User Reviews

Take a handful of what's happened in the past, use a variety of authors, novelists, from Science Fiction to Noir, with a space ship as a car, imagination, inspiration, and then cast.

It's not the most exciting film you've happened upon, and it can be rather heavy going more often than not, I'm not sure it's aged that well either if I'm honest. Packed full of ingredients that will consume more than one viewing to deconstruct, if you're a fan of the director you may enjoy the challenge, but I increasingly find his films a bit of a chore and only relevant as original for the time but not the space.

I really like Alphaville. But I can understand why some would find it uninspiring or even boring. A Sci-Fi with no special effect. An intellectual feast in black and white. A movie that probably appealed to the crowd of the Quartier Latin. The story of a techno society. A society where people are killed if they act in an illogical way (ex. express sentiments). The episode of the pool is particularly good. The movie goes between two paradox: technology and poetry. But eventually, victory will prevail in the form of a «je vous aime».

Great lines in this one: «Dans la vie, il n'y a que le présent. Personne n'a vécu dans le passé et personne ne vivra dans le futur». Or this question by Alpha 60: «Quel est le privilège des morts?». Lemmy answers: «Ne plus mourir». This is just great!

On last word: Eddie Constantine and Anna Karina are both terrific in their role.

Out of 100, I give it 79. That's good for *** out of ****.

Seen at home, in Toronto, on November 12th, 2002.

What can you say that hasn't already been said. The dispassionate pastiche that is Lemmy Caution. The lethargy is exhilarating at times. The photography inventive and startling. The sound design unique and ground breaking. The acting superb. The music fantastique! Love it or get out of here!

Lemmy Caution, a French version of Sam Spade -- or perhaps a James Bond gone to seed -- is on a mission: "liquidate" the tyrannical Dr. Vonbraun, inventor of the "death ray" and the Orwellian supercomputer, Alpha 60. But to get Vonbraun, Lemmy must make the intergalactic voyage from his home in the Outlands (roughly, "Nueva York") to Alphaville (roughly, mid-Sixties Paris). He gets there via his Ford Galaxy. That's right -- a car. Are you with me so far?

The key to understanding Jean-Luc Godard's *Alphaville* is to realize that it is first and foremost a spoof. It spoofs nearly everything it touches: science fiction; comic-books; George Orwell; Aldous Huxley; American private-eye movies; spy movies; technology in general and computers in particular; romantic love as presented in cinema. If you sit down to watch this expecting a high-minded piece of French New Wave cinema, you're going to end up being put-off. Those familiar with Godard will perhaps be less put-off. After all, when was this guy ever really "high-minded", anyway? Godard was the prankster of the "Cahiers du Cinema" gang. Just listen to the score by Paul Misraki if you're looking for the tongue in the cheek. Even the putative theme of the movie, which is the priority of "love" and artistic creativity over logic and technology personified by the talking Alpha 60 supercomputer, is not taken too seriously. "Love" is personified by the beautiful dingbat princess, Natasha Vonbraun (Anna Karina), who doesn't even know what the word means. She's a child, as easily manipulated by Lemmy Caution as she is by the technocrats of Alphaville. Therefore, our rooting interest for humanity resides in Lemmy. Eddie Constantine reprises the role of Caution, a popular TV character in France during the Fifties, for Godard here: Lord knows what Constantine thought when he first read the script. The way he delivers the line, "This 'Alphaville' ought to be called 'Zeroville!'" gives a forceful indication of his bemusement. He submits to Godard's nouvelle vagueisms like a good soldier, delivering a fantastic performance in the process. Raoul Coutard's cinematography captures the heartlessness of the architecture in mid-Sixties Paris, which seemed to consist of blocky buildings blaring florescent lighting from every window, claustrophobic corridors, run-down apartments, and endless spiral staircases. It's a pitiless place, which perhaps was Godard's one serious statement amidst all the postmodern, meta-cinematic foolery: we're living in Alphaville already.

