GatorDeb

I wasn't really into the kind of movies he made but as a Criterion enthusiast I'm very familiar with the name.

dex14

French outlet La Liberation says it was assisted suicide in Switzerland: "He wasn't sick, he was just exhausted. It was his decision and it was important for him that it be known. This is. practice authorized and supervised in Switzerland.

Hokeyboy

One of the all-time greats. I'm not the biggest fan of the French New Wave but for Alphaville alone, dayenu. He had some real shitty personal views but then again who doesn't?

Coral

Legend... (in filmmaking - don't know his personal views)... although he did have a few stinkers later in his career.

eXcentris

Not a big fan either but he was a monument of French cinema. RIP.

orangerunner

I'm not the biggest fan of the 1960s French New Wave but "Breathless" was a very influential film with its handheld black and white photography and random improvised dialogue with fragmented editing. It certainly influenced many filmmakers and fashion-related advertising campaigns.

The Antipodean

Bit sad to see so little appreciation for one of the most influential directors of all time here. Breathless is astounding.

weirdly I was rewatching other big influential French New Wave film The 400 Blows by his peer Truffaut when I read the news last night. Godard outlived him by almost 40 years!

Hazel Motes

Even some of his 60s films I didn’t like. But Godard’s great films are absolutely untouchable.

Godard, Belmondo and Karina are all gone now. Sad stuff. Especially the way Godard died.

sleepyhead55

I liked Band of Outsiders the most out of the 60s films. It looks like Delon and Deneuve are the only ones still alive from those who starred in French cinema in the 60s. Yeah, they weren't really know for French New Wave but they were stars in that time period.

Hazel Motes

Brigitte Bardot as well.

TGM

I know this is going to be controversial, but I think he was the best Captain of the Enterprise ever.

Lipid

RIP to a fucking LEGEND of cinema. Completely changed the direction and ushered in so many newer fast paced and creative movies. The man deserves a statue.

His 60s run is legendary and some of the funnest and freest cinema. "A Woman is a woman" is such a great movie. He's more than just "Breathless."

His didactic political films are such trash. I remember I made a thread here and no one seemed to enjoy them. I enjoyed some of his 80s work and his later 2000s works. "Notre Musique" probably being the last one I really enjoyed.


Last of a group of people who transformed cinema for the better and created many masterpieces. From memory, isn't he the last of the european greats ?

GoldenJCJ

Personally speaking, all of MY views are 100% correct. It’s everyone else who’s the asshole!

Decker

Ash Ketchum

And she actually starred in a Godard film, CONTEMPT (1963), with Jack Palance of all people!

Hazel Motes

Don’t forget Fritz Lang!

eXcentris

I have a love/hate relationship with the French New wave because it controlled every aspect of French cinema for decades and if you weren't part of the gang, you didn't make films. It did produce lot's of great films, but was almost 100% exclusionary of others. It's no wonder the current crop of French fimmakers are far more critical of that period.

Norm de Plume

I am not at all not partial to his determinedly inscrutable narrative methodology (many of his films are unwatchably obtuse), but I approve of his barbed objurgations of the crass commercialism of Hollywood.

Kurt D

wut

Nick Danger

I watched Alphaville and Breathless. I watched Breathless again a decade later with Mrs Danger. I never bothered with another of his movies.

In the mid-20th century there was a movement that believed True Art is incomprehensible to anyone but the elite. I wonder if Godard got a boost from that.

rexinnih

Well, RIP. Some good ones and some bad ones.

inri222

An icon and a legend. For me Contempt is his masterpiece.
Vivre Sa Vie, Weekend, Band of Outsiders, Alphaville, Pierrot Le Fou, and Breathless are all great.