by Allan Fish
(France 1965 110m) DVD1
Aka. Crazy Pete
A love with no tomorrow
p Renée Pigneres d/w Jean-Luc Godard novel “Obsession” by Lionel White ph Raoul Coutard ed Françoise Colin m Antoine Duhamel art Pierre Guffroy
Jean-Paul Belmondo (Ferdinand Griffon), Anna Karina (Marianne Renoir), Dirk Sanders, Raymond Devos, Graziella Galvani, Jean-Pierre Léaud, Samuel Fuller,
Though maybe not my favourite Godard, there can be no denying it a place in his sixties pantheon of classics. At the time of its release it was hardly universally praised, especially in English-speaking countries, where the likes of John Simon and Dilys Powell savaged it, the latter memorably observing that “Godard has reached a stage where self-confidence and self-indulgence join hands to lead him into a disaster area.” It may be difficult to appreciate the film’s impact forty years on, not least perhaps because critics then were kept literally on tenterhooks for the next Godard because he churned them out so quickly, so feverishly, as if he himself, like his protagonists, was on the run from the law and knew that they would, eventually, catch up with him.
The plot itself concerns the escapades of married Ferdinand Griffon who, completely bored with his Parisian bourgeois existence and family, runs off with a young girl, with whom he goes off on a rampage of not so much mayhem as anarchy, which involves robbery, assault and plain murder. Godard himself described it as “the story of a guy who leaves his family to follow a girl much younger than he is. She is in cahoots with slightly shady people, and it leads to a series of adventures.”
That’s one way of putting it, but it may be more a propos to look around the fringes. It’s been described as an anti-establishment piece, but it’s far more than that. It’s not only pivotal in Godard’s own career as the last of the freewheeling films that began with A Bout de Souffle, not only as a comment on the souring relationship with his then wife Anna Karina – also documented in Le Mépris – but also, it seems, a comment on the violence in society, our ambivalence to it, and the very transient, impermanence of love. It has many of Godard’s trademarks, both visually and in terms of narrative, from Belmondo’s directly addressing the audience while driving his car to the impossibility of a crash site centred around a piece of an elevated highway stuck in the middle of nowhere (as if dropped into a surrealist’s painting) to the homages to films past and present, be it in the person of Samuel Fuller’s imperishable cameo to the overcoming of petrol station attendants thanks to a trick Karina learnt from Laurel & Hardy. Godard was influenced by Lang’s You Only Live Once and the later noir classics, but the anarchy of the violence displayed here, and the couple’s references to pop culture, also resound in Natural Born Killers. Godard ensures everything is done not for a reason so much as a mood, illustrated perfectly in the tedious party where, for no apparent reason, some of the girls are topless. Are they really topless, or is it merely a comment on how the party is so boring even their nudity isn’t enough to liven up a mausoleum for the living.
What is perhaps most striking about Pierrot is its use of primary colours, both of paint and light. Everything seems to be some shade of green, yellow and, especially, blue and red. When asked about the inordinate amount of blood in the film, Godard replied “it’s not blood, but red“, and that captures in essence what Godard was doing; reducing everything to abstract. He contrasts unrealistic but sensuous shots of coloured lights reflected in the car windscreen with gorgeous vistas of endless sea horizons and skies and even the protagonists’ wardrobe. He’s helped immeasurably by his peerless cameraman Raoul Coutard, who shows again his mastery of sun-kissed photography, and by his two leads, who perfectly capture the spirit of Godard’s oeuvre, while also recalling his past glories; Karina in particular never looked more ravishing. Andrew Sarris called it “the last local stop for Godard’s express train of history.” It’s also, one cannot forget, the film in which Belmondo famously says “put a tiger in my tank.” In a word; breathless.
I remember the use of color i n this film. It was striking. Even so, not a favorite Godard from this end either.
Hi! Allan Fish,
hmmm….“Godard” Who’s (is) he? 😕
I have never watched his 1965 film Pierrot le Fou, but I will seek out this avant garde frenchman film. ha!ha! 😆
I found your review of (his Godard)
film to be very interesting, quite descriptive, and very detailed…Merci!
Deedee 😉
This isn’t a personal favorite for me, either, but that’s more a testament to just how rich Godard’s 60s period was — even a film as good and interesting as this falls somewhere in the middle of the pack compared to veritable masterpieces like A Married Woman, Alphaville, 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her, Vivre sa vie, etc.
That said, this is one of Godard’s more interesting films in terms of self-referentiality; it’s a very conscious summary of everything he’d been doing up to this point, a kind of catalogue of “Godardian” ideas and images. There are obvious references to Contempt, Le petit soldat, Les Carabiniers and A Woman is a Woman, among others, scattered throughout the film, like a map of Godard’s oeuvre from the first half of the 60s. This makes the film a much richer experience for those already familiar with Godard’s films.
Thanks very much for the fantastic comment there Ed–I will yield to Allan to respond specifically, since he wrote the review of PIEROT LE FOU.
Much appreciated.
Dee Dee:
Likewise, thanks very much, we’ll have to rectify that slight ASAP, but the (usual) method! LOL!
Hi! Sam Juliano,
Right you are!…I will also send you an email about the 1949 film that Tony, just reviewed called The Concrete Christ.
Take care!
Deedee 😉
That one will be done too Dee Dee!!!!!
That’s CHRIST IN CONCRETE.
It’s other Godards I’m less a fan of, Ed, the likes of Bande a Part, Les Caribiniers, Une Femme est une Femme, Le Petit Soldat. Alphaville is OK, but I didn’t rate it that highly.
Bonjour! Sam Juliano,
I was just “kidding around” when it comes to my comment about Monsieur Godard because of a question that I asked Rick, from over there at The Creek, …Coosa Creek Cinema, but of course! after reading his review about Monsieur Francois Truffaut film The Last Metra.
Btw, I posted my comment here at WitD…before I read Rick, response to my question.
Merci!
Deedee
Sam Juliano said, “That’s CHRIST IN CONCRETE.”
Oops! Thanks, right you are!… Ha!ha! LOL!!!! 😆
Not one of my favorite Godards, though I seem to be missing something since those who love this movie REALLY, REALLY love it. They speak of it as if speaking of a mystical encounter with the Infinite. For myself, I was engaged by the first half-hour or so and then after the murder in the apartment, it lost me. But I haven’t seen the Criterion disc yet, and I’ve been dying to revisit it, so that’s something.
By the way, was John Simon ever right about anything? I like critics I can disagree with, but not only is Simon frequently way off-base, he’s particularly nasty about it to boot.