Altogether, this is Godard's most satisfying film. Despite all its detractors, *Alphaville* still survives (in a Criterion edition, no less). Classics always do.

If one had to use just one word to sum up Alphaville¸that word would have to be weird. It is a film that constantly challenges our preconceptions, our expectations, and, as a result, manages to be both deeply disturbing and very funny at the same time.

The film begins as what appears to be a pastiche of the American detective movie of the 1950s, but then suddenly takes a dive into the Twilight Zone. What follows is a perplexing 100 minutes of cinema that manages to be classic film noir, imaginative science-fiction, an action-packed and suspenseful thriller and - most surprisingly of all - a very entertaining black comedy, in the mould of Dr Strangeglove. By trying to blend so many contrasting elements, the result could have easily been a disaster. That the films succeeds, and succeeds admirably, is down largely to two factors.

Firstly, Eddy Constantine plays the part of Lemmy Caution, the private detective, throughout with total conviction, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he is playing a complete parody (and a very funny one) of a character he had made his own in the preceding decade. In the 1950s, Constantine played the hard-nosed detective in a series of French films of the traditional American detective genre. It would have been very easy for a lesser actor to ham the part up or downplay the character, but Constantine does neither, and the result is utterly brilliant.

We have a familiar character transposed from a familiar milieu into a parallel universe, where everything appears to be superficially familiar but then is shown to be a distortion of what we see in our own world - a kind of Humphrey Bogart through the Looking Glass. Over and over again, we are surprised at how easily we are tripped up and misled by our own preconceptions. This would not have been possible without a strong central character who is firmly anchored in our world - and Eddy Constantine serves this purpose brilliantly. The fact that he works so well with his co-star, the superb and very stylish Anna Karina, is a bonus.

Secondly, Alphaville's creator, Godard, appears to be at the height of his powers as a director. He shows complete mastery of the revolutionary cinematographic techniques which he thrust onto an unsuspecting world in the early years of the New Wave (the late 1950s). Far more accessible than some of Godard's contemporary films (such as La Chinoise and Weekend), the style is nonetheless distinctive and fresh, somehow giving the film an extra dimension that constantly surprises and entertains. Godard is also responsible for the script, an adaptation of a novel by Peter Cheyney, where he manages, quite cleverly, to draw parallels between the futuristic soulless society of Alphaville and contemporary France. (There are more than a few direct statements to suggest that Godard regards his own country as Alphaville - for example the infamous HLM joke. Godard appears to see France ending up as an isolationist state, seeming to have imperialistic ambitions, with its language under strict state control - not an uncommon caricature of the country in the latter years of the 20th century.)

Popular concerns about the impact of computer technology on society are also exploited by Godard who suggests that widespread dehumanisation and total state control will be the outcome.

Paul Misraki's enigmatic background music adds to the eerie other-wordly atmosphere of the ensemble.

Overall, an amazing film that never ceases to surprise and shock. A dark and very frightening thriller, a comic pastiche of detective films, a love story, a sci-fi movie with a power-mad (and asthmatic) computer... how Godard managed to pull this one off is probably one of the great mysteries of cinema history. Watch, listen, laugh and be amazed.

Forget about watching this if you have no patience for slow-moving drama, thought-provoking narratives, and/or philosophical discourse.

This film is however unique, virtually impossible to categorize and visually arresting. It's basically a film noir set in an Orwellian future with its lead character using emotion, jokes, philosophy and love to weeds doubts into the rule imposed by a mechanized society of tomorrow....and well it's much more than that too. Recommended to anyone who enjoys the qualities listed in the first paragraph.

An excessively weird although constantly engaging futuristic film, there is plenty to enjoy in it, even though it is a bit hard to understand. Godard makes brilliant use of shadows and lighting to set up a scary atmosphere, and negative images are used effectively throughout to create a sense of awe and provide a feeling of a foreign environment. The sets are very creative, taken from existing buildings in France, and the music used throughout the film fits in delightfully. At times the film bears a bit too much resemblance to Orwell's '1984' to stand on its own two feet, and there might be a few other problems for the nit-picky, but I simply found this to be a fascinating and well made film, and it definitely comes recommended if you simply feel like watching something different for a change.

