Band of Outsiders (1966)

One of my all time favorites.

Am I Missing Something?

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

Once again I don't know what do with a Godard film. Not really compelling, but not really awful, not too innovative, but not too formulaic, certainly not entertaining but not completely tedious. A Band of Outsiders is a crime romance flick that just baffles me, but not in a thought-provoking way or any other way of titillating my interest. Ultimately I dislike it. There is some really good stuff in here, but most of it seems to be probing the borders of boredom.As a New Wave film, it's expected that this one too would part ways with conventional storytelling and filming style, but it's caught in that awkward middle way where it's not over the top enough to be really memorable and inspired and it's not conventional enough to tell an entertaining crime story. Godard's typical tricks are here on display too; sudden deadpan narration, sudden diversions, sudden sound mixing and editing jokes, but most of those miss their mark here. The plot moves unbearably slow and the characters here are far from magnetic or charismatic, besides Anna Karina, but that's probably just because she's pretty to look at. I didn't care for these characters' fates at all.The film isn't completely bland. There's some really good stuff here. The dance scene is very cute, the music all throughout the film is charming, the camera occasionally captures a great snapshot of 1960s Paris. But really, for every good scene here there are 10 tedious ones, and it just doesn't click with me overall.

Rather charming little film loosely based on an American pulp fiction novel. Actually probably just inspired by the storyline so there is some sort of plot here for Goddard and his cast to dance around. There is some humour and certainly was some innovation but now mostly loved for the bubbly performance from the lovely but drearily dressed, (intentionally of course), Anna Karina and four key scenes. The cafe dance, where the three do the 'Madison' is rightly adored and imitated by Tarantino, the minute's silence in the cafe where even the background sounds are cut - scary or what, the childlike pretend shoot out in the street and of course the run through The Louvre. In interviews in recent years Anna Karina will talk with eyes glistening gleefully, of how a real guard in the museum tried to stop them and just how long it took for her male co-stars to learn the dance. I don't find the film as a whole, set in a very unattractive and grey Paris, particularly exciting but there is enough here to make it an essential view.

In 1960, French visionary Jean-Luc Godard made A Bout De Soufflé, a film that influenced generations of filmmakers, and had a style that is still seen in films today. It was a low-budget, free-spirited crime film that mixed genres, conventions and techniques, and kicked off the French New Wave movement. As Godard progressed, he became more confident and experimental, making musical comedy Une Femme Est Une Femme in 1961, political thriller Le Petit Soldat in 1963, and the satirical Le Mepris in the same year. He had unfinished business, it seemed, as he returned to the B-movie crime genre in 1964 with Bande A Part, similar in themes to his debut. Why he did this is unclear, but thank God he did, as, in my opinion, it's an ultimately better film.Shy student Odile (Anne Karina), is befriended and by two partners in crime, the quirky and silent Franz (Sami Frey), and the confident and reckless Arthur (Claude Brasseur). Both men are seemingly besotted with the beautiful Odile. The three become friends, hanging out in cafes, driving around, and generally messing about. After a while, a strange love triangle forms as the two men try their best to seduce Odile, who initially only seemed interested in Arthur. It soon becomes apparent, however, that the two men are using Odile to plan a heist of her Auntie, who she mentions has a large amout of cash stashed in her apartment.The first two thirds of the film sees Godard at his most playful. The famous scene in which the three dance in time to a jazz song is one of the most delightful scenes I've seen in a Godard film. The music occasionally stops, allowing us to hear the characters inner thoughts, and also to see how ridiculous the characters look without the music playing. To me, it seemed Godard was both showing how wonderful cinema could be, as well as highlighting the deceitfulness of it. Perhaps I was mis-reading it, or maybe Godard was leaving it open to interpretation, or maybe it is just a fun scene. Either way, it's a great scene.It's also delightful to see Anna Karina, as it always is. She is one of the darlings of French cinema (even though she is Danish), and truly one of the most beautiful women to have ever graced the screen. She was, at the time, married to Godard and appeared in many of his films until their divorce in 1967. She gives one of her best Godard performances here, playing shy and timid early on, to become more confident and calculating later on, having the two men practically worshipping her. That is until the final heist scene when the men become drastically vicious and nasty as they get desperate in their greed.It is one of the last of the light-hearted films Godard made before taking a more political and controlled approach to cinema. After this he went on to make sci-fi masterpiece Alphaville and, in my opinion, his best film Weekend, a dark and hypnotic odyssey into a bourgeois- consumerist nightmare future. Bande A Part may lack a recognisable plot, but it has spirit in abundance, and style to spare.www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

I found Godard's Bande à part to be much more entertaining than À bout de soufflé and my favourite out of the Nouvelle Vague films. It was in its cool, its aesthetics and simplicity in narrative that had me captivated and I finished the film with a smile on my face.It had everything you could want from a film with interesting textual references, comic quips, a love triangle and the protagonists sprinting through the Louvre, not to mention the best dance sequence to be caught on camera.This is why I want to make films, because they can be this stylish, this cool and this entertaining.8/10