Review of Alphaville (1965) by Yoav K — 22 Jul 2007

2007/07/24 I really can't stand Godard all that much. So here he takes up 1984- and Brave New World-type settings but populates them with pulp/comic book characters, saying all the insipid comic book lines.

Maybe he could have pulled it off with better acting, but the actors here hammed it up so much that the pulp stuff wasn't charming, as it would be in a Tarantino flick for example, but just groan-worthy.

Also, I wasn't sure so much from viewing the film that Godard means the story here to be tongue-in-cheek. But he has to, right? It's just so ridiculous, with the super-intelligent computer learning about love from the gumshoe and destroying itself? So maybe he just made this movie to show off his artistic skills.

Granted, there are very visually striking sequences in this film, and the visual style of this film contributed a lot to the French new wave, but some of the visual flourishes just come out of nowhere here.

Also worth noting is that even when my favorite new wave director, Truffaut, tried a future-dystopia movie the result was fake and ineffectual, so maybe it's this kind of narrative just not mixing well with the French new wave style.

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