Tuesday, March 15, 2011

BREATHLESS

6 comments:

  1. Breatheless is a 1960 French drama film.In this movie Michel is an irresponsibl thief,who steals a car and murders the motorcycle policeman who pursues him. Now wanted by the authorities, he renews his relationship with Patricia.She is a American girl studying journalism at.Before leaving Paris, he plans to collect a debt and expects her to accompany him on his planned getaway to Italy. Even with his face in the local papers and media, Michel seems to not care. I found this movie to be interesting and innovative. It displays several characteristics of French new wave, this includes the editing used in the film.This film is one of my favorites so far in this semester.Also I believe that everyone should watch the 1983 version of this movie, its hilarious

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  2. Xueyun Liu
    Breathless is 1960 French New Wave film. In the movie, Michel a criminal killed a policeman find himself in love with American girl Patricia. While Michel tries to get some money to escape to Italy with Patricia, Patricia betrays him by calling the police. Breathless showed the influence of Italian Neorealism because the film is shot at local; the film also shows the influence of classical Hollywood cinema, such as the love relationship between Michel and Patricia.
    Breathless also shows different way for editing. The film showed lots of editing which several shots of same object only have slightly different, which created jump cuts. Such as when Patricia was in the car while Michel driving around the city, the camera focus on Patricia only but camera positions change slightly for each cut.
    I think this film is very interesting because the love between Michel and Patricia is very unusual. They both love each other, but there is always something to hold Patricia back from loving Michel. Until the end of the movie, Patricia finally finds out her love Michel but it is too late. The relationship seems don’t make sense at beginning, but when I think about it after, I do think this kind of situation happen in real life. Lots of people don’t realize certain thing is important to us until we loss it.

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  3. Breathless is a 1960 French... wait, I see that's been done.
    1960's. France. young directors are making "new wave" films on a budget. They reject established hollywood narratives, preferring films following believable modern characters chopped down to enhance the effect of long, often public, follow shots. Portable cameras allow them to track subjects through live environments like crowded markets and parades. Editing these down to only the most crucial dialogue, interaction, and movement gives the directors another tool to both progress the plot and save on expensive film. The resulting style finds a worldwide audience.

    Director Jean-luc Godard and his contemporaries reuse several themes & editing techniques to define their new style. The emerging music in post-ww2 france was a major influence to these directors. Their jazzy soundtracks could alternate from hectic, jittery percussions for action and tightly cut scenes, to lazy, strolling background pieces for car rides, scenic pans, and moments of thought or reflection. Despite the realworld characters and third-person, almost voyeuristic camera work, 'Breathless' and Nouvelle Vague don't hesitate to say f the fourth wall and address the audience directly. The main character literally introduces himself as an Asshole. Later, he turns aside from his leisurely country drive to share some observations and maxims directly with the camera while remaining in character. 'Breathless' was a gritty, groundlevel film whose love story might be allusion to the smug aggression of a dictator and his fatal romance with the young and independent. I liked it.

    Summited late, via cellphone

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  4. In response to Xueyun Liu's comment:
    The comments about the influence from Italian Neorealism and CHC are interesting to note and something I didn't originally think of when looking at this French New Wave film (specifically the right bank). But I also wanted to add onto this and touch on a few characteristics of this film that makes it a right bank French New Wave film. For instance, the scenes tend to be long and drawn out. One scene that specifically stood out to me was when MIchel stops the cab (he's with Patricia) and gets out and goes into the building. The camera neither follows him or cuts to Patricia. Instead, it stays in the exact position so that we're staring at a car door for a minute. Another characteristic is the random dialogue. I noticed this in the scene where Michel and Patricia meet someone at near a cafe and he tells Michel shouldn't wear a tweed jacket with silk socks. It was completely off-topic and unexpected. Other characteristics shown in this film are the non-traditional ending (which breaks away from the CHC love story ending in order to show New Wave's own identity) and the real-life settings.
    -Katie Daly

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  5. Laurie M In the movie Breathless, the director Jean-Luc Godard, uses continuity editing in new ways. He moves frames from the middle to make jump cuts. He uses the camera on real streets, and he allows viewers to search for the characters in the streets. For example, when Patricia is being followed by the detective, and Michel is tailing them in the streets and movie theater. The movie cuts longs shots, and turns them into close ups. The movie is a good example of a new wave film because of its realistic scenes/settings, realistic themes, and random dialogue. The random dialogue throughout the film is illustrated. For example, the couple is in Patricia's bedroom talking about Mexico, Sweden, and William Faulkner.

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  6. In Breathless they did begin to use this new technique of jump cuts which hasn't been done before. Considering the time period in France they had to operate on a really low budget for which this film turned out to be pretty good. This new wave also like the Italian neorealism shows realistic scenes for example on the street.

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