À bout de soufflé (1959) Jean-Luc Godard, a French film director, was one of the most significant directors within the "New Wave" in French cinema. As a student he belonged to the environment around the Cinematheque in Paris and wrote critiques for the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma. Having worked with short films, he debuted with his first feature films, À bout de soufflé, in 1959. (https://snl.no/Jean-Luc_Godard) Godard wanted to show reality instead of interpret it, and aimed to present daily activates, especially the interaction between people, as they occurred in real life. By using a naturalistic stylistic approach, practices common to documentary tradition, like cinéma vérité, recognizable locations, and editing as tools to create a more …show more content…
It strives to erase the notion that a fictional world is being created for the camera and seeks to convince us instead that the camera is simply capturing events occurring in the real and familiar world. This can include long-take shooting and other practises common to the documentary tradition, like cinéma vérité’s use of handheld camera, location, and editing. (Rabiger et al., 2013, p.137) Godard knowingly uses these techniques to create a realistic representation of the world. He wants the characters to show life as it actually unfolds, and does therefor not cut out pauses and silences that occur in real interactions between people. He uses long takes to show the entire interaction and does not cut out parts that to more traditional filmmakers are seen as unnecessary. By using long takes, Godard is not only making the scene more realistic, but also objective. When we see the entire conversation between two characters, we know that the filmmaker did not cut the conversation to make us sympathise with one of the characters, but we are given all the information and has to take an unbiased decision our …show more content…
The movement and tracking of the camera looks like it’s not planned, but is following the action while it happens. The film is shot from a fairly objective perspective, and it’s like we are following the life of the characters as they are happening without any directorial interpretation. Godard also uses locations that do not feel like they are constructed or directed for the camera. He uses recognizable places and there are even times in the film where bystanders are turning and looking curiously into the camera. This shows that Godard did not clear the set before shooting, but instead took a choice of having them in the film as a way of creating a non constructed, documentary feeling to the scene. The action is taking place in actual streets with every day, non acting,
In this one sequence, the whole substance and strategy of Alphaville is revealed. This architecture of flickering light is the film. From A Bout de Souffle onwards, Godard was committed to filming in natural light and to the method of location shooting as opposed to the artificial light of the film studio. To realise his idea of making the present look like the dystopian future, Godard created an atmosphere of high contrast without using any additional lights, regardless of low light conditions.
This purposeful interruption shows how the director's main focus was on laying the foundation for the later upturn. The director also plays around with the camera when he wants to show a difference. When the mood needs to change, or the audience's point of view needs to be re-addressed, he changes the camera angles. For the less intense scenes wider camera shots are used and for the extreme scenes, close-ups are used. Sound is too utilized to its full potential.
His decisions were in part due to the producers asking that he shorten the film but also to his decision to create the sense of discontinuity present throughout the film. One such way that he breaks away is through the use of nonprofessional actors and handheld cameras in order to achieve a more documentary style of storytelling while also allotting him a great deal of flexibility in deciding what and where to film the shots, allowing him to improvise regularly. Traditionally, filmmakers would attempt to make transitions and edits of scenes to be as seamless and unnoticeable as possible, such is not the case with Godard, who insists on having jarring cuts even within a single conversation, often changing the angle and juxtapositioning between actors and objects in the scene. We first see these most prevalently when Michael first confronts and murders the police officer where there are continuous cuts between himself, the officer, and various objects such as the gun where the positioning of each is swapped between cuts, causing a sense of confusion for the audience. Scenes such as these become commonplace throughout the film and offer insights into both the characters and the themes of the film as a whole.
...the reflective camera work and the metaphorical visuals. In the film, it is likewise the language of the camera that creates the spectacle.
Robbe-Grillet was one of the foremost filmmakers and the novelists of the French new novel, of the twentieth century. Frustrated about the lack of progress and innovation in the art of the novel since the nineteenth century, Robbe-Grillet and Nathalie Saurrate began to write complex novels that interrogated and challenged conventional narrative modes, novels that altered or abolished fictional elements such as character, plot, setting, point of view, and chronological time in favor of repetitions, an absence of emotion, minute objective and sometimes geometric descriptions, the lack of authorial analysis, and the deconstruction of time. His films also reflect his desire to challenge the conventions of filmmaking, but he is recognized principally as a novelist.
For Nicholas Ray to put so much thought and effort into the placement of the characters, and the camera, it allows for a much more enjoyable experience for the careful viewer. Many people would just overlook some of the things he is doing with the camera but if you are a part of the people that do not, your understanding for the movie and characters increases colossally. And this is only one aspect of the movie, in which Nicholas Ray put so much care towards. He put the same amount of care into the other aspects of the movie, such as the sounds and the plot. He took a movie with a good plot and made it amazing, by putting great care towards every little aspect of the movie.
When I watching this movie, I notice that I felt less separation from the movie. Initially I could not find a reason for that but, soon after I realize that the camera is not static but it wobbling slightly. In most movie, camera does not move and it creates the frame. In the other hand, this movie’s handheld camera type of camera works imitate the human eyesight feeling and make people feels like to experience the event in a movie as a one of the character. In this perspective, do not explain too much about the detail is emphasizing this experience. Consider these things, I really excited and enjoyed couple of scene which are the running through battle field and engaging to the baby. In the every day world, both scene is pretty rare to experience. For the battle field scene, majority of the people have avoiding to be in there so that is rare. The engaging to the baby experience is quite normal event for most people and of course it is grate experience but, in this movie setting, baby is extremely rare and seeing baby is truly miracle event. To emphasize and provide this miracle event, this camera work is perfect to apply.
