Jake Delpine April 11, 2015 FST 200 Dr. Olenina Breathless Draft Outline Thesis: Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless holds aggressive attacks on filmmaking norms like breaking the 180 degree rule, and the use of ellipses that convey pure artistic liberation. The breaking of these norms coupled with the film’s cinematography, improvised performances, and the unorthodox style during the production’s sequence where Michel drives through the country provide a great sense of spontaneity and authenticity. Breathless is widely regarded as a film that doesn’t feel like a film. 1. Raoul Coutard, the film’s cinematographer, claims that the film was virtually improvised with the only written dialogue being from Godard’s personal notebook that no one else had …show more content…
Raoul Coutard was tasked to shoot the film as a documentary, on a handheld camera, with little to no lighting. The effect the decision to shoot under Godard’s documentary conditions produces on the visuals is that the film never really feels like a film, despite reminding you from end to end. Instead Breathless feels like an interesting home movie, (if such thing is even possible,) with shakes, basic framing, and other imperfections throughout. The images on screen simply feel real. • The first shot as Michel drives the getaway car through the France countryside is a twenty second POV shot. There are no establishing shots of the car driving through the country, there is no narrator to explain what is unfolding, only a POV from Michel’s perspective. In employing such a long and simple shot, the viewers feel the nonchalance of the drive as well as the improvised nature of the film. • Michel looks over his shoulder as he drives and announces “If he thinks he’s going to pass me in his bloody Renault!” The over the shoulder shot as Michel peers out of the window is like that of the view of a passenger in the car. Adding to this passenger perspective, the handheld aspect of the filming is now made apparent through various bumps and shakes. The motion and framing all play a part into making this film feel
In 1954 François Truffaut, in ‘Cahiers du Cinéma’, elaborated on this idea further with his essay ‘Les Politique des Auteurs’. He argued that ownership in a film, or the creative voice that drives a movie, is always inextricably linked to the director. As such, when looking at any director’s body of work there will be recurring themes, stylistic trends, and preoccupations that define these movies as belonging solely to the director. Accordingly, there are never “good or bad movies, only good and bad directors”. Greatness in a movie is a measure of originality and vision. Village Voice’s Andrew Sarris, in his Notes on Auteur Theory (1962), refined this concept by applying a visual aid of three concentric circles to help identify an auteur - the outer circle being technique, the middle circle, personal style, and the inner circle, interior
The motion picture I selected to analyze is Relatos Salvajes (Wild Tales) an Argentinian movie, directed and edited by Damián Szifrón and Pablo Barbieri. Wild Tales is dark, comedy with a series of realistic events that turn unpredictable. This film displays six different segments and six different story lines with a variety of actors. I believe that the best edited segment is the “Road to Hell” segment. The “Road to Hell” story line is about two male drivers, where their road rage becomes deadly. This analysis will go over how Szifron and Barbieri used certain shot angles, sound, and music to intensify and bring the story together. In the “Road to Hell” segment the director does not include the character’s name, for analysis purposes I will refer to the first character as Carlos and the second character as Pete.
the relation of what is filmed and what truly is real. In an inspection of The Thin
Robert Bresson’s A Man Escaped follows the confinement and eventual escape of political activist, Lieutenant Fontaine. The movie’s theme is blatantly clear: freedom at all costs. Fontaine must not only save himself from imminent death, but from the fear of parched sanity. Bresson, an “auteur” by the standards of colleagues and the Cahiers Du Cinema group, creates suspense melded with hope through the scarcity of music and sound, the restricted establishment of setting, the daunting acting of Francois Leterrier, the exposition of time, and the heavy reliance of a narrator.
There is a brilliant use of diagonal dimensions in this scene in the railing behind the hearse, again sending a message of disorganization and anxiety. There is also the use of movement here as a gentle breeze ruffles the hair of the character, almost as a caress, and it is a stark contrast to the underlying sense of danger. The brightly colored almost cartoon-like use of the graffiti hearse and the colorful signs as dominate contrasts suggest that there is bit of hope for the characters in this film. At second 5 the scene changes to a center framed shot with the main character shot at a quarter turn. The subsidiary focus is the characters in the background who also are at a quarter turn. The shot is with a hazy lens to depict their secondary significance to the main character. The lighting used here is both high and low key with the emphasis in high key lighting on the center foreground character to draw the viewer’s eye to him. He also appears taller than the subsidiary characters to reinforce his status as the
In another budgetary adaptation, the film crew, lacking the funds for cranes and dollies to do moving and panning shots, quickly switched between multiple shots for dynamic dialog, giving a certain frenzied feel to the dialog interactions (Hervey 38). The style this lends to th...
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
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.
The way that a movie is pieced together by the director/producers has a huge impact on the viewer’s experience. Stylistic elements are used to help engage the viewer; however, without these techniques the viewer will most likely loose interest. In this essay I will be taking a look at a scene within the movie Casablanca directed by Michael Curtiz in 1942. Casablanca is a classic film that is reviewed to be one of the greatest movies of all time. This could be due to the notable quotes used throughout the movie, or its ability to follow a historic, comical, and romantic storyline throughout the course of the film. It caters to several different viewers, making this movie favorable to many. This scene in Casablanca uses specific editing techniques
Gallagher, T. 2002. Senses of Cinema – Max Ophuls: A New Art – But Who Notices?. [online] Available at: http://sensesofcinema.com/2002/feature-articles/ophuls/ [Accessed: 8 Apr 2014].
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.
Jean Luc Godard’s Breathless is often regarded as one of the earliest films exhibiting the French New Wave style of cinema due to its influence on the movement and innovation by the producers. One of the most noticeable edits that Godard does in Breathless is the jump-cuts made frequently during conversations, and other times when one would expect continuity, in order to break up the flow of story to the audience and force them to actively participate in understanding the progression of events. This is quite contrary to the typical Hollywood style of film editing as transitions between shots are usually smoothed over as much as possible so that the audience focuses solely on the plot events transpiring on the screen rather than the editing work. Godard breaks free from the mould countless times throughout the film in order to force the audience to pay attention to the editing as well as the progression of the plot in order to achieve a lack of continuity within and between scenes.
Breathless is in many ways the antithesis of the classical Hollywood cinema; the changes have a direct effect on the relationship the film has with the viewer. Classical Hollywood cinema includes standards such as continuity editing, highly motivated, character-driven stories and a coherent narrative structure. Breathless defies these elements of traditional filmmaking, instead defining what we know as French New Wave.
“Marie Antoinette” (2006) directed by Sofia Coppola is a drama/comedy, that is centered on the life of the notorious Queen of France, in the years leading up to the French Revolution. Coppola’s film style was very modern avant garde. The film focuses on Antoinette point of view throughout all her adventures and difficulties. She was the character with whom the viewer identified with the most, her observation were the most important (aside from the audience). Therefore there were many close ups and high lighting on her. The film also invokes the lesson that luxuries is not everything that it will not make you completely happy, which makes the audience feel somewhat sympathetic towards the queen. Coppola successfully achieves to use beautiful and extravagant cinematography to tell the story of the late Marie Antoinette. The mise-en-scene of the film that will be discussed is setting, costume, lighting and figure behavior.
Godard creates a unique editing style in Contempt and Breathless through the combination of long takes and jump cuts. Godard’s use of these two editing techniques expresses two separate ideas in regards to an individual’s place in society. In Contempt, Godard’s use of editing illustrates how an individual can exist separate from society. While in Breathless, editing conveys the idea of how society can isolate an individual. The use of jump cuts within Breathless and Contempt was an unconventional technique during the French New Wave and still is today because it violates one of the rules of Classic Hollywood Style.