave challenged the established cinematic order in France and in the process revolutionised world cinema. Led by a small group of young film critics-turned-filmmakers including Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette and Claude Chabrol, the French New Wave sought to elevate the act of filmmaking from one of mere adaptation to one of artistic creation. They believed that up to that point in time, the films being celebrated in France had failed to fully engage the artistic potential of the cinema, but rather were too literary, merely seeking to put pictures with the words of the script. Much like Bertolt Brecht had done with the theatre, the New Wave directors sought to draw attention to the actual construction of the film. With this in mind, the polished and stylised veneer of the classical cinema was gone in exchange for a much more casual, some might even say sloppy, style of shooting. The strictly obeyed rules of continuity editing were toyed with. Longer takes were used in which actors were encouraged to improvise their dialogue. Advances in technology had made cameras more lightweight so that location shooting was now possible. This move out of the studio became a real feature of the New Wave. These lightweight cameras also enabled a the camera to be much more active. Traditionally the camera would be locked off on a tripod, but the French New Wave employed a lot of camera movement, pans and tracks, to really break down the fourth wall and bring the viewer into the scene.
While it was not the first film of the French New Wave, Godard's Breathless was seen as a kind of manifesto of the French New Wave. It perfectly encapsulated the tone and the style of this new cinematic movement. It was Godard's first film, and one he described as "the culmination of a decade's worth of filmmaking in my head."
Breathless contains all the characteristics we expect from a New Wave film. There are a number of long, moving camera shots (for example the famous scene walking up and down the Champs Elysees, and another scene in the travel agents, in which the camera follows a man in one long take as he goes from the lobby, through a series of corridors and back out to the lobby). Belmondo and Seberg were encouraged to improvise their dialogue, making for much less refined, more organic discussions between the two. There is a lot of referencing of the American films, particularly film noir, which these young film critics had been so interested in. Poiccard is fascinated by the figure of Humphrey Bogart, adopting a very noirish image (the hat, cigarette and pistol) as well as constantly mimicking Bogart's famous habit of rubbing his lip.
One of the distinct formal features in Breathless which will forever be associated with Godard is the jump cut. Time for a quick lesson in film editing. The number one rule of continuity editing is that if you want to cut two shots together they have to be different either in terms of size or vantage point. If they are sufficiently different, the cut will be seamless and the viewer will unconsciously accept it. If the shots are from a similar vantage point, some of the items within the frame appear the same, meaning that those that change create a little jump within the frame. The easiest example I can think of to make the concept of a jump cut accessible is to think of I Dream of Jeannie. The shots in which Jeannie appears or vanishes are achieved by the use of a jump cut, cutting two shots together where all the elements in the frame are the same except for the presence of Barbara Eden. As a viewer in those shots you get a little sense of a jump when some of the other characters in the scene may not be in exactly the same position as in the previous shot. Godard took this jump cut, previously a sign of bad editing, and employed it as a means of supporting the narrative. He uses it for two purposes. At some points he uses it to give the sense of the passing of time (for example the early scene looking out the windscreen from the driver's perspective we have jump cuts of different scenery to suggest the car's progress down the road). At other points he uses it to animate the state of mind of the protagonist. Michel is a bit of a flighty person. His brain goes at one hundred miles an hour. So Godard uses a lot of jump cuts mid conversations to accompany Michel's changing of thoughts. Thus, in a way that is achieving what the New Wave directors set out to demonstrate, Godard is using some of the techniques and devices available to the filmmaker to assist in the progression of his narrative and establishment of his characters. He is engaging with the previously untapped potential of the cinematic form. So there you go. You've just had a crash course in Godard101: Jump Cuts. So now you know if you get stuck in a conversation with a pretentious film nerd and the get onto Godard you just have to nod and say, "... and those jump cuts. Amazing..."
Godard's Breathless is a film with a huge reputation. However, it is important to remember that this reputation is not so much based on it being a great film, but rather it being an unprecedented film and an influential film. It is a filmmakers film, with a number of great filmmakers citing it as one of the biggest influences on their work. However, many of the techniques in the film which were so revolutionary at the time (the moving camera, the long takes, referencing of other films, improvised dialogue) have been absorbed into the mainstream, so don't amaze us. If you can try and place the film within it's historical context you can appreciate it from that perspective. If you can't do that you may struggle to see what all the fuss is about. I definitely got more out of it on my second viewing than I did when I saw it the first time.
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