Jean-Luc Godard Dead at 91

[Idris2002]

Just seen this, more as it develops: French new wave director Godard has gone to the big editing room in the sky.

Like Claude Levi-Strauss, he outlived his time. And his films became a byword for difficult, or if you prefer, pretentious arthousism.

But I still think that when he was good, he was very good. Who else would even have thought of something like Alphaville?

 

[Pickman's model]

on the bright side, he never met liz truss

 

[belboid]

A genius, a bore, a revolutionary and a shit.

Quite the guy, RIP

 

[friedaweed]

91's a good bat. I'd take that.

 

[Dillinger4]

RIP

 

[SysOut]

His films were fun pure fun, and "Weekend" is the one I love most.
A view of western "Leftism" (radicalism) in "La Chinoise" here.
The european directors such as Godard and Antonioni have always been the subject of attacks from the right, using terms such as "arty" or "pretentious" and it still continues. Antonioni's "Zabriskie Point" was "killed" (in the distribution) because it was deemed anti-american. Never saw a good copy til years later.
WTF - we're all "american" now

 

[danny la rouge]

I think people who don’t like his films should be arrested. Hospital appointments should be stopped in France as well as funerals, and children should be banned from playing games for 17 days. Out of respect.

 

[RainbowTown]

Weekend and Contempt were great films, but for me Breathless remains my favourite. Belmondo and Seberg and 60's Paris captured in all it's black and white glory. RIP.

 

[Idris2002]

I think people who don’t like his films should be arrested. Hospital appointments should be stopped in France as well as funerals, and children should be banned from playing games for 17 days. Out of respect.

bof

 

[danny la rouge]

bof

Now is not the time. Show some respect.

 

[platinumsage]

I think people who don’t like his films should be arrested. Hospital appointments should be stopped in France as well as funerals, and children should be banned from playing games for 17 days. Out of respect.

That’s obviously way over the top considering he famously hated corgis.

 

[Reno]

I think people who don’t like his films should be arrested. Hospital appointments should be stopped in France as well as funerals, and children should be banned from playing games for 17 days. Out of respect.

I’d go easy on those who find his work after Weekend (1967) difficult to like. By the 80s his films got more accessible again though I can’t say a single one of them made the impression on me the best of his 60s movies did.

 

[danny la rouge]

I’d go easy on those who find his work after Weekend (1967) difficult to like. By the 80s his films got more accessible again though I can’t say a single one of them made the impression on me the best of his 60s movies did.

Now is not the time.

 

[danny la rouge]

That’s obviously way over the top considering he famously hated corgis.

The corgis are all dead.

 

[Chz]

I think people who don’t like his films should be arrested. Hospital appointments should be stopped in France as well as funerals, and children should be banned from playing games for 17 days. Out of respect.

More of a Truffaut man myself, and if he didn't rate a period of national mourning then no-one does.

 

[danny la rouge]

More of a Truffaut man myself, and if he didn't rate a period of national mourning then no-one does.

So am I. In fact I’m even more of a Louis Malle man.

However, we really need to stop having our own opinions about dead nonagenarians, and just do as we’re told.

 

[ska invita]

"I’ve never gotten anything out of his movies. They have felt constructed, faux intellectual and completely dead. Cinematographically uninteresting and infinitely boring. Godard is a fucking bore. He’s made his films for the critics"

who said that?

Spoiler

ingmar Bergman

Some other opinions of his:
Alfred Hitchcock, whom Bergman considered to be “a very good technician.” He was also full of praise for a select few of his contemporaries. Bergman enjoyed the films of Federico Fellini and his “scorching creativity” as well as François Truffaut’s “way of relating with an audience.” Above everyone else, he ranked Andrei Tarkovsky and declared him as “the greatest of them all”.

only seen Breathless and Alphaville and i have to say that they didnt really do much for me. For all the potentially interesting and rule breaking things going on the main effect was boredom. Alphaville I didnt finish. Not as jazzy and freewheeling as i was expecting it to be. I guess time is a factor - im certain they would've felt much more revolutionary at the moment -and for those around at the time the legacy is undoubtable. I think its kind of like Punk that it made people feel they could have a go and all the rules were there to be broken?

(ive not see any Truffaut films...only Louis Malle film i saw was Dinner with Andre which I loved at the time)

 

[danny la rouge]

"I’ve never gotten anything out of his movies. They have felt constructed, faux intellectual and completely dead. Cinematographically uninteresting and infinitely boring. Godard is a fucking bore. He’s made his films for the critics"

who said that?

