European Cinema                                    

Minutes from class meeting– June 3. 2002.

Note: Class began with announcement that the topic for class was the French version of New Wave.

A short introduction to the web site IMBD was presented.  Type in a movie title in the IMDB web page and go to “external reviews” where you will find a list of reviews.

Dr. Reimer returned our first Freewrite papers.  A paper that had a good analysis, but had grammatical errors had points marked off.  A paper with good grammar, cut didn’t give a deep enough analysis also had points marked off.

The next topic for the second Freewrite is any Ingmar Bergman film, which is due on Thursday, June 6­ (D-Day).  There are several Bergman Films in the library.  Dr. Reimer will bring some of his own Bergman films to class tomorrow.

Bergman’s film style has come to be known as Bergmanesque for their heavy psychological subject matter that probes at issues that people don’t usually like to talk about.

Film clips and analysis:

The French New Wave began with a group of directors in 1959.  The French film industry had been competitive with the Hollywood film industry.  The difference is that French films are rooted in French culture and geography, but still retaining a level of competitiveness with Hollywood.  They knew that in order to compete with Hollywood they had to produce a higher quality product that appealed to a wider audience.

The French New Wave felt the need to shake up the French film industry, but recognized the film noir and femme fatale high style of Hollywood, which is alluded to in the French New Wave films.

The French film industry had a rough start due to the interruptions of WWII and its occupation by Germany.  After the war, the French had a difficult time reestablishing itself as a competitor with Hollywood.  By 1959, a group of young directors patience had reached its limit.  These young directors wanted to go back to the author-type films of the late 1920s and the 1930s.  They wanted to deal with contemporary French society showing through the eyes of the younger generation in their early-to-mid twenties. 

Film #1

Breathless directed by Jean-Luc Godard. Debuted in 1959.

This film was not well received by the critics, at first, but soon critics were writing words of praise of the new movement.  The hand-held camera was used as well as natural lighting.  There’s a jumpiness to the film that is not related to the hand-held camera, but is the result of the editing style. 

The characters are unlikable.  In the first couple of scenes a young guy kills a cop and is on the run for the remainder of the film.  The lead woman is not likable either because of her affection for the fugitive cop killer. 

Godard’s editing cuts whole sections from the film, which results in great leaps forward leaving the audience with the feeling that something was missed.  This editing style is supposed to show the seams in the film.

The protagonist, Belmondo, tries to act like Humphrey Bogart.  At the beginning of the film, he speaks as though he’s talking into a reporter’s camera.  In the later clip that was shown, he does the same, adding more distance to the film. 

The critics did not like the low budget quality of the film. 

The heroes of the New Wave did not have to be heroic.  This had an influence on Hollywood directors of the late 1960s.  One film of note is Peter Fonda’s Easy Rider. 

By the late 1960s, Godard’s style became more and more distant from his audiences because of his extreme political messages.  In the 1970s he lightened up on his political messages and began to experience a renewed popularity.

Film #2

Hiroshima Mon Amour, directed by Alain Resnais.  Debuted in 1959.

This film is done in a style of remembering the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. 

The two main characters have no name. They’re referred to as he and she. 

The film show the duel horror of a man who loses his whole family when the A-bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and a woman who lost her lover to an angry mob that killed him because he was German.  The man’s loss represents a universal suffering and the woman’s loss an individual suffering. 

The camera is always moving into a scene giving the effect of looking deeper into the character’s memories. 

The idea of another A-bomb attack on another city is given as an expected outcome of the Hiroshima attack.  

Film #3

L’année Dernière dans Marienbad (Last Year in Marienbad) directed by Alain Resnais.

This film is a narrative type dialogue of remembrance or a trying to remember. 

The camera goes forward to represent a look into a memory. 

The narration is repetitious.

The style of the hotel is Baroque, the ornamentation is continuous.  Theme, narration, and visuals thus reinforce each other.

The main feature of the new wave directors is to experiment.

Film #4

La Jette directed by Chris Marker

This film experiments with still photography with different motion picture camera techniques, and Mise en Scène.  The camera moves in and out, and pans and tilts, and cuts to various still photographs.  The film was the source of the recent Hollywood film Twelve Monkeys.

Dr. Reimer announced that tomorrow we will explore the German New Wave.