MovieChat Forums > Notre musique (2004) Discussion > burned again! Thanks JLG!

burned again! Thanks JLG!

posted 19 years ago by adamwarlock
16 replies | jump to latest

I'm done with Godard and all the critics that praise his post 60s work. He is a bore! A bunch of intellectual pseudo-profundities that make 80 minutes seem like 4 hours. One or two were of interest, but you get no time to let it sink it before another..and another... The Jews have poets & the Palestinians don't..big whoop..explains nothing & helps no one. And Godard still lamenting communism, I don't care what failings the west has-Mao is a bigger murderer than Hitler so why should he be my hero? Man of action-what BS.

A film about post-war Bosnia would have been fine. The scenes about the Mostar bridge were of interest. That's about it. Walking around some shot up building with a big piles of books & talking in different languages about nothing. Shot-reverse shot, you need to catch up to something more comtemporary than Hawkes! Of course, Godard basically hates everyone in cinema post early 50s anyway. Fine, declare the art dead & move on. But no, he has to bore us every year.

Those guys guarding heaven aren't marines, their sailors! Does he not know what marines look like? Do some real research.

His 60s work at least has spirit & enthusiasm with the profundities. Tout va bien was the last really good film he made. That 80s "rebirth" to now is a bitter old man drained of all humor. I got roped into Novelle Vague and Germany Year 90(where he continues his communist lamenting). This was his last chance. I'd rather go to the dentist than see a JLG film.

[–] The_Troublemaker 19 years ago

I was thinking about this film. And after i read your post is there non reason to se it.

Thank you for the post. Was a big help.

Box office figures:
Domestic($M)_Worldwide($M)
M:I1__181______286
M:I2__215______330

[–] ThreeSadTigers 14 years ago

Come off it; look at your posting history. You clearly had no interest in seeing this film AT ALL.

[–] IceboxMovies 14 years ago

Well, I would love to disagree with the OP, but I'm afraid I cannot. I tried as hard as I could to appreciate this film, but I have a feeling I will have forgotten most of it by tomorrow. The only thing about the film that amused me and made me smile was Godard's own performance. And I kind of liked the sequence where he's teaching his students about the shots in His Girl Friday, but I do agree with the OP that Godard seriously needs to find a filmmaker of a later date than Hawks to be gushing about these days.

Apparently he HAS given up on every filmmaker who went to work after the 1950's. After Hawks, Nicholas Ray and Sam Fuller died, he just stopped caring, I guess.

"What I don't understand is how we're going to stay alive this winter."

[–] Johnny-Sack 19 years ago

Have to agree with adamwarlock. Rented this and it truly is a dreadful mess of pretension!

[–] PigeonsAreTasty 19 years ago

I am torn on this film... I thought that the scenes that worked, worked really well, but the entire movie felt more of a scrapbook of JLG thoughts than an actual full-length film. But, some parts were outstanding, mainly the Hell sequence, the end of the Purgatory, and some of the Heaven. JLG would have made a masterpiece if he gave the thing some damn structure.

"I like Kit-Kats, unless I am with 4 or more people"

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] polysicsarebest 15 years ago

"the entire movie felt more of a scrapbook of JLG thoughts than an actual full-length film."

You just described, oh, EVERY FILM GODARD HAS EVER DONE.

[–] ManFromSanFernando 14 years ago

The scene with the native Americans, other ppl in bombed building reminded me so much of something from the 70s, like some school video on world cultures from the 70s teaching understanding etc or some kind of play. It was nearly funny,if Godard didn't get the humor in this scene he is out of touch.
Some of the quotes in the movie were insightful...

[–] ThreeSadTigers 14 years ago

It was nearly funny,if Godard didn't get the humor in this scene he is out of touch.

I'm sure he did.

Most if not all of Godard's films have intentional humour, just as they have intentional drama, intentional social commentary, intentional philosophical musings and intentional cinematic experimentation. It's up to the viewer to decide for themselves how to approach, enjoy or interpret each individual sequence, getting whatever they can out of it, rather than what they expect.

Most people these days will only praise a film if their expectations are met. If they want to laugh they'll watch a comedy, if they want to cry they'll watch a drama, if they want to think they'll watch...

I mean, you honestly didn't laugh when you saw Godard crack the back of his head on the hanging basket? His almost cartoon-character exaggeration of it was just brilliant. A film like Soigne ta droite is also pure comedy. Completely formless, plotless and episodic, but filled with just the silliest Tati-inspired sketches you could ever hope to see.

I can't think of any other filmmaker of Godard's generation willing to parody himself so mercilessly in his later films; whether its casting himself as a washed up movie-director living in a mental institution or portraying a mad scientist with extension-chord dreadlocks.

But he combines this silliness with something incredibly beautiful, thought-provoking, genuinely experimental and often unbelievably moving.

[–] LizzyO3516 19 years ago

I've never even heard of this director but from reading the posts on this board it seems he's some sort of "artist." I love foreign films...so I thought I'd give this one a chance. I don't know...reading the posts on this board I feel as if I am "ignorant" or even "stupid" because I didn't feel an intellectual and stunning love for this movie. There were some parts of the movie that intrigued me and would catch my attention...but after those parts...I was about to die of boredom. I absolutely love and adore "The English Patient" and can watch that movie 50 times...and I have been told that that movie's the most boring movie in the world and that most people slept through it. So yes, I love a movie that many consider "boring"...so it's not like I am a love of action and sci-fiction and therefore was unable to appreciate this film. I can appreciate "boring" films...this film just wasn't one of them.

Can someone tell me.....

There's a part when the girl is in the taxi or car after getting off the plane during the "Purgatory" part and one of the men say something to the extent of:

Killing for an idea is killing a man not an idea.........

Is that how it goes? Well, I am pretty sure the way I put it in the above sentence is wrong...but from what I remember in the movie...that had to have been my favorite quote...it made sense...it actually made me think about something I had never thought about before.

Like I said it had its good parts...but all in all I would not tell someone to see it.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] adamwarlock 17 years ago

very true!!! especailly this one.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] ThreeSadTigers 14 years ago

That 80s "rebirth" to now is a bitter old man drained of all humor.

This isn't true, as most of his films from 1980s to the present will attest, so maybe this is a case of you not appreciating Godard's sense of humour. More importantly though, why is it such a bad thing for his films to "drained of all humour"? For example, how much humour is there in the work of directors like Tarkovsky, Bresson, Bergman, Fassbinder, early Herzog, Wenders, etc? Are these filmmakers somehow creatively deficient because they were more interested in the darker aspects of life, society or human interaction? Surely you could say that the comedy elements are the least successful elements in the work of John Ford or Ken Russell for example.

Also, I don't really see much reference to Mao in Godard's work and haven't since at least 1972. I simply don't know where you're getting that from. I'm pretty sure Godard has dismissed his most radical 'Moaist' work (the stuff produced with J.P. Gorin) as "total, near-sighted garbage." In fact, the vast majority of his films since 1980 have been largely apolitical, dealing more with theology or spirituality alongside the usual interest in the relationship between men and woman and the role that cinema plays in creating a commentary on all three.

Some rather strange objections here, but fair enough if that's how you feel. Apples and oranges and all that.