Spoiler

ingmar Bergman

Some other opinions of his:
Alfred Hitchcock, whom Bergman considered to be “a very good technician.” He was also full of praise for a select few of his contemporaries. Bergman enjoyed the films of Federico Fellini and his “scorching creativity” as well as François Truffaut’s “way of relating with an audience.” Above everyone else, he ranked Andrei Tarkovsky and declared him as “the greatest of them all”.

only seen Breathless and Alphaville and i have to say that they didnt really do much for me. For all the potentially interesting and rule breaking things going on the main effect was boredom. Alphaville I didnt finish. Not as jazzy and freewheeling as i was expecting it to be. I guess time is a factor - im certain they would've felt much more revolutionary at the moment -and for those around at the time the legacy is undoubtable. I think its kind of like Punk that it made people feel they could have a go and all the rules were there to be broken

(ive not see any Truffaut films)

I still like A Bout de Souffle, but you’re right in saying that not seeing it in 1960 in the context of the conventions that were being broken makes a difference. We’ve all seen jump cuts a million times now. So it’s not the same as being there then.

 

[tim]

on the bright side, he never met liz truss

There's almost certainly photographic evidence on that Liz Truss thread that he did.

He was so 1960s, I just assumed that he was already long gone.

 

[dessiato]

Loved his films, especially Bande a Parte and A Bout de Souffle. RIP

 

[SysOut]

"I’ve never gotten anything out of his movies. They have felt constructed, faux intellectual and completely dead. Cinematographically uninteresting and infinitely boring. Godard is a fucking bore. He’s made his films for the critics"

who said that?
ingmar Bergman

That describes his films and reputation.

Above everyone else, he ranked Andrei Tarkovsky and declared him as “the greatest of them all”

I wonder how many directors, or any other artist, would call another "the greatest of them all". This is league table rubbish.

 

[ska invita]

That describes his films and reputation.


I wonder how many directors, or any other artist, would call another "the greatest of them all". This is league table rubbish.

he's pretty fucking great tbh. heres the full quote

"My discovery of Tarkovsky's first film was like a miracle. Suddenly, I found myself standing at the door of a room the keys of which had, until then, never been given to me. It was a room I had always wanted to enter and where he was moving freely and fully at ease.

I felt encouraged and stimulated: someone was expressing what I had always wanted to say without knowing how. Tarkovsky is for me the greatest, the one who invented a new language, true to the nature of film, as it captures life as a reflection, life as a dream."

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Alfred Hitchcock, whom Bergman considered to be “a very good technician.” He was also full of praise for a select few of his contemporaries. Bergman enjoyed the films of Federico Fellini and his “scorching creativity” as well as François Truffaut’s “way of relating with an audience.” Above everyone else, he ranked Andrei Tarkovsky and declared him as “the greatest of them all”.

That's quite a scattergun of opinions. I'm not surprised he was lukewarm towards Hitchcock, nor that he liked Truffaut and loved Tarkovsky, but I'm a little surprised that he liked Fellini. I've never got on with Fellini's self-conscious artifice. Not very Bergmanesque imo. I know Persona has a lot of artifice to it, but it's in the service of making a serious point.

 

[SysOut]

he's pretty fucking great tbh

Not questioning that at all.
Just the use of the superlative.

 

[Sue]

So am I. In fact I’m even more of a Louis Malle man.

Though Le Feu Follet isn't one to watch if you're feeling down.

However, we really need to stop having our own opinions about dead nonagenarians, and just do as we’re told.

Sorry.

 

[ska invita]

I wonder how many directors, or any other artist, would call another "the greatest of them all". This is league table rubbish.

“Your vision of life has moved me deeply, much more deeply than I have ever been moved by any films. I believe you are the greatest film-maker at work today,” Kubrick to Bergman in a letter

 

[SysOut]

JLG would like this thread: one about anyone but himself.
I don't think he took himself as seriously as some do.
For me each film was as if it was his first film

Thus there's the thing about artists and their works.
Are they separate. One literature critic - before he went to pieces - thought so.
He went to pieces when he stopped thinking so.
Or it was a symptom of him going to pieces.

Then there's the question of whether artists make good critics.
Indeed, that whether being an artist disqualifies, rather than qualifies, one to be a (good) critic.

ETA
Are there people who have made (some) great works, or are there great artists whose works therefore are great.
False dichotomy, maybe, but worth thinking about.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

It's perhaps a thing people do when others heap praise on them. Orson Welles dismissed the idea that he was a genius by saying that Picasso was a genius, not him.

 

[Sue]

It's perhaps a thing people do when others heap praise on them. Orson Welles dismissed the idea that he was a genius by saying that Picasso was a genius, not him.

That's always my tactic tbf.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Humble bragging.

iirc Welles said there were only two geniuses - Picasso and someone else I forget. Yeah, maybe I'm third on the list, but I'm only third...