In a near future, the American secret agent Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine) travels to Alphaville posing as the journalist Ivan Johnson from the Figaro-Pravda newspaper. His mission is to find the missing agent Henry Dickson (Akim Tamirof) and to convince Professor von Braun (Howard Vernon) to come with him to Nueva York. Prof. von Braun is actually Leonard Nosferatu and has created the powerful computer Alpha 60 that has conceived the inhuman dystopian society of Alphaville, where love, conscience, poetry and emotion have been banished and words are systematically eliminated from the dictionary. Alpha 60 is also omnipresent and Lemmy has the assistance of Natacha von Braun (Anna Karina), who is the daughter of von Braun. Soon he falls in love with Natacha but he needs to complete his mission before leaving Alphaville.

"Alphaville, une étrange aventure de Lemmy" is my favorite Godard movie and maybe his most digestible film despite being weird. This is the third time that I see this sci-fi noir (last time was on 07 September 2001) and it is still an intriguing story that resembles George Orwell's 1984, inclusive with the idea of rewriting the dictionary removing words related to emotions and including new ones. The scary atmosphere gives the sensation of nightmare and the sets and locations are ahead of time. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Alphaville"

Note: On 03 March 2021, I saw this film again.

Based on a simple philosophical premise (Alphaville is a city where emotions are not allowed, everything is based on logic, everyone has a clear purpose imposed upon him, people that believe in ideals are executed etc), Jean-Luc Godard uses an arsenal of directorial tricks to transform this into a futuristic film-noir, a surrealist collage, a humanistic elegy, an off-beat comedy etc.

In the end, Alphaville doesn't quite fully achieve it's potential. Some of the sequences look amateurish, some of the verbose scenes are too much etc. But it's a worthwhile watch for any cinephille. And even so early in his career, Godard shows a healthy desire to turn the rules upside down.

Complex plot about a secret agent who arrives from the outer space outlands in the capital of a large union of nations which resides in space. The people in this capital are acting very crazy. They are token under tranquillizers the whole time and even don't know anymore what love is. The system from the state is under the spell from a large, intelligent computer, alpha 60, which cares about nearly everything. Developed from a scientist (von Braun aka Nosferatu, both are hints to germans, the first to werner von braun, the developer from the apollo moon project, the second from the first dracula movie ever, the german soundless movie: NOSFERATU 1922)he tries to install a system of pure logic and rationalism. But what about emotions? And freedom? No one cares anymore... And then the secret agent comes into town and have to fight against this system. Goddard shows nearly no special effects and has made his movie in Paris in the sixties, which is a good trick (except that it is cheap!), because it says that this system is not far away from our reality.

Suddenly the world is Alphaville , a trench-coat wearing secret agent is a breathless race against the Masters of future . As an extraordinarie Sleuth is sent into the future world and arrives in Alphaville . This is Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine), an American private-eye, who investigates at a futuristic and logic-constructed city located on another planet. Caution is moved from his usual twentieth century setting, and places him in a futuristic sci-fi dystopia, the technocratic dictatorship of Alphaville .His mission is to rescue a trapped scientific and chase the criminal brain , Nosferatu or Professor Von Braun (Howard Vernon , Jesus Franco's ordinary) . Here he meets Natacha Von Braun (Anna Karina who married Jean Luc Godard) and tried to arrange an interview with her father, saying he is a journalist. In the Red Star hotel he meets Henri Dickson (Akim Tamiroff) and happen weird events . The futuristic city called Alphavilled is run by an electronic brain computer that submits the citizens .