They all had a number of technicians, rules, regulations that controlled them in the production of the film. However, Godard got rid of the excessive and only kept Raoul Coutard, his cinematographer. The usage of sensitive film stock helped them film both outside and inside without any relative problems. Also, as I mentioned previously, the sound in Breathless didn’t seem to fit and was due to Godards decision to film the movie silently and dub the sound in after. This was a perfect example of how post classical culture encouraged people to tackle the status quo and look for innovative ways to further the discourse. Breathless was Godard’s stubborn assertion that he could make the film he wanted how he wanted. In todays films, we see Godard’s innovation in many of our current day styles. Jump cuts alone, are often apparent in music videos or commercials, in trying to rewrite the rules, Godard created a new standard not only for the thriller genre, but also for film
In conclusion I hoped to have demonstrated just how the all the specific film making techniques used throughout the film help to define the central theme as it is intertwined with the action. As I have conveyed, realism is just one of the very important aspects that help the production of this film come to the close of its’ solid final cut. I think that this being the ultimate visual style of the picture it is what made this movie so great. It got the point across and it definitely had an influence on the way films were shot after it.
Hill, Rodney. "The New Wave Meets the Tradition of Quality: Jacques Demy’s The Umbrellas of Cherbourg." Cinema Journal 48.1 (2008): 27-50. Project MUSE. Web. 21 Jan. 2011. .
Since the very first actualities from the Lumière brothers and the fantastical shorts of Maries Georges Jean Méliès, cinema has continually fulfilled its fundamental purpose of artistic reflection on societal contexts throughout the evolution of film. Two French cinematic movements, Poetic Realism (1934-1940) and French New Wave (1950-1970), serve as historical bookends to World War II, one of the most traumatic events in world history. The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir, 1939) is a classic example of French Poetic realism that depicts the disillusionment in society and government politics by a generation already traumatized by the monumental loss of human life during the First World War. Breathless (Jean Luc Godard, 1960), one of Jean Luc Godard’s most iconic films, portrays the next generation’s consequential feelings of loss and struggle. Both Rules of the Game and Breathless embody the spirit of their respective movements while exploring realism and redefining the purpose of cinema. However, while Rules of the Game contrasts the formative and realistic traditions through long takes and deep focus, Breathless breaks cinematic conventions through distanciation techniques and disjunctive editing to convey disillusionment and cinematic realism. Though these techniques and definitions of realism are seemingly oppositional, Godard and Renoir both hold to the same cinematic purpose of communicating their feelings of disillusionment towards society with the audience.
Bicycle Thieves is considered an example of Italian Neo-realism. The plot demonstrates Italians of the working class in Italy and unfolds their day to day lives. One could argue it portray the reality and develops into an emotional storyline towards the end. Antonio, the main character is offered a job requiring a bicycle and on his first day it was stolen on the streets. You immediately feel drawn to the character as you want to see a happy ending. Watching the film, automatically feel sorry for him as he’s got no money and needs to make a living as soon as possible for his wife with two children to support. From the close ups and observational shots it clearly shows he is desperate as Antonio and his son Bruno go around searching for it for hours. The opening sequence uses the conventions of documentary to introduce the film giving an impression of realism and authenticity, which attracted me to the film instantly. These shots were used to capture realism. The function of this scene is to illustrate the nature of surrounding and an insight of Italy at this time.
In 1959- early 1960 five directors released debut feature length films that are widely regarded as heralding the start of the French nouvelle vague or French New Wave. Claude Chabrols Le Beau Serge (The Good Serge, 1959) and Les Cousins (The Cousins, 1959) were released, along with Francois Truffauts Les Quatre cents coups (The 400 Blows, 1959), Jean-Luc Godards A bout de souffle (Breathless, 1960) and Alain Resnais Hiroshima mon amour (Hiroshima my love, 1959). These films were the beginning of a revolution in French cinema. In the following years these directors were to follow up their debuts, while other young directors made their first features, in fact between 1959-63 over 170 French directors made their debut films. These films were very different to anything French and American cinema had ever produced both in film style and film form and would change the shape of cinema to come for years. To understand how and why this nouvelle vague happened we must first look at the historical, social, economical and political aspects of France and the French film industry leading up to the onset of the nouvelle vague.
The Restless Woman The famous D.H. Lawrence once quoted “A woman unsatisfied must have luxuries. But a woman who loves a man will sleep on a board.” The first part of this quote fits the description perfectly for Guy de Maupassant’s restless woman in “The Necklace”. Guy de Maupassant was a famous French author known for his popular short stories.
She writes that this aspect of cinema came to be know as “the alienation effect”. It is used to remind the audience that what they are watching is not reality enabling them to think and act rather than becoming involved in the play. She also advocates for long shots of the film used to constrain emotional identification by placing a concrete distance between the audience