A Woman Is a Woman

Yet Godard made some films which were more intelligent (or included more intelligent people), this one is definitely one of the funniest. Parodizing some aspects of the genre of musical comedy, there is not very much singing and dancing performed on screen, but the dialogues and actions are often quite absurd, or exaggerated, or not quite realistic, just like a song in a musical.

This is why at times it seems that Anna Karina's character is a little dumb, whereas in some dialogues she reminded me of Brigitte Bardot in Le mépris, who is cruel but not at all stupid. Convincing characters are not the most important thing in Une femme est une femme.

Playful camera work, playful use of music. A short and entertaining Godard film (really!), which nevertheless provides masses of material to be interpreted by New Wave lovers.

For me, Godard is easily the greatest living filmmaker; the most radical and revolutionary, one of the few director's whose work is so defiant, unique and idiosyncratic that he can go without credit on some of his greatest films - Weekend (1967) and Hélas pour moi (1993) to name just two - and yet, the work is always distinctive, exciting and immediately identifiable. Une femme est une femme (1961) was Godard's first film in colour and also his first in cinema scope, and he uses both of these devises to the fullest of their capabilities. As a result, it is one of the most important films of his career, sowing the seeds of creativity that would give way to later films like Le Mepris (1963), Pierrot le fou (1965) and La Chinoise (1967), and in the process creating a unique and entertaining film that rewards repeated viewings, whilst simultaneously remaining true to the filmmaker's progressive, cinematic intent. Like much of Godard's earlier work, the preoccupations here are almost entirely referential. He's still trying to revolutionise the format somewhat - playing with codes and conventions, simplifying character and narrative to an almost ironic degree and creating the drama from an accumulation of scenes - but there is also something more playful going on alongside a genuine love of cinema that is all too often overshadowed by the cynicism in his more recent work, such as Slow Motion (1980) and the underrated In Praise of Love (2001).

At first glance, the story of Une femme est une femme would seem to be incredibly sweet; a play on relationship difficulties and notions of love, honour and friendship wrapped up in the eternal battle of the sexes in a way that makes for great, light-hearted farce. However, on closer inspection, the giddy production design and typically imaginative use of mise-en-scene seem to be presenting a number of abstractions that draw our eye away from the deeper themes behind the film and the characters that are introduced. Like Jean Pierre Jeunet's Amélie (2001), the colourful format and child-like games being played by both character and filmmaker alike seem to be hiding darker notions that point towards ideas of loneliness, emasculation and dissatisfaction. With this in mind, we must ask ourselves if Godard's playful references and elements of sardonic pastiche are intended to be seen as something chic, or are they instead more in tune with the escapism presented by a film like Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark (2000), in which musical sequences and the air of American melodrama is used as an exit point for the hopelessness of the central character.

With this interpretation it is important to look at the character of Angela, a strip-club artist in a tempestuous relationship with the cold and chauvinistic Emile. Angela delights in playing games with Emile and with the audience as well; acting out her existence as if trapped between the continually juxtaposing worlds of the sitcom and the Hollywood musical as a desperate attempt to derive a simple sense of pleasure from a life that seems entirely joyless. She believes her relationship with Emile can be salvaged by the birth of a child, but when Emile seems unwilling and unaccommodating she turns to his best friend Alfred and begins yet another duplicitous game between the two. This throws something of a shadow over the character of Angela, her name itself creating an ironic juxtaposition as she plays the two men off against each other in an attempt to get what she wants. These issues would appear in subsequent Godard films, from Vivre sa vie (1962) to Slow Motion, with the depiction of women as performers, and indeed, women as prostitutes, seemingly allowing themselves to be put-upon in an attempt to get what they really want. Unsurprisingly, these are serious themes and issues with real dramatic weight that could, in the hands of a lesser filmmaker, have been used to mine a path of social-realist melodrama. Godard is more shrewd than that and presents the film as a carefree farce that is continually undercut by the distancing and distracting use of both audio and visual experimentation.

Despite the darker and more despairing thematic issues presented by the script, the tone of the film and the central performance from Anna Karina as Angela is undoubtedly bubbly, with its vibrant conversations, imaginative use of role playing and blithe musical interludes. However, the film is still reliant on Godard's iconic use of early deconstructive elements, with jarring and dissonant bursts of music, random jump cuts, provocative inter-titles filled with sardonic wit and devious puns, and the appropriation of numerous genre characteristics and stylistic cross-references to offset the story at its most basic level. Regardless of such personal interpretations, the film works just as well if taken at face value, with the boundless energy and imagination of Godard and his crew, the playful references to Truffaut and the relationship between the burgeoning French New Wave and its roots in Hollywood B-pictures, and the fantastic performances from Karina, Jean-Claude Brialy and Jean-Paul Belmondo.

