Jean-Luc Godard’s first film, A Bout de Souffle was released in 1960 to critical and popular acclaim, and was the beginning of an intense period of high-quality artistic output from someone who was to become one of France’s, and the world’s, true great directors. It helped usher in the ‘new wave’ of French cinema, which reflected the great social and cultural dynamism sweeping across the western world. Taking home the Silver Bear award at the Berlin film festival in the year of its release, A Bout de Souffle stands the testament of time, still feeling fresh today with its groundbreaking cinematic language and production ethos.

“Godard, the master of the gnomic epigram and perceptive paradox, once said: "All you need for a movie is a gun and a girl." This was the basis of the brief scenario [for A Bout de Souffle] that [François] Truffaut, a fellow admirer of film noir and série noire pulp fiction, provided for Breathless. Its antihero, the swaggering, misogynistic petty criminal Michel (Belmondo), steals a car in the south of France and kills a policeman on the road to Paris, where he takes up with an old girlfriend, the well-heeled American, Patricia (Seberg). They talk of life and literature (in particular Faulkner's The Wild Palms) in a seedy hotel, make love and visit the movies while he tries to get money owed him by criminal associates. The police close in, Patricia betrays him. Hardboiled B-feature stuff. But the style is everything, a calculated destruction and remaking of traditional film grammar, and Godard formulated his much-quoted idea that "a film should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order".”

(Philip French, The Observer)

Try and make it to the MLC Librairie Café for 6.45 to get a drink and have a chat, then we'll have a brief introduction to the director and film, and start the film promptly shortly after 7, with time afterwards to discuss. Please do try to be on time out of respect for others watching the film.

As usual, the film will be shown in the original version with English subtitles. Although there is no cost to this screening, I will ask you to buy a 1 Franc raffle ticket in order to have the chance of taking the DVD home with you. It is also helpful to Francis, whose premises we are using, if you buy a drink!