Eddie Constantine came to the film through producer André Michelin, who had the actor under contract , he is good as super private-eye in this jumbled New Wave film . Constantine had become a popular actor in France and Germany through his portrayal of tough-guy detective Lemmy Caution in a series of earlier films and the character was originally created by British pulp novelist Peter Cheyney . It's Sam Spade type of story with Science-Fiction leanings and stretching rather far for some of the plot points . The picture is full of cinematic and literary references as Jorge Luis Borges , Raymond Chandler , and George Orwell , adding comic-book style . Like most of Godard's films, the performances and dialog in Alphaville were substantially improvised . Alphaville mingles the genres of Dystopian science fiction and film noir. Although set far in the future on another planet, there are no special effects or elaborate sets; in spite of , the movie was filmed in real locations in Paris by cameraman Raoul Coutard , Godard usual, in precious white and black photography , the night-time streets of the capital becoming the streets of Alphaville, while modernist glass and concrete buildings represent the city's interiors . Suspenseful and thrilling musical score by Paul Misraky . This low-budgeted motion picture is originally directed by Jean Luc Godard who created various masterpieces of the Nouvelle vague as ¨A Bout De Suffle , Pierrot Le Fou and La Chinoise ¨ . ¨Lemmy Caution¨ won the Golden Bear award of the 15th Berlin International Film Festival in 1965 but is recommended for New Wave fans , only .

When I first saw this movie in 1965, I was a naive, impressionable student and thought it was daring, profound, and totally cool. Now I'm grown up and after seeing it for the second time in 2008, I realize how dumb and easily fooled by "sophisticated art critics" I was back then. Without a shadow of a doubt, this movie is:

Pretentious......

Pseudo-Philosophical......

Psycho-Babble......

Although Eddie Constantine delivers a reasonably good performance, the production values (sets, direction, cinematography, and editing) are so amateurish they are reminiscent of the notorious Ed Wood movie Plan 9 From Outer Space. It's really that bad! The simple truth is that despite his reputation as an avante garde film maker, Jean Luc Godard has no real talent and wouldn't last 5 minutes in Hollywood.

Anna Karina is cute but can't act. Neither can the rest of the supporting cast. Even the great character actor Akim Tamiroff is totally wasted. The plot is unbelievable, the dialog is corny, and the music is grating. After watching the DVD, I tossed it in the garbage can. Don't waste your time on this miserable clunker, which is basically a student film masquerading as art.

Its hard to say exactly how much I liked Alphaville. Seeing it was a valuable experience, and at times was quite enjoyable. However, there was definitely a part of me that couldn't wait for it to be over.

Probably the best part of the movie was the general "vibe." I wholeheartedly approve of its all-around aesthetic. Using (at the time) contemporary Paris was, in my opinion, a genius move. It makes the film a lot more plausible- it's like saying, "The future isn't some phoney-baloney Jetsons stuff. It will probably look a lot like today." Plus, in my opinion, special effects are the #1 contributing factor to making a movie seem "dated", something that Alphaville doesn't need to worry about. Either way, JLG succeeds in giving us a bleak, antiseptic vision of the future. Unlike nearly all of the recent dystopic sci-fi, there's nothing whimsical about the future in Alphaville. It is cold and realistic.

However, I found that, at a lot of points, Alphaville tended to be rather slow. Usually, these slower parts occurred when the movie more or less gave itself over to philosophical speculation (such as the Alpha 60's long monologues), and pretty much abandoned the idea of keeping our attention. Don't get me wrong, I realize that the philosophical underpinnings are absolutely necessary to Alphaville- however, I think that JLG should have chosen to "show, and not tell." (Actually, I find this to be the case with a lot of sci-fi)

And I really don't understand the various action sequences in the film. (WHY would they have let him keep his gun, and take it with him when he's interrogated?) I would say that this particular element lends credence to the theory that the whole movie was meant as sort of a spoof.

In the end, I would probably recommend this film to my more open-minded friends, with the one proviso that they watch it early in the day, when they are less likely to fall asleep.

Anyone who criticizes Godard and his work, especially Alphaville, must be some sort of horrendous, filth-ridden film snob. Godard represents a very important part of film history and to call him hack and so forth is a great injustice, not only to him but to anyone who enjoys his work.

