An electrifying, nonchalant and uninhibited legendary debut by Jean-Luc Godard.
The film that truly launched contemporary cinema. Small-time gangster Michel (Jean-Paul Belmondo) arrives in Paris from Marseille in a stolen car. There he meets young American Patricia (Jean Seberg), who is taking her first steps as a journalist. The pair flirts and engages in a romantic game – will Michel's criminal affairs affect their relationship?
Breaking with conventions and proposing its own dynamic aesthetic, Breathless paved the way for all subsequent "new waves" and combined a love of American culture with Parisian cinephilia and the spirit of youth. It is hard to overstate the film's influence on generations of filmmakers: from New Hollywood to countless independent directors and filmmakers for whom Godard's audacious work remains an unfailing source of inspiration. Shot by a small crew on the streets of Paris, Breathless also launched an iconic duo: the boisterous Belmondo and the modern, aloof Seberg. When we think of France as the capital of cinema, we see the very frames from Godard's debut. Fascinated by Breathless, Richard Linklater directed Nouvelle Vague, now entering Polish cinemas – a stylized account of the turn of the 50s and 60s and how one of cinema's most famous films came to be.
The thrilling genre play in Breathless is on one hand a revolt against the stale cinema of the 50s that the New Wave directors wanted to settle accounts with, and on the other – a result of countless screenings of B-movies from Hollywood that they enthusiastically watched in Parisian cinemas. It is also a boastful declaration by a creator who seems to say: "My name is Godard and before your eyes I am changing what everyone loves most: CINEMA". Over 60 years after its premiere, Breathless remains a violent, thrilling and still compelling classic.
Restored 4K version distributed by Past Perfect
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