| Breathless | |
|---|---|
Original release poster |
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| Directed by | Jean-Luc Godard |
| Produced by | Georges de Beauregard |
| Written by | Jean-Luc Godard François Truffaut |
| Starring | Jean-Paul Belmondo Jean Seberg |
| Music by | Martial Solal |
| Cinematography | Raoul Coutard |
| Editing by | Cécile Decugis Lila Herman |
| Distributed by | Films Around the World, Inc. (France) UGC (US) |
| Release date(s) | March 17, 1960 (France) February 7, 1961 (US) |
| Running time | 87 minutes |
| Country | France |
| Language | French English |
| Budget | FRF400,000 |
| Box office | $67,464 |
Breathless (French: À bout de souffle; literally "at breath's end") is a 1960 French film directed by Jean-Luc Godard, and Godard's first feature film. One of the first and most influential films of French New Wave[1]. At the time, the film attracted much attention for its bold visual style and the innovative editing use of jump cuts.
Breathless, together with François Truffaut's The 400 Blows and Alain Resnais's Hiroshima, Mon Amour, both released a year earlier, brought international acclaim to the French nouvelle vague.
A fully restored version of the film was released in the U.S. for the 50th anniversary of the film in May 2010. When originally released in France, the film had 2,082,760 cinema goers.
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Michel (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is a young petty criminal 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 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 prolonged death run, he dies “à bout de souffle” (at breath's end).
Michel'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:
MICHEL: C'est vraiment dégueulasse.
PATRICIA: Qu'est ce qu'il a dit?
VITAL: Il a dit que vous êtes vraiment "une dégueulasse".
PATRICIA: Qu'est ce que c'est "dégueulasse"?[2]
In his book, Andrew translates the dialogue thus:
MICHEL: That's really disgusting.
PATRICIA: What did he say?
VITAL: He said, "You are really a bitch."
PATRICIA: What is "dégueulasse" [bitch]?
Dégueulasse is the noun and adjective form of dégueuler, a slang verb meaning "to vomit."
Andrew's translation obscures the subtlety of Vital's misquotation of Michel; in the original French, it is not clear whether Vital misquotes him deliberately, or simply mishears. Other translations have made the possibility that Vital mishears Michel more apparent. In the English captioning of the 2001 Fox-Lorber Region One DVD, "dégueulasse" is translated as "scumbag", producing the following dialogue:
MICHEL: It's a real scumbag.
PATRICIA: What did he say?
VITAL: He said, "You're a real scumbag".
PATRICIA: What's a scumbag?
The 2007 Criterion Collection Region One DVD uses a less literal translation that renders the French into a familiar American colloquialism:
MICHEL: Makes me want to puke.
PATRICIA: What did he say?
VITAL: He said you make him want to puke.
PATRICIA: What's that mean, "puke"?
This translation also was used for the 2010 restoration print.
Jean-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.[3]
Godard envisaged Breathless as a reportage (documentary), and tasked cinematographer Raoul Coutard to shoot the entire film on a handheld camera, with next to no lighting.[4] The production was filmed on location in Paris during the months of August and September in 1959,[4] using an Eclair Cameflex. Almost the whole film had to be dubbed in postproduction because of the noisiness of the Cameflex camera.[5]
Coutard has also stated that the film was virtually improvised on the spot, with Godard writing lines of dialogue in an exercise book, giving the lines to Belmondo and Seberg, having a few brief rehearsals on scenes involved, then filming them. No permission was received to shoot the film in its various locations (mainly the side streets and boulevards of Paris) either, adding to the spontaneous feel that Godard was aiming for.[6]
According to the New York Times, Breathless is both “a pop artifact and a daring work of art” and even at 50, “still cool, still new, still — after all this time! — a bulletin from the future of movies”.[8]
The film currently holds a 96% 'Fresh' rating on Rotten Tomatoes.[9]
Breathless ranked as the #15 best film of all time in the British Film Institute's 2002 Sight and Sound Critics' Poll.[10]
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