A Woman is a Woman - Criterion Collection (1961)

New wave romantic comedy: cute, playful

Godard is beginning to grow on me. Maybe it's because I'm watching his films from the sixties, made when I was a teenager in France, and the nostalgia appeals to me. Maybe it's because his work seems free and easy, uncontrived, almost amateurish compared to some other famous film makers. Or maybe it's just that I like this particular pretty girl he features.

She is pretty, gangly Anna Karina starring as Angela, an exotic dancer who is madly in love and wants to have a baby. Godard has a lot of fun with her, encouraging her to mug for the camera, getting her to do movements that cause her to trip and look not just gangly and very young like a pre-adolescent, but even clumsy--and then to leave the shots in the film, probably telling her, "This is a comedy. You need to be not just beautiful, but funny, warm, vulnerable."

Karina does manage a lot of vulnerability. Her exotic act including her singing is...well, there are usually only a handful of customers in the joint and so her skills are probably appropriately remunerated. Again this is intentional since Godard wants her to be just an ordinary girl without any great talent, someone with whom the girls in the audience can identify. But the irony is that the girl must needs be at least pretty. Karina is more than pretty. She is exquisite with her long shapely limbs and her gorgeous countenance.

One of the compelling nostalgic elements is the way women did their eyes in the sixties: so, so overdone! Although I thought that look was oh so sexy then, today I would like to clean the blue, blue--or is it purple?--eye shadow and the black, black mascara off of Karina's face and see her au naturel!

But it is the sixties in Paris--Gay Paree, Paris in the Spring, the City of Light! Well, 1960 to be exact, which really is more like the fifties than the sixties if you know what I mean. Everything is so innocent, Ike still in the American White House, De Gaulle the triumphant hero of France. Algeria and Vietnam completely offstage of course--this is a romantic comedy. The German occupation, the horrific world war and its aftermath are distant memories for Angela and her friends who were only children then. Life is young, the girls are pretty, the boys are cute, prosperity is upon them. It's Godard's Paris. Life is playful. Life is fun. You tease and you have no real worries. The Cold War is of no concern. The 100,000 or so American troops still stationed in France to support the troops in Germany are not seen. But Godard's love affair with the mass American culture is there in little asides and jokes. Emile or Alfred (I forget which) asks Angela what she would like to hear on the jukebox. "Istsy-bitsy bikini," he offers. No. She wants Charles Aznavour. She wants romance and an adult love that leads to marriage and maternity.

Angela's beloved is Emile played with a studied forbearance by an eternally youthful Jean-Claude Brialy. He doesn't want to father a baby, at least not yet. She pouts, she makes faces, she threatens, she burns the roast and drops the eggs, she crosses her arms, and she gives him the silent treatment. It doesn't work. He prefers to read the Worker's Daily. Ah, but will Alfred (Jean-Paul Belmondo, who seems intent on out boyish-ing Brialy) pull himself away from TV reruns of "Breathless" to do the job? Will she let him? Is Emile really so indifferent as to allow his friend carnal knowledge of his girlfriend? Is this a kind of threesome, a prelude to a menage a trois?

Watch for a shot of Jeanne Moreau being asked how Truffaut's film Jules et Jim (1962) which she was working on at the time, is coming along, a kind of cinematic insider jest that Godard liked to include in his films. She gives a one word reply, "Moderato."

See this for Anna Karina, and see her also in Godard's Band of Outsiders (1964) in which she looks even more teenager-ish than she does here. She is not a great actress, but she is wondrously directed by Godard who was then her husband. January 19, 2008

A Bloated, Grotesque Musical - Not for Everyone

I am a fan of experimental cinema as much as the other person, but definitely fall into the camp of people who abhor this film. I tried to get past the weak direction and poor performances, but the music really got on my last nerve. As a huge fan of musicals, this had one of the weakest scores and vocal deliveries I've ever witnessed on screen.

Could we also say 'pretentious'? Though this is from the 1960s and is supposed to be tongue in cheek, it was not at all moving. The lead actress, whom everyone on this Amazon review page seems to be in love with, is a pale imitation of Nathalie Delon, and though she is admittedly a beautiful woman, she is not competent enough to shoulder this entire film on her frail and tuneless shoulders.

My main problem with movies like this is that when a cult director is revered (especially on the Criterion series), people dont want to hear anything negative about them, and every film these directors make is hailed as a 'masterpiece'. How naive. This film is by any stretch of the imagination a work in progress (not much of a work, but still) and is not at all in releasable form. Its suited for the Awards Ceremonies (and it won some when it was released), but this is one Criterion release that really disappointed me.

The DVD has some fine extra features, including a black and white short experimental film from the director. Ironically, this short film is better than the actual movie, which is sad, really. Criterion should really pick the films they choose to remaster and release. This one wasn't worth their effort, really. September 28, 2007

A Woman is a Woman

Half musical, half madcap New Wave romantic comedy, Godard's highbrow take on a beloved Hollywood tradition remains dazzling not because of the musical sequences, which are jokey and deliberately amateurish, but because of Karina's refreshingly impetuous presence. Brialy and Belmondo play well against her chippy airs, coming off as adorably hip, chain-smoking straight men. With visual and sound gags galore, Godard's playfulness is at its peak in this French valentine to Bob Fosse, Cyd Charisse, and all those fickle, mercurial femmes. June 27, 2007

One of Godard's most fun

Before the 'umbrellas of choubourg' there was a 'woman is a woman' a film which uses the format of the hollywood musicAL to explore the very nature, at its most abstract, of cinema.. This is some of jean luc godard's best commentary on the art of film-making... It is ablaze in color and glamour, making it one of Godard's most accesible films.. It is unique, however, to the point of questioning its own validity.. This is the first film to fully realize the potential of the new wave to capture the visual imagery of the popular hollywood musical and to turn it against itself.. it is also an introduction to the magic of Anna Karina - an actress with very revealing eyes.. Jean paul belmondo reunites with godard to create a fine companion piece to 'breathless' - they would later come together again in the incompareable 'pierrot le fou'.. One of the top new wave films.. March 5, 2007

What a Woman Wants...

"Une femme est une femme" (1961) is the second Goddard's film - his dissection of a traditional Musical and Comedy. It may seem silly and naïve at times but it is a funniest and most enjoyable of his films that I've seen so far. A pretty stripper Angela (Anna Karina) wants a child. She decided to become a respectable bourgeois mother and wife but her dear husband Emil (Jean - Claude Briali) is categorically against her decision. He loves his wife but he loves his freedom even more, and the child means the end of freedom. Angela turns for help to Emil's friend, Alfred (Jean - Paul Belmondo). He is ready to do anything for Angela because he's been deeply and desperately in love with her ...But a woman is a woman and blessed is he who truly knows what she really wants.

3.5/5 or 7/10 January 30, 2007

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