Without question, Une femme est une femme could be seen as Godard's first true masterpiece. It is funny, witty, clever and insightful - filled with imaginative vignettes and the infectious sense of joie de vivre that only great film-making can present - whilst beneath the surface we find all manner of hidden depths and avenues of interpretation that remind us of the filmmaker's particular sense of genius. Regardless of your interpretation, the final moments of Une femme est une femme, with that devilish last line, visual pun and wink to the camera is a masterstroke from Godard; one that works within the context of the film as a frothy attempt at jovial farce, whilst simultaneously reinforcing the darker side of Angela's character and the empty life that she leads. As the character herself proclaims halfway through; "I don't know if this is comedy or tragedy... but it is a masterpiece".

It's always fascinating to watch Godard operate outside of his beloved gangster/noir thing, just to see if he can he do it- or how he'll do it. "A Woman Is A Woman" not only proves he has a flair for romantic comedy, but that he has made quite an extraordinary one. This movie is so charming and funny that it puts the assembly-line Hollywood romantic comedies to shame.

I've never thought Anna Karina was a great actress, but she is a good one, plus has the added benefit of a natural beauty and presence on-camera that really makes a star a star. She is a one-of-a-kind performer, and her lilting, flitting style fits remarkably well with Godard's roving camera in this light-headed, light-hearted story about a young girl working as a stripper who desperately wants to have a baby with her boyfriend Emile (Jean-Claude Brialy).

But the thing that sets the film apart from others in this mostly trite genre is Godard's unique style: the use of on-screen graphics to give insights into the character's motives, the all-too-sly speaking directly to the camera, the stop-start of the film's scoring, the accentuation of moments and dialogue by music which is extremely well-done. I loved the scene where Karina and Brialy, "not speaking", speak to each other with book notes, concluding in "all women to the firing squad". His conception of the Zodiac club is hilarious; it might be the tamest strip club in world history (it looks like a little Italian restaurant). And Godard is an absolute genius at writing small talk that sounds interesting and funny. It is a rare gift, and he doesn't get enough credit for it. In a genre like romantic comedy, where the subject matter is so trivial, to be able to sustain an entire motion picture just on small talk is no small accomplishment.

I highly recommend this picture for fans of good romantic comedy-it might be the best ever of this type. "A Woman Is A Woman" may be lightweight as Godard's films go, but it's exceptional as well. 3 *** out of 4

A Woman is a Woman belongs to the period when Godard was playful, uninhibited and really a wild child of the movies. So when he made a musical, in fact he made a childish and free imitation of a musical that at the same time showed, in an Godardian analytic way, how the Hollywood musicals usually depict life and love. In the film characters love and evade committing to love at the same time. There is music by Legrand and spontaneous looking movements which are aspirations to dance but at the same some oblique realism is at work. As with Godard, fantasy and realism interact in a dialectical way so that both seem indistinguishable after a while.

The trio of Brialy, Belmondo and Karina is great but Karina is obviously unique in that she makes the whole subject of performance seem out of place. She is there playing innocent, dumb, inviting, sad etc. and again at the same time she seems NOT THERE as though her mind is some place else. Her big eyes work and shine all the time but they don't give away the character. There is no argue about Godard's style which after so many years and so many innovations in the language of film has remained fresh and unsurpassed in vitality and an acute understanding of "Films as Games" or rather "Life depicted as a game within a game". However watching A Woman is a Woman after some years I still wonder at the their cinematic child: Acting as a sort of being there and being free to feel the film, breathing the air of movies. The plot is as unimportant as it can be. In its place moments show up, little but infinitely joyful moments of adults looking like teenagers amused and fascinated by the thought of being in a musical comedy. Was Godard the biggest daydreamer of the cinema or what?

Angela makes a living in a club, where she struts around after, she's got dressed up, she then casually discards, almost all untasteful garbs, gets paid, and goes back home, to homme Jean-Claude. She's yearning for that man to make a child, causes friction with the two, driving her wild, should she pursue their friend Alfred, he's more than willing to go to bed, or can she find a way, to become, reconciled.

A truly original and innovative romcom from the master of New Wave French cinema. Anna Karina plays to perfection the adorable Angela, so desperate for a child, with great support all round, especially Jean-Paul Belmondo. If mainstream traditional storytelling is what you're after you'll not find it here, just a quirky, daft, stylised and occasionally bizarre performance that's thoroughly entertaining and packed full of links to remind you to revisit some of the influences that make this time in cinema so refreshing.