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Roll-A-Bout, Original by Roll-A-Bout Corporation - Orthopaedic LIST orthopaediclist.com | Transplante De Pelo - Transplante De Pelo, Transplante De Pelo Mexico nadermedical.com |
Breathless (French: À bout de souffle; literally "at breath's end") is a 1960 French drama film directed by Jean-Luc Godard. Godard's first feature-length film is among the inaugural films of the French New Wave. It derived from a scenario by fellow New Wave director, François Truffaut, and the film was released the year after Truffaut's The 400 Blows and Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour. Together the three films brought international acclaim to the nouvelle vague. At the time, Breathless attracted much attention for its bold visual style and the innovative editing use of jump cuts.
[edit] PlotMichel (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is a young thug who models himself on the film persona of Humphrey Bogart. After stealing a car in Marseille, Michel shoots a policeman who has followed him onto a country road. Penniless and on the run from the police, he turns to his American girlfriend Patricia (Jean Seberg), a student and aspiring journalist, who sells the New York Herald Tribune on the streets of Paris. The ambivalent Patricia unwittingly hides him while they dally in her apartment as he simultaneously tries to seduce her and call in a loan to fund their escape to Italy. At one point, Patricia says she is pregnant with Michel's child. She learns that Michel is on the run when questioned by the police. Eventually, she betrays him, but before the police arrive, she tells Michel what she did. He is somewhat resigned to a life in prison, and does not try to escape at first. The police shoot him in the street and, after a protracted death run, he dies. [edit] Closing dialogueMichel's death scene is one of the most iconic scenes in the film, but the film's final lines of dialogue are the source of some confusion for English-speaking audiences. In some translations, it is unclear whether Michel is condemning Patricia, or alternatively condemning the world in general. As Patricia and Detective Vital catch up with the dying Michel, there is the following exchange, according to the transcript published in Dudley Andrew's book on the film:
In his book, Andrew translates the dialogue thus:
Andrew's translation obscures the fact that Vital misquotes Michel. It is not clear whether Vital misquotes him deliberately, or simply mishears. A mishearing could stem in part from the similarity between Michel's first word, "C'est" (It is/That is) and the word "T'es" (You are), which are hard to distinguish audibly. It could also stem from the ambiguity of the word "dégueulasse", which can either be an adjective ("disgusting"), or a noun ("disgusting thing", rendered as 'bitch' by Andrew); however, even "vous êtes vraiment dégueulasse" ("you are really disgusting") would have had the same meaning, without any change of adjective and noun. By quoting Michel as saying "T'es", Vital represents him as condemning Patricia, but if, in fact, Michel said "C'est", he would have been referring to his situation in general, not specifically to Patricia. Other translations have make Vital's misquotation more obvious. In the English captioning of the 2001 Fox-Lorber Region One DVD, "déguelasse" is translated as "scumbag", producing the following dialogue:
The 2007 Criterion Collection Region One DVD uses a less literal translation that renders the French into a familiar American colloquialism:
Another interpretation of the first line by Michel is "ch'uis vraiment dégueulasse", which translates to "I'm really disgusting". Another interpretation of the final lines included 'louse' replacing either 'puke', 'scumbag' and/or 'bitch'. [edit] Casting and productionJean-Paul Belmondo had already appeared in a few feature films prior to Breathless, but he had no name recognition outside of France at the time Godard was planning the film. In order to broaden the film's commercial appeal, Godard sought out a prominent leading lady who would be willing to work in his low-budget film. He came to Jean Seberg through her then-husband, Francois Moreuil, with whom he had been acquainted. During the production, Seberg privately questioned Godard's style and wondered if the film would be commercially viable. After the film's success, she collaborated with Godard again on the short Le grand escroc, which revived her Breathless character.[2] Godard envisaged Breathless as a reportage (documentary), and tasked cinematographer Raoul Coutard to shoot the entire movie on a handheld camera, with next to no lighting.[3] The production was filmed on location in Paris during the months of August and September in 1959[3], using an Eclair Cameflex. Almost the whole film had to be dubbed in postproduction because of the noisiness of the Cameflex camera.[4] [edit] Cast
[edit] References to other films and media Breathless makes numerous references to films. Michel's constant lip-rubbing is a direct homage to Humphrey Bogart, a poster of whom Michel gazes at in one scene and says, "Bogie". Moreover, Patricia comments on Michel's similarity to Bogart when she tells him that he is only an image and should say more about himself. The film includes additional references to many other films. In one scene, "Bob Montagne" is mentioned, an apparent reference to the proto-New Wave film Bob le Flambeur (1955), the title character of which shares the same name. A few American film posters are seen in the streets, including Humphrey Bogart's The Harder They Fall and Ten Seconds to Hell with Jack Palance (who would later work with Godard on Contempt). Michel and Patricia also attend a screening of Budd Boetticher's Westbound and she sneaks into a theatre showing Preminger's film noir, Whirlpool (1949) with Gene Tierney. The film also makes reference to Godard's work as a critic for Cahiers du Cinéma: a woman (uncredited) attempts to sell a copy of Cahiers to Michel on the street, saying "Monsieur, do you support youth?" He angrily refuses, saying "No, I prefer the old." According to Barbet Schroeder,[5] Godard's original title for the film was Moi, un blanc ("Me, a white man"). This was in response to a 1958 film by Jean Rouch, entitled Moi, un noir ("Me, a black man"). [edit] Allusions and remakes
[edit] DVD releasesBreathless has been available on DVD for several years in the English-speaking world, in editions distributed by Fox Lorber in Region 1 and by Optimum Releasing in Region 2. In both of these releases, the film has a greenish tinge. This was removed for the Region 1 2-disc release by the Criterion Collection in 2007, which features a fully-restored image approved by director of photography, Raoul Coutard. The 2007 Criterion release is illegal for sale in Quebec, Canada because it falls under Bill 101's law that prohibits French films from being released with an English title, although it has brief sequences in English. Criterion did not produce a French cover for the DVD release of Breathless. [edit] Awards
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