Die Verachtung

In 1963 Jean-Luc Godard directs this dramatic movie, which is one of the his most "mainstream" works.

At this time Godard is still able to tell stories, without loosing himself in intellectual games and political messages -the films he makes from 1966 are more and more hermetic. From 1968-69 they're incomprehensibles...

In "Contempt" a screenwriter is going to realize with Fritz Lang an adaptation of "Ulysses". There are tensions with the American producer, on the other hand there are tensions with his wife -who feels alone and treated more like an object by him. She despises him for that and for his being so coward. She thinks to find a revenge in flirting with the producer...

This films talks about coldness in human relationships and failures in communications. Colours, Italian atmospheres and Mediterranean locations increase this world of silence and frustration.

We can remember "Contempt" for many reasons: first the presence of a young Michel Piccoli and of a wonderful Brigitte Bardot (although she was delicious in every movie she made, here she's special -more sad, frailer ... a real actress). We can't help to appreciate, by the way, her body... this wonderful naked body (we're only in '63!!!). We can also remember the presence of a giant like Fritz Lang, who acts himself. And we can't forget this is a film about movie's world, a film which talks about films... That shows love Godard has for this art.

This lush, stylish story of a disintegrating couple's interactions with a grotesque Hollywood producer give Godard a chance to examine and present his views on the internationalization of Hollywood in the sixties, broken relationships and the state of the filmmaker's art. It's all beautifully evoked in CinemaScope by cinematographer Raoul Coutard, with a dream cast (Bardot, Jack Palance, Michel Piccoli and legendary director Fritz Lang) and solemn music by Georges Auric. Among the most interesting aspects of the movie is how much of a "Godard" film this production eventually turns out to be in spite of the director's attempt to go for a more mainstream product. Visually arresting, intellectually stimulating and one of the great mid-century, art-house classics. It's great to see this picture given the "Criterion treatment" on DVD!

Jean-Luc Godard's Contempt is a beautiful film visually and an ugly film thematically, depicting the disintegration of a marriage. One wonders how Godard, who had just married the ravishing Anna Karina the same year Contempt was released, managed to write a film so pessimistic about the union of marriage and how it corrupts both parties mentally.

The eye-popping color scheme of Contempt, thanks to Raoul Coutard's predictably wonderful cinematography as well as CinemaScope, a specific kind of anamorphic lens for widescreen shooting, is one of the defining reasons for this film's greatness. The process of CinemaScope enhances the color extraordinarily, adding a new layer of vivid texture to the film and a spot-on visual scheme throughout the film. Ordinary things like walking along the beach, admiring the ocean, or just simple conversations staged inside unremarkable buildings become a feast for the eyes simply because Godard uses this delightful method of shooting.

But what a way to use the film's visual scheme to contrast it with its overall bleak tone. The film revolves around an American film producer Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance) who decides to adapt Homer's renowned and iconic piece Odyssey for the big screen. He hires famed director Fritz Lang, who treats the film as if it were an artistic indie film and not the epic he had envisioned. Prokosch decides to hire Paul Javal (Michel Piccoli), a writer and playwright, trusting him to handle Homer's work with the respect he knows it deserves.

Paul, however, begins to feel increased pressure with adapting this work, as well as opposition in line of his own personal artistic expression as well as studio interest. To add to his already filling plate, Paul's marriage to the incredibly beautiful Camille (Brigitte Bardot) is on the rockiest of waters with persistent fights occurring between the two as well as Camille's hot and cold attitude towards him and their marriage.

Godard's Contempt is a multilayered piece of work to say the least. The film can be taken as a surface examination of a marriage in total jeopardy, and perhaps a depiction of the death of a practical union between two impractical people, or simply seen as an on-screen showcase for the issues and opposition Godard faced when he began making films on his own in the 1960's. I've already established that Godard is a rebel filmmaker in every regard; he consciously set out to fight against typical French filmmaking conventions and, in turn, pushed French cinema through an unthinkable New Wave movement, redefining cinematic aesthetics, tampering with narrative convention, and even adding deeper morals and themes provided with new visionary techniques and darker tones to films.

He puts his talents and his desire to destroy and construct to use with Contempt and, in turn, makes a fascinating film. Rotten Tomatoes' consensus on the film states that it is "essential cinema" and blends the ideas of "meta" and "physique," a statement I couldn't agree more with. Godard has always been big on abstraction with film to, at times, treading the line of being inaccessible in what he's trying to say. The best way that I've heard his work put, by a colleague, is that his films "are like having an intellectual conversation." So many ideas are getting tossed around, most of his films lack central ideas (one thing I've been known to critique with his films), and some I find to be next to impossible in trying to extract even some meaning out.

