Masculin, Féminin
Director Jean-Luc Goddard’s film Masculin, Féminin being viewed in the year 2008 retains a rather modern feel in the narrative (sans the luxuries of today’s texting, IMing, and tweeting as the necessary tools for keeping relationships flourishing) for being made in 1963. I have this feeling when viewing Goddard’s other films as well.
The French New Wave is the late 1950’s film movement that saw numerous French film critics move from the passive role of writing about film to the active role of directing films. These new directors had a vision: their own! Goddard was a major figure along with Francois Truffaut and Eric Rohmer in the New Wave or Novelle Vague. In fact, Truffaut and Goddard would collaborate on several films and they would share actors as well. Masculin, Féminin’s Jean –Pierre Leaud (Paul) starred in Truffaut’s 400 Blows. Truffaut and Goddard wrote the film Breathless (1960) together. The vision of each director was unique, but they shared a common belief that film was the best medium to tell stories combining feeling with method.
Director Chabrol’s films include the study of violence in the middle class. Rohmer focused on ironic moral narratives within the sensibilities of intellectuals. I see his influence in contemporary Woody Allen films. Director Truffaut’s film concentrated on love stories that are usually dark in nature. Goddard was experimental with method pioneering the jump cut in Breathless. His films usually contained a political, social, and cultural militancy. The French New Wave film movement and director Jean- Luc Goddard films can be viewed as attempts to dismantle the traditions of cinema.
The French citizens rose up in the revolution of May 1968 against their government making demands upon it in the areas of class discrimination, workers rights, education funding, and, generally, the De Gaulle administration as a whole giving voice to those who were devalued and misunderstood. Interestingly enough, Goddard was part of the revolution on May 19th as he, Francois Truffuat and others brought the Cannes Film Festival to a halt “professing solidarity with insurgent students and workers, they rushed the stage at the Palais des Festivals and held down the curtain, preventing the scheduled screening from taking place.”[1][1]
Stop! - This is not a discussion on the French New Wave, however! I can hear the readers shouting as they read the last paragraph. However, it is difficult to discuss Goddard and not mention the movement he was a catalyst of.
Back to Masculin, Féminin, peppered with gunshots and inter-titles, the film plunges into the lives of Madeline and Paul. The narrative is fresh and relevant; two young and attractive people who also have very interesting jobs. Madeleine works for a magazine as a type setter but she also has a potential singing career ahead of her. Paul’s jobs change in the film representing the exploration of youth, wandering, and the testing of potential careers. He is an interviewer/writer/journalist for a magazine and he has also worked as a writer, pollster, and documentarian.
The film progresses through 15 chapters (Faits/Precis- Assessment of facts and circumstances/ precise or exact, description meaning). We watch as Madeleine rises in her singing career, as Paul earns a living interviewing teen idols, and as they eventually become roommates along with Madeleine's two friends Catherine and Elizabeth. The pace of Masculin, Féminin is refreshingly fast and creates an exciting feeling. True to Goddard’s contradictory nature cynicism and reactionary philosophy are infused into the film.
Major political issues of the day are addressed in the film including the Vietnam War and the re-election of General de Gaulle in France. Neither event receives positive treatment. America’s involvement in the Vietnam War is the subject of criticism. Paul lumps Lyndon Johnson, Stalin, and Hitler together. A very telling social commentary.
Emotionally charged experiences is what Masculin, Féminin offers it’s audience. Love, war, sex, commercialism, and birth control dominate the subject matter covered. Goddard creates a sense of realism. This realism exists in the characters' portrayal as well as in the filmmaking. One scene has Paul following the camera, watching it as he moves about. In another sequence, people in the street don’t appear to be extras, they appear to be looking directly at the camera with an authentic expression of puzzlement. Moving the filming to the streets from sets and studio productions are techniques of the French New Wave. These changes also foster a rapid pacing.
Masculin, Feminin‘s setting is Paris and we see a good deal of the Parisian landscape. The cinematography creates a feeling of unlimited space and then shifts to a handheld camera and an over the shoulder close-up. The setting: a small well lit room that can just accommodate the actors and a cameraman. This juxtaposition of images can also be viewed in the characters' personalities. Paul is completely the opposite of his friend Robert .Their differences are obvious, especially in the verbal sexual sparring Robert and Catherine engage in with one another. Looking within Paul we see that he is an ex-military recruit who craves peace so much he will act violently to obtain it (a paradox in itself).
Blending realism and formalism grounds Goddard in the present, by espousing well formulated statements about love, war, men. women, children, America, capitalism, socialism, life and death. Masculin Féminin forces it’s audience to view commercialism with skepticism and contempt. Goddard uses Madelaine’s reference to Pierrot le fou, his film, as a product placement, thus poking fun at himself as well. The more actively we participate in the film the funnier and more provocative it becomes!
[1] Scott, A. (2008). The Spirit of ’68. Retrieved May 12, 2008, The New York Times. Http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/movies/27scot.html
Other thoughts:
Brigitte Bardot (who had worked with Godard earlier in 1963's "Contempt") appears in a cameo, going over a script for her next film.
In the scene in the movie theater there is a member of the audience who could pass for a zombie.
To summarize the French New Wave: art, politics, and life in the second half of the twentieth century.
Dialogue of note:
Ideas are nothing!
Can it Trotskyite!
Emotions are everything!
[1][1] Scott, A. (2008). The Spirit of ’68. Retrieved May 12, 2008, The New York Times. Http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/27/movies/27scot.html
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