Godard is a deconstructionist. His films are designed and structured(?) with the intent that there be no easy or simple interpretation. This, I believe, is best illustrated by Alphaville. In this film Godard is doing two things: 1) he is expressing his fear that humanity is moving into a future in which emotion is sacrificed for logic, and 2) he is using his ingeniously creative visual and narrative style to point fun at the pretentious slickness of big budget studio films. Many simple minded film watchers, numbed and drained of any natural intuitive understanding for art by the studios, view this film as pure gobbeldegook. An example of this might be the scene in which Caution is being interrogated by Alpha 60. The machine is doing its best to penetrate into Caution's mind by using its seemingly infinite logic. In response Caution fires back with poetry, a form of expression that follows no certain logic and yet is infinitely expressive; something that confounds the machine. As I said before, many viewers may consider this scene to be incomprehensible. I suggest that perhaps that was exactly Godard's intent. If you are unable to gather any insight from this film, it is not because Godard makes no sense, but because you, probably longing for a slickster Michael Bay movie as you watch this film, have become like Alpha 60, a being incapable of abstract thought. I assume that is why Godard shot the film using modern architecture instead of sets. He is making a point: this dark, soulless future is now.

Without pitting into an over-sized budget and effects, Jean-Luc Godard relies on his wits as an artist and filmmaker to adapt Paul Eluard's novel on a society of evil, satirical, 'logical', and demonstrative force. What achieves a film like Alphaville to the status of an audacious, superlative art-film (with the broad outlines of the noir attitude Godard eats up like pudding), is it isn't an entirely classifiable film to put to genre. One can go directly to the word 'science fiction', and it's near justifiable to do so. But this is like sci-fi for those who only read the books, both of the pulp kind and philosophical breed - thus one of the film's most accessible qualities is it translates novelistic techniques in a way.

That's another touch that Alphaville (aka The Strange Adventure of Lemmy Caution, played by Eddie Constantine) puts forth both in technique of the photography (compositions) and music, as well as the script. As in his other films, particularly from the 60's, Godard seems to pepper these characters in the city with dialog and twists that spark good philosophical debate...the fact that so much of the dialog - along with the camera - moves to a beat of consistent poetry, in a environment where practically all don't know what the word means, is a feat that Godard is cool to handle. Like in Band of Outsiders he's toying with the aspects of the cinematic process, while presenting a cohesive narrative (at least far more so than something like his version of King Lear, which is Shakespeare cross-bred with H.S. Thompson and then edited through an acid-head's filtered imagination). It will depend on the viewer's taste of talent if they enjoy Alphaville, as naturally with his other films, i.e. Weekend.

But would contemporary audiences consider such experimental side-bars like a beep played whenever a certain word is spoken, or in heightening the tension by changing the exposure on the film so black is white and white is black? I wonder if my friends would find some of this pretentious after so many years of Star Wars and Close Encounters. Then again, maybe those who have read Orwell or seen Gilliam's Brazil, or even the old Bogart detective films, would find more interest than others. At a young age, Godard's films generally contain the qualities by a parent creating a film for his children, the audience- he prepares you for like by f***king with your head, and it will either tick an audience member off, or others will come to enjoy it and dig in to it with repeat interest. For example, the voice of Alpha 60, the head honcho and 'logical' leader of the city of Alphaville and its doped-up type civilians, at first had me a little bugged too. And much of what he was saying the first time around was intriguing, but befuddling for my mind to take all in.

And although Godard strikes up a chord with his main players (Constantine and Karina notably), it's Coutard and Misraki's show as much as his. Their touches add to Godard's vision, as Coutard brings the director some of his most indelible images: the long takes down the corridors of the hotel, the dank lighting in the darkness during Alpha 60's rant, the unusual angles...and the music cues are similar too, though in another context to say Contempt. The score rises and falls, is repetitive, and it's lyrical in a sense: threatening, mysterious, for a thriller that itself isn't entirely serious with itself.

