1.
Sauve qui peut (la vie) / Slow Motion / Every Man For Himself (1980, Jean-Luc Godard) Rewatch
Can a film succeed even if its purpose for existing, its core gimmick or experiment is at best hit and miss? I struggled with the slow-motion technique when I saw Slow Motion for the first time, and I am still ambivalent to the point that had this not literally been JLG's comeback film, shooting him back into the limelight and on the receiving end of praise from around the world I'd have felt almost like a professional apologist to recommend this film. It is a film that while I was captivated from start to finish, as per usual, I almost feel confused as to why it was a success.
The film is a bit of a hot mess, mixing crass, almost juvenile humor, complete with an ass fixation and incestuous fetishes as a semi-running motif - and a hardly inspiring film director(?) lead named after Godard's father, Paul, which may be a stand-in for either or both - though whether Jean-Luc fears he is turning into his father or not is hardly a key concern for the film.
While the first storyline is messy and choppy, this is, for the first real-time since '72, the first proper narrative film Godard had done, everything else leaning too far into essay or video art territory. Here we have characters, yes, characters, with hopes, dreams, and narrative progress - and what's more we have stars.
Yes, Godard managed to nab Jacques Dutronc, Nathalie Baye and Isabelle Huppert, the two former as a definitely off-again couple, and the latter as an entrepreneurial prostitute. To be frank, of the two stories (both given about 40 minutes, with a few overlaps and a shared conclusion) it is Huppert's that is the most gripping, while the former tries a little too hard to be funny, complete with a non-existent Marguerite Duras cameo, though "she is definitely there".
A part of me wonders what Godard was thinking mounting this, especially the combination of the bizarre humour, the occasional surreal imagery, and two, to me, very different stories. Is there a shared idea or riff, like in his later 80s films, or is it window dressing for a technique he had to test - and even he admitted he was not quite happy with and was not always successful in capturing what he wanted or was looking for.
At the same time, no one has done slow motion quite in this way, and reading about his intent from time to time over the years - the idea of time being slowed down revealing and obscuring at the same time, leaving more room for interpretation and letting us see something more - well, it does often work. The most famous scene of Paul jumping across the table at his ex in a scene where we are not sure if he is attacking her or romancing her is of particular interest, but also the scene towards the very end where he pulls his other ex towards him and it seems like an elegant dance. There is a power to it, even if it is often more jarring.
As someone who loves Godard's stretch of 80s films, I can also very much see what he meant when he called this his 2nd first film. It is not just a "comeback", it is a very new relationship with form - one that was born out of the experimental cinema he was producing in the late 60s and 70s, but reshaped into something else, with a stark sense of space and movement within the frame. His shots and compositions are often remarkable, not just in themselves, but in their contrasts to essentially everything else that was out there, and it was this form he would test drive and frankly, do far more with as the decade progressed. In this way, it shares quite a lot with Breathless, in showing his intentions to do something radically different, and cinema was once again richer for it. 8/10
2.
L'esclave blanche / Pasha's Wives (1939, Georg Wilhelm Pabst, Marc Sorkin)
Another post-silent era Pabst that often impresses with craft, or at least is perfectly competent in craft, but is rather lacking in the script department. 6/10.
3.
Le garçu (1997, Maurice Pialat)
Pialat's last film before retiring is rarely thought of as his best, and edited a way he himself was displeased with and wanted to "fix", but while it may at times drag just a little, the core is strong. It has his traditionally dark "realism" the way only he does it, but here, amidst relationship trouble and the every day, is something a little more human, parental love - or what there is of it. Gerard Depardieu is absolutely phenomernal as the largely absent father and womanizer who shows up with the medium-grand gestures, if only occasionally, and there's some wonderfully raw and complicated emotions here, making it perhaps Pialat's most "lighthearted". If you were unsure of whether or not to complete Pialat's feature filmography I'd strongly recommend it, and the 4k restoration is simply stunning.
4.
Le bon et les méchants / The Good and the Bad (1976, Claude Lelouch)
Watching The Good and the Bad I was struck by how odd it is that Lelouch has been largely erased from the conversation and does not get the credit he is due in terms of being a relatively daring and creative voice within mainstream French cinema in the 60s and 70s - this largely due to the contrast with the French New Wave directors I'm sure. The way he carries long-takes and just trust the audience as he lets a scene rest is frankly remarkable.
The Good and the Bad is a sepia/golden-toned black-and-white crime comedy, that spans from the golden, jovial 30s through the occupation, and manages to balance form and content from beginning to end. Along with the rather interesting (though overt) set-up as the Nazis running the occupation as a criminal gang, the morally dark grey but "charming" leads, toying with profiting off of, and even working with the nazis, with their own conscience, lights up a rich, fun romp that goes some dark and ambiguous places. 7/10
5.
Viens je t'emmène / Nobody's Hero (2022, Alain Guiraudie)
Dirty, funny, quirky and tragic in its inaction, Guiraudie is back in full steam with this comedy that manages to spin together sex (of course), prostitution (makes sense) and terrorism, racism, rising crime and French culture as a whole (...). Ok then. It feels like a film where he is biting off more than ever before, but plays without ambition, or rather in such an ussaming way, that the grander points he may make or, situations he might make you contemplate, occur as if natural and never under the suspicion of "prevention". 8/10
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