Contempt is definitely abstract and lives up the description of "meta;" various scenes leave a viewer confused and questioning what they were supposed to take away from a certain part. However, the overarching theme of the decline of marriage and artistic creativity remains accessible and digestible through the abstraction. Just by the inclusion of Fritz Lang, one of Godard's biggest cinematic influences, we can evidently see that Godard is commenting about how warped studios become in money, profits, and the meticulous "Hollywood/film accounting" process that they forget about the visionaries, the film stylists, and those who have original ideas that desperately need to find ways out in the public. Cinema had to inherently be discovered by rebels, illusionists, and subversive artists, and these are the same people that are finding the film industry a harder and harder place to break out, let alone work. Through Paul Javal, Godard details this struggle beautifully.

As stated, the film's style - or "physique" - is dashing in every regard. When one sees stills from the film taken out of context, one can easily infer Contempt to be a film masquerading in a more positive light than it actually is. However, make no mistake, as Contempt deals with the disintegration of a marriage in its darkest form. If capturing how difficult it was to make a film when you're barricaded by philistines wasn't subversive enough, Godard dares enter the realm of showing how marriage itself is a practical union between two people but people themselves aren't always practical. Look at the character of Camille, who seems to play psychological mind-games with her husband, never really solving anything and just getting him to dance around a whirlwind of mixed singles and unidentified irritations she seems to form overnight.

After watching what I deem Godard's "happiest" film so far, his sophomore effort A Woman is a Woman, entering into Contempt's world was a rough wakeup call. Godard is one of the moodiest filmmakers I have yet to discover. I'd love to catch him on a good day, but he's so much more thought-provoking, alive, and blustering when he's angry.

Starring: Michel Piccoli, Brigitte Bardot, Jack Palance, and Fritz Lang. Directed by: Jean-Luc Godard.

Paul (Picoli) is hired by vulgarian US producer Jerry Prokosh (Palance) to rewrite a screenplay for his adaptation, which Fritz Lang (himself) insists on shooting in a hyper-stylized, mythological fashion. Paul's relationship with his trophy wife Camille disintegrates as she feels abandoned by him to Prokosh's advances, and sees him subdue himself to these great men.

It is about film-making - of course! - it is about the plight of the artist, but where it succeeds most is in the carefully examined slow destruction of Camille and Paul's marriage. Raoul Coutard's cinemascope photography, filled with lush colors, only serves to highlight how little Paul is and how out of his depth he is. He and his wife hide it in different manners: Paul by trying to assert intellectual superiority over his wiser-than-she-appears wife, therefor earning her contempt. She hides by relying on her sensuality.

Godard typically references his love for film in a way that many will find pedantic, and the lush score isn't always wisely used, overwhelming and sometimes even obtrusive. But thankfully, Godard's message and cast survive the director's pseudo-intellectual short-comings. Bardot is perfectly cast as the ignorant innocent who strives to appear and be smarter than she is (even sporting a brunette whig at some point, in what is really a sad moment of self-loathing), but fails. Camille never convinces when she speaks, but the pain in those eyes is intensely real. Picoli's Paul is easier to sympathize with, as the "reasonable" whose every move to please anyone dooms him further. It is a cruel lesson and warning about relationships.

The film also serves a more sarcastic and amusing (and far more conscious) duel between Palance's Prokosh, superbly vulgar and dramatic, and Lang, who becomes a wise and immensely charismatic figure that stands against compromise. It is sad that this was the German master's only performance in front of the camera.

Le Mépris is slow, and if you get caught too much in Goddard's referencing and hyper-stylization, it will bore you. But if you really follow these characters, you're in for a unique, edifying and sometimes unnervingly uncomfortable ride.

Must be seen several times under different angles to be fully appreciated.

It all starts, with so much elegance and grace, with such smooth outlines, that your eyes caress and trace, Paul Javal and bride Camille, she seeks assertion, he makes her feel, that he won't allow a soul to take his place. But the ties that bind are easy to let go, and Camille is feeling Paul isn't so true, like a plate than can be shared, causes contempt and despair, and attraction comes unstuck like perished glue.

An often tricky piece of cinema that hardly entertains but leaves a mark that you may or may not be able to reconcile. Brigitte Bardot is as elegant as ever, in a film about a film that leaves you pondering how on earth could Paul Jarval let her go and wondering how many times you need to re-watch it to gather the intent.