Shot in black and white, the film is narrated in twelve frames. As in other films directed by Godard, the camera is an observer who follows Nana (Anna Karina) into the world of prostitution. The film assumes, in many scenes, a documentary, observational tone.
The script is not intended to explain much about Nana. Right off the bat, in a sensational shot, when she and the man she's talking to at a bar are shown from the back, but you can see Nana's face in the mirror in the background, we know the man is her husband who's separated, who left her son with him and who needs money. But it doesn't show us why. These are facts that interest the viewer to understand Nana's decision to prostitute herself.
Nana is cold, doesn't show feelings, with rare exceptions, namely, in the movies when she cries watching The Passion of Jeanne D'Arc, 1928 silent film directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, and when she happily dances Swing! Swing! Swing!, music by Michel