But perhaps the most wonderful thing I found about Alphaville was how Godard juggled the philosophical/societal issues and schematics in a underlying serious way (as most great sci-fi pieces do), and also made it satirical and funny. You have the theme of segregation (err, Nazism in a sense, in Alphaville only a few nationalities of people are allowed to assimilate, while all others commit suicide or get killed in roves), dehumanization (a running gag is that the residents say "I'm very well, thank you very much"), the power that technology holds over a race of people, and destruction through war powers. However, it isn't all thought-provoking carp for the brainy among the audience. He's too smart a filmmaker for that. So, like in Pierrot Le Fou, he lets the audience in on the fact that this IS after all a movie, and you can't have an intellectual heap accompanied by the photography/sound of a poetic-painter without having fun. If a viewer gives him/herself, as I did, one can laugh at the little one liners, and gestures, that one doesn't notice the first time. Overall, I was impressed immensely by this film, and it's a great one, though it isn't the kind of popular sci-fi that'll play on the major cable networks. A+

I'm a big fan of Godard's style of filmmaking, and Alphaville does nothing to dispel my enthusiasm for his art. Alphaville is a triumph of style, if nothing else. The story is pretty simple, French super-spy Lemmy Caution blows into town to destroy Alphaville and the tyrant Von Braun who runs the place with his computer, the Alpha 60. But this film is more detective noir than sci-fi and that's why it works, because Godard sticks with what he knows best. The sci-fi elements are presented in basic visuals: the beaming light of Alpha 60, the neon sign reading e=mc2, and so on.

As usual, The photography and compositions are superb, as in the hotel room conversations between Eddie Constantin and Anna Karina, the sexy "bellhop" who escorts Constantin to his room and offers to bathe with him, the photo-negative stuff toward the end, and the swimming pool-execution scene, which is truly priceless.

If the film has weaknesses, it's in the conventional gangster shoot-em-up and the love story mixed in to the plot in a movie that is distinctly unconventional. But in Alphaville, Godard creates another work of film art that is not to be forgotten. 3*** out of 4

I spent the entire first half of 'Alphaville' wondering what on Earth was actually going on. Perhaps this was Jean-Luc Godard's intention. In the world of spies and espionage, nothing is what is seems; alliances and loyalties are uncertain; the line between what is real and what is fake is blurred and indistinct. Lemmy Caution, a secret agent from the "Outlands," enters Alphaville under the guise of Ivan Johnson, claiming to be a journalist for the 'Figaro-Pravda' (this title comes from the name of two actual newspapers, from France and the Soviet Union, respectively). Caution's first mission is to track down a missing agent, Henry Dickson, and to acquire (or, otherwise, kill) the brilliant creator of Alphaville, Professor Von Braun – formerly Leonard Nosferatu (a nod to F.W. Murnau's classic 1922 horror film). Lastly, it is Caution's objective to destroy the dictatorial computer who is in complete control of Alphaville, Alpha60, thus also destroying the city itself.

American-born actor Eddie Constantine had already portrayed the character of Lemmy Caution on a number of occasions, in a string of hard-boiled detective films based on the novels of Peter Cheyney. In 'Alphaville' (full translated title: 'Alphaville, a Strange Adventure of Lemmy Caution'), Godard resurrected Constantine's character for this very strange venture in science-fiction. Not wishing to spend money on expensive futuristic sets, Godard shot the entire film at cleverly-selected real locations in Paris, with the night-time Parisian streets becoming the streets of Alphaville, and modernist glass and concrete buildings becoming the city's interiors.

Alpha60, the coldly-logical AI controller of the city, speaks with a grating, throaty voice – becoming, at times, almost unbearably torturous to listen to. The computer, an omnipresent narrator of events throughout the city, has made emotion a capital offence, holding mass executions for "crimes" as innocent as crying over a deceased love one, or even for simply using the words "why" or "love." These executions occur ceremoniously alongside an eerie swimming pool, though there was a time – when many people were required to be executed at once – when Alpha60 used to simply electrocute them as they sat in a film theatre watching a picture.

