Director Richard Linklater actually had two brand new films play at MIFF this year: “Blue Moon”, a bio-pic about troubled songwriter Lorenz Hart, and “Nouvelle Vague”, Linklater's love letter to the French New Wave and Jean-Luc Godard himself. If you had asked me which of the two films I would end up loving the most, I wouldn't have hesitated in answering “Nouvelle Vague”, due to my love of French cinema, and the fact that I did not know who Lorenz Hart even was before I saw “Blue Moon”, however the opposite turned out to be true, as I was blown away by “Blue Moon” and Ethan Hawke's performance in it as Hart. It is the more serious of the two films as well. That said, “Nouvelle Vague” was also an excellent film, and a whole lot of fun, but in my eyes, less of an artistic achievement compared to “Blue Moon”.
“Nouvelle Vague” is the dramatisation behind the making of one of the most influential films of all time, Jean-Luc Godard's “Breathless”. In Linklater's film, we watch Godard stress about the fact that all of his contemporaries from Cahiers du Cinema have all made films, and he is still yet to, and he begs producer Georges de Beauregard to help him finance his first film. He agrees, on the proviso that Claude Chabrol and Francois Truffaut help with the script since they have already made successful films themselves, and they could use their names to sell the film. Godard agrees, and the rest of the film is about their journey to make the classic film. This is Richard Linklater's first French language film, but it matters little as it appears being unfamiliar with a language isn't something that bothers the director and force him to make a bad film. If I am being a little unfair, I would say that “Nouvelle Vague” is essentially a gimmick film, as Linklater does his best to recreate classic moments from “Breathless” while getting Jean-Luc Godard to sprout some of the quotes he has become most famous for. It may be a gimmick, but he does it so well, and it is such a fun movie.
To capture the same New Wave spirit that existed during the making of “Breathless”, Linklater has cast his film with a whole bunch of newcomers to the big screen. He has cast enormously well too, finding actors who not only embody the real-life person they are playing, but to actually look very close to them as well. Guillaume Marbeck is sensational as Godard, giving the director the air of arrogance that he is known for, as well as an excitement to go out and shoot his first film. It is hard to believe that this is Marbeck's first leading role because he commands the screen, and is so convincing as the famed director. The way he loses himself behind his ideas, the fact that he never doubts that what he wants to do in his film is the right way to do it, even the way he constantly fights with his producer...you just believe that you are watching Godard himself. I was very impressed with Aubry Dullin, who plays lead actor Jean-Paul Belmondo, and how close he actually looked like him. He is also believable in the physicality he shows as a boxer, while showing a looseness when shooting the film, and not getting too concerned whenever Godard would change his mind over something. Zooey Dutch plays Jean Seberg, and she certainly looks the part, but if there was one thing I was critical about, was how it appeared Dutch was really struggling with the French language and may have even learned her lines phonetically. Then again, Seberg herself was American so maybe this is intentional. Two other people whose performances I loved in the film were Bruno Dreyfurst who plays producer Georges de Beauregard, and is often seen at his wits end over the time and way Godard is shooting his film, and Matthieu Penchinat who plays cameraman, Raoul Coutard. There are also so many blink and you miss it cameos of people playing important characters in cinema history like Roberto Rossellini, Jacques Rivette, Eric Rohmer, Francois Truffaut, Claude Chabrol, Jean Cocteau, Suzanne Schiffman and Jean-Pierre Melville to name a few. Unfortunately the guy Linklater got to play Melville was much too thin and old for the role, although got his deep voice spot on, which is why I am sure he got the role.
To recapture the look of “Breathless”, apparently Richard Linklater used the same type of camera and film Godard used and you cannot say it was a bad decision because “Nouvelle Vague” definitely looks just like the 1960 classic. He and cinematographer David Chambille have done a fantastic job of recreating the look of Paris in 1960, and you would be excused to think that what you are watching actually came from that era; it is that convincing. Probably the best thing about “Nouvelle Vague” is that it captures the spirit of that time and how excited everyone was at making a movie that was a little bit different from the norm. Well almost everyone, as it is shown in “Nouvelle Vague” how confused Jean Seberg was in Godard's shooting decisions, confused at getting her script each morning, and convinced that the film would ultimately be a failure. Apparently, all this is true, and Seberg didn't always get along with Godard, which is not sugar coated here. One scene in the film that is an absolute highlight is when Godard is told to meet someone down in the Metro. He heads down there, only to find Robert Bresson himself, who is currently shooting (his future masterpiece) “Pickpocket”. The scene is also very amusing as Bresson has his star constantly steal things from Godard and his producer whilst they are talking. It is a fantastic scene and if the timelines really did crossover, it is crazy to think that two absolute classics of French cinema were shooting at the exact same time.
I mentioned above how I am a big fan of French cinema, which is true, although the French New Wave is not my favourite era (I love the Poetic Realism films of the 1930's best), even though so many classics were made during this time. Of the New Wave directors, my favourites were always Francois Truffaut and Claude Chabrol, and I also like Alain Resnais (particularly “Last Year in Marienbad” which is a flat-out masterpiece), but I just could not get into Jean-Luc Godard. While I like some of his films, he always came across as too arrogant to me, and that his films were a way to show how smarter he was compared to you. I actually loved that “Nouvelle Vague” doesn't shy away from portraying Godard as an arrogant prick at times, and I also got a laugh when the actors would mock him for it. (I should point out that “Breathless” is one of the Godard films I love).
Overall, I really had a fun time with Richard Linklater's “Nouvelle Vague”. He has perfectly captured both an era and the spirit of that era that saw so many French film classics being made. The film is incredibly well cast, and even looks as though it was shot back in 1960 itself. Whilst it is an entertaining film, I wouldn't really call it a serious film; more like a hang-out film as we spend time with these well known faces as they shoot a film destined to change the world.
3.5 Stars.
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