This book is a must-have for any fan or person interested in the work of Jean-Luc Godard. It is a comprehensive critical biography detailing the working methods and conditions surrounding each film in Mr. Godard's ouvre. It is a massive and lengthy tome filled with erudition.
I break my rating down as follows:
Skipping the childhood and parental history: 5 Stars (because his childhood and parental history does not interest me... and was already covered in MacCabe's book.)
Late 40's/Early 50's background on French critical theory: 5 Stars (for the Astruc/Bazinian/etc. cinema theory... mixed with Satrean/etc. existentialism... along with a dash of vermouth named Brecht)
The financing/producing of the films and a history of various working methods: 5 Stars (great for any cinephile)
The Karina/Godard relationship: 5 Stars (not enough can ever be said about one of the true goddesses of cinema!)
May 1968: 5 Stars (some exciting stuff that I lived through at the time)
Comprehensively talking about every short, middle and feature-length film or video that has even been publicly seen in a movie theater, on television, or at various screenings: 5 Stars (`nuff said...)
Critical Taste in the analysis of films: 2 Stars
I find this to be Mr. Brody's only failing but his taste is somewhat different than mine in the appreciation of the relative merits of Mr. Godard's individual films. To wit:
Brody speaks much more highly of King Lear than Band of Outsiders. He rates Prenom: Carmen much more highly than the film that immediately preceded it (Passion). He is not much of a fan of Two or Three Things yet raves about A Married Woman. He doesn't have much use for Les Carabiniers. Or British Sounds.
(Huh?)
King Lear over Band of Outsiders? Band of Outsiders was poetic AND fun at the same time. Looks easy but hardly anyone can do it.
Les Carabiniers is a dadaist masterpiece and includes one of the high points of cinema... (and I paraphrase the dialogue...) ... "You mean we get to steal, rape and kill and get away with it?" "Yes." "SIGN US UP!"
(Isn't this as good, if not better, than Bergman's God-is-a-spider-crawling-on-the-wall??) (!!)
I liked Prenom: Carmen very, very much. But I liked Passion very, very, very, very, very, very, very much. I guess I preferred the ecstatic/epiphanal shots of art tableux in Passion to the repeated shots (in Carmen) of Ms. Detmers' pubis.
Mr. Brody can't see the forest for the trees on this one! As Chuck Heston once said when confronted with wooly beasts, "Get away from me you d--n dirty ape!"
(Apologies to Ms. Detmers who more than proved her acting chops/oral skills in Marco Bellocchio's DEVIL IN THE FLESH. A fine lass, she...!) (And I did very much enjoy Carmen as well as her performance... but Passion is a superior work of art.)
The best cup of coffee in the history of the world was Godard's Two or Three Things... and even Hamlet never faced the poetic quandary Godard did when he wondered "Should I speak of Juliette... or the trees?" as an Edenic shot of creation is framed within the 1.66:1 ratio. Or was it 2.35?
And if you've ever worked on a factory line... you'll admire the perfectly chosen perfection of the ear-drone-hammer-industrial-noise soundtrack in British Sounds.
Perhaps Mr. Brody never was an industrial wage-slave or he would have more admiration for the truth in much of what Godard/Gorin expressed in their Vertov films. Sometimes the truth ain't pretty. And sometimes the truth may hurt your ears.
IN SUMMARY, though you may disagree with Mr. Brody on his critical analysis of individual films... (taste in their relative merits may simply be akin to taste in ties)... the reading of his critical biography was sometimes fascinating, and almost always interesting. Well worth each capitalist penny spent!