A truly baffling film to watch for the most part, 'Alphaville' picks up substantially in the final half an hour or so, partly because you begin to gather an understanding of what is happening, and also because this is when Caution starts to make good use of his pistol. Beautifully shot in crisp black-and-white by Raoul Coutard, the film also uses long takes to good effect. Though it is not perhaps a film that everybody will enjoy, Jean-Luc Godard's 'Alphaville' is a fascinating foray into science-fiction.

Definitively I and Jean-Luc Godard don't get along with each other in what concerns films and filming. I didn't like any of his films I have seen previously and didn't like this one either. What does it mean and what does he want to communicate or say to us in all his films? Is he serious or is he just kidding with crime or science-fi or even love stories? Does he want to pass on any message to us? Which is it? I am not so stupid but if he is considered one of the best movie directors of our times by most responsible critics maybe the fault is mine. This movie takes place in Alphaville, a supposed extraterrestrial town in some exterior galaxy but that looks like any current town or city in this world like New York or Paris for instance, peopled by apparently normal people normally dressed. Some scenes are quite ordinary, some dialogues too but some others show very odd behaviours and incoherent talking. You travel out of the galaxy by car and by road for instance. Which codes and symbols is Godard recurring to? He once said: To make a movie we only need a gun and a woman. Is this the answer maybe?

Amazing 60's sci-fi, all done without special effects. The lead character Lemmy Caution was a french created American spy hero, who Jean Luc Godard re-imagines as an intergallactic spy who goes to Alphaville; a planet/city/state where emotions and ideas like "why" are replaced with "because". Godard fills this new pulp dimension with mentions of "Flash Gordon" and "Dick Tracy" as fellow Outworld agents like Caution. There are a lot of amazing scenes, the executions with the bikini girls with shark knives being one of the best. The romanitc oblique dialogue almost got too much for me, but works in keeping with the overall poetic themes of the the film. Not your average sci-fi, but beautiful conceptual noir. A true original from a great director.

Even though Alphaville is about the midpoint in Jean-Luc Godard's New Wave, sixties filmography, it's really unsurprising to see him attempt to make a film that explores and subverts the general visual and narrative quips of your archetypal film noir story. The result is an interesting, if ultimately kind of droll, exploration from a filmmaking known for defying all convention and expectations like it's his job.

The film stars Eddie Constantine in the daunting lead role of Lemmy Caution, a secret agent who is entering a town called Alphaville, posing as a journalist named "Ivan Johnson," claiming to work for the Figaro-Pravda. Caution is on a several top secret missions, one of which involves searching for a missing secret agent by the name of Henry Dickson (Akim Tamiroff), another is to exterminate the creator of Alphaville, who is Professor von Braun (Howard Vernon), and he has to destroy the computer that controls all of Alphaville, which is named the "Alpha 60." Alpha 60 was created by von Braun and controls all of Alphaville, making the city one of the most artificial cities in the world. Alpha 60 has completely dismantled the ideas of free thought, individualism, and self-satisfaction, making concepts like love, poetry, feeling, emotion, and mood nonexistent and stripping people down to the bare basic living, breathing, and speaking organisms.

Alphaville adheres to the aesthetic and visual chemistry of American film noir quite nicely, making its presence known through dark and brooding chic and familiar camera angles. Having this cold and extremely unique style mesh together with Godard's often deviant and unconventional cinematic structure make for two very fitting styles that mesh well in the presence of one another. This shows that while Godard is keen on replicating the well-known characteristics and visualizations brought together by film noir - such as extreme darkness, cold and isolated cityscapes, rain on empty streets, and heavy use of shadows and the unseen elements - he isn't afraid to continue doing what he has been doing, which is plugging in his style even where one would assume it doesn't fit.

