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Pierrot le fou
F 1965 105'
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Script: Lionel White, Jean-Luc Godard
Music: Antoine Duhamel
With: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Anna Karina, Dirk Sanders, Raymond Devos
Pierrot le fou
Jean-Luc Godard
About to set out for the evening with his wife, Ferdinand (Jean-Paul Belmondo) discovers that the girl who has been engaged as babysitter, is actually Marianne (Anna Karina), a former lover he hasn’t seen in five years. They each drop their attachments and take off on the road together, across the country towards the South of France and Italy. They take off without a care in the world, but eventually have to come to terms with the differences that lie between them – Ferdinand’s love of abstraction and poetry against Marianne’s love of the concrete and money. Both of them love the idea of ‘life’, but the reality of living is something different. Eventually Marianne persuades Ferdinand (or Pierrot as she calls him despite his constant reminders that it is not his name) to embark on a risky enterprise to gain a great deal of money from her brother Fred.
Although he had made some superbly accomplished films during his 1960’s Nouvelle Vague era – arguably reaching perfection with LE MEPRIS in 1963 – Godard has never seemed so entirely at ease and in control of every single element of his craft as he is in PIERROT LE FOU - effortlessly interweaving all his thoughts, ideas and obsessions about filmmaking up to that point, playing around with colour and sound, with plot and artifice, with political comment and social critique and above all, imbuing it all with a glorious sense of fun and love for the medium. And it shows in every single frame of PIERROT LE FOU - a perfect balance between art and entertainment, drawing the audience into its attractive, colourful, lyrical world only to subversively sweep the carpet away and force the viewer to confront their own reactions to the cinematic artifice that is being presented to them. The film is visually poetic, Godard throwing in images, references, quotes, paintings, comic strips, cartoons – not randomly (well, occasionally randomly, just to keep the viewer on their toes and to see what random effect it will produce) – but to create a deliberate and specific impression, whether it’s the romance of a randomly inserted musical number (and even here Godard is much more at ease with the format than the self-conscious archness of his 1961 film UNE FEMME EST UNE FEMME) or the playfulness of a Laurel and Hardy-style slapstick routine. The film projects through this rich mixture the impression of a carefree insouciance, the excitement of freedom, of being able to take these wonderful characters anywhere and do whatever he likes with them. Even Godard’s contempt for consumerism and capitalism – a hatred that would ultimately explode in his 1967 film WEEKEND - is treated here with playful scorn, a character at a party speaking in nothing more advertising slogans (even Ferdinand, arriving at a petrol station, asks the pump attendant to “put a tiger in his tank”), and a playful sideswipe at the American actions in Vietnam. PIERROT LE FOU sees Godard at a peak – one of a number of peaks often matched by equally deep lows in a long and productive career – and one that is most accessible for the viewer to see just how capable, exciting and innovative a director Godard can be.
Jean-Luc Godard
Born in 1930 in Paris, France. Spent his childhood in Switzerland. Studied Ethnology in Paris. Critic for “Cahiers du Cinéma”. One of the founding members of “Nouvelle Vague”.
2010 FILM SOCIALISME
2004 NOTRE MUSIQUE
2000 ELOGE DE L'AMOUR
1999 THE OLD PLACE
1988-98 HISTOIRE(S) DU CINEMA
1996 FOR EVER MOZART
1995 2 x 50 ANS DE CINEMA FRANÇAIS
1994 JLG/JLG
1993 HELAS POUR MOI
1993 LES ENFANTS JOUENT A LA RUSSIE
1991 ALLEMAGNE NEUF ZERO
1990 NOUVELLE VAGUE
1987 KING LEAR
1987 SOIGNE TA DROITE
1986 DETECTIVE
1985 JE VOUS SALUE MARIE
1983 PRENOM CARMEN
1982 PASSION
1981 LETTRE A FREDDY BUACHE
1980 SAUVE QUI PEUT (LA VIE)
1978 FRANC-TOUR-DETOUR-DEUX ENFANTS
1976 SIX FOIS DEUX
1975 NUMERO DEUX
1975 ICI ET AILLEURS
1971 TOUT VA BIEN
1969 LE VENT D'EST
1967 WEEK-END
1967 ONE PLUS ONE / SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL
1966 MASCULIN - FEMININ (D)
1966 DEUX OU TROIS CHOSES QUE JE SAIS D'ELLE (Livre)
1966 MADE IN USA
1965 ALPHAVILLE
1965 PIERROT LE FOU
1964 BANDE A PART
1964 UNE FEMME MARIEE
1963 LE PETIT SOLDAT
1963 LES CARABINIERS
1963 LE MEPRIS (DIE VERACHTUNG)
1962 VIVRE SA VIE
1961 UNE FEMME EST UNE FEMME
1959 HISTOIRE D'EAU
1960 CHARLOTTE ET SON JULES
1959 TOUS LES GARÇONS S'APPELLENT PATRICK
1959 A BOUT DE SOUFFLE (AUSSER ATEM)
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