Pierrot le Fou

Year: 1965
Genre: Black Comedy
Directed: Jean-Luc Godard
Stars: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Anna Karina, Graziella Galvani, Jean-Pierre Leaud, Dirk Sanders, Georges Staquet, Laszlo Szabo, Roger Dutoit, Samuel Fuller
Production: Films Georges de Beauregard

Director Jean-Luc Godard has always been a baffling and enigmatic figure to yours truly. Considered one of the most important figures in film history, Godard's reputation doesn't help when many a film student sits down to watch Breathless (1960) for the first time. While I have only seen three of his films, each one showcases the talent of an artist, very purposely engaging with his audience in new and interesting ways. While his projects may be alienating to most, you have to admit his imagery sticks with the viewer long after the credits roll. Whether it be the shuttered, moody apartments of Alphaville (1965) or the extended chaos of the "carmageddon" in Weekend (1967), there's just something both literate and literal that immerses the curious mind to play along if only to see where he's going.

Pierrot le Fou is said to be one of Godard's last early-career masterpieces, before going off the radical deep-end. It brings to the screen the auteur's wry suspicion towards bourgeois complacency, an eye towards the garish, and an almost giddy sense of humor. French star Jean-Paul Belmondo plays Ferdinand the Pierrot (roughly translated to Ferdinand the sad clown). Unhappy with his trite existence as an obedient husband, doting father and successful ad man, Pierrot runs away with his mistress Marianne (Karina). The two make their way to the south of France, borrowing and stealing their new found life from those absent enough to be taken advantage of. Meanwhile the two are being chased by a duo of mobsters who are hoping to recover money the couple have stolen.

The film is very roughly based on the novel "Obsession" by Lionel White. Known for stylized pulp fiction, Lionel White's book is about as American as Pierrot le Fou is French. The book is straight-forward, the film is eclectic; the film is intellectual in nature, the book satisfies baser instincts. We've seen this kind of uneasy cross-cultural pollination in many of Godard's work from Breathless hero Michel sporting a Bogart-esque fedora to the Dick Tracy comic-strip pop permeating through Alphaville. In the case of Pierrot le Fou, Godard's love of American iconography is most obvious with a very brief cameo by American auteur Samuel Fuller.

As with all of Godard's work, the specifics of the plot are not important or entirely necessary. It is the mode to which the director makes the themes of his story clear. The first thing that grabs the viewer's attention is the color. Pierrot le Fou is Godard's first feature-length color film. In it, he uses a triadic palette to add a layer of pop art sensibility. Almost everything in the film is drenched in loud pigments of red and blue making the entire film resemble a live-action cartoon. Only instead of inviting the viewer into it's colorful world, it purposely alienates you.

Godard increases this alienation with elliptical almost Lynch-ian editing and constant character asides that are often political in nature. In one cringe-worthy scene the young Anna Karina yabbers and tongue-clicks while wearing Vietnamese yellow-face to entertain a group of American sailors. While the scene aptly lampoons the Vietnam conflict, it does so in such an aggressively buffoonish way that even audiences of the time likely would have looked on with puzzlement. Then there's the collage-like structure of the film itself, which often goes on long tangents on mass media, socialism, pop culture, violence and the cinematic art form. It's all quite fascinating and Godard wisely infects his high art concepts with a lowbrow sense of humor. The balance reaches a boisterous crescendo when Marianne and Pierrot ditch their car in a mock wreckage...then the film continues for another hour.


Out of all the film's I've seen by the master of the Nouvelle Vague, Pierrot le Fou is the best work I've seen, though I'm not sure it's because Godard is an acquired taste or it's truly a better film. It's certainly filled to the brim with awe-inspiring visual ideas and influential storytelling techniques that have become common among the American film intelligentsia. Godard's imaginative use of wordplay, puns and portmanteaus adds yet another layer of sophistication that upon repeated viewings (and a rudimentary understanding of French) can make anyone smirk with satisfaction. Pierrot le Fou is also the director's most accessible film, though certainly not a movie for novices.

Yes I know that sounds pretentious.

Final Grade: C+