As an exercise in style and the subversion of it, Godard's Alphaville can be granted a fairly high honor. However, despite a plot that really questions individualist freedom and the value placed on freewill, Godard does another alienating and disguising of that central idea in what seems to be a frustrating attempt to keep audiences within arm's length of the film at all times. There was never any specific connection between myself and the characters of the film, and because of that, I relied on style for the one-hundred minutes, finding nothing but guttural emptiness and a frustrating lack of interest in their motivations and interactions with one another. Even when the gorgeous, scene-stealer Anna Karina walks on screen, playing Natacha von Braun, the daughter of the professor and creator of Alpha 60, who is introduced to the complex emotions and feelings of love and happiness upon being introduced to Ivan Johnson, she doesn't make much of a splash like she did in Godard's earlier works like Breathless and Vivre Sa Vie.

Film noir has always been a genre of film that has alienated me, whether it was the classic Maltese Falcon or Godard's early venture into the area, I've always been completed turned off by the characters, the structure, and their motivation, with the only thing I can really find myself immersing in and embracing is the style and the genre's unique and beautiful visuals. Even with traditional, American film noir, I found a certain, almost indescribable emptiness to it, but put Godard, his filming techniques, and his convention-defying aesthetic inside an already cold and unwelcoming environment and you have me even further lost.

With all that being said, Alphaville is still lucky to have Constantine and Karina as its two core performers, both of whom usher in identifiable chemistry in the later scenes, and both work off one another in their ambiguous performances. Even Raoul Coutard's incredible cinematography compliments the film to a higher state than most films would get on cinematography alone, as he continues to emphasize his love for crisp, clean shots as well as holding nothing back in terms of visuals. Despite these golden attributes, Alphaville still gets brought down to a lesser level thanks to a story structure that finds ways to purposefully mystify, as well provide a viewer with frustrating attributes such as a grating narration in efforts to only make an already disconnecting story more disconnecting as it goes on. If there were ever a film to test your patience on how much you really like, appreciate, and understand it, here it is, in stone-cold celluloid.

Starring: Eddie Constantine, Anna Karina, Akim Tamiroff, and Howard Vernon. Directed by: Jean-Luc Godard.

I really wanted to like the movie, firstly because I like the new wave of French cinema made in the 60's and secondly, because the plot seemed to be something that would strongly appeal to my cinematographic interests when it comes down to dystopian movies. Being a person that watched quite a few titles throughout his life I must say I was seldom more irritated by a movie like this one that managed to make me turn it off after as little as thirty minutes.

I don't really know why Godard didn't manage to pull this off, I suppose that he wasn't entirely aware of what he should be doing in order to create a Orwellian, dictatorship driven, anti utopian movie. It starts off extremely unpromising, as the environment is a patchwork of symbols that were not by any means used in place, not to mention the sound used for the movie was the most inappropriate thriller - like type of sound that they could possibly pick up from just any half - decent crime movie made by the same time.

If you manage to neglect the messed up environment that is a patchwork of this and that but never manages to make it up to the full picture that it should represent, there is no possible way you won't get extremely irritated by the computer - generated - Big brother - type of voice that brags nonsense that tries to sound as if it's brainwashing the listener. Beware that this is light-years behind 1984 - a movie, based on a great novel crafted to perfection - a dystopian masterpiece, that I can only praise.

After wanting to smash my sound system and after trying to adjust it well enough so the inadequate sound effects won't damage the proper functions of my nerves, I started thinking how this movie would have been a masterpiece if created by Pasolini. I remember how he managed to pull out the entire Theorema using the sound of a church bell, which by no means sounded anywhere that inappropriate as the sound effects found here.

Apart from that I do believe he would have done great job in implementing the political meaning into the movie. Godard failed in his attempt to be overly artsy in an environment that was probably chosen by himself - one that managed to fail his movie even more.

As a conclusion, with a little bit of sadness I should admit that at least the cover art looks somehow acceptable and pleasant, and that is why I bother to give one star to this hour and a half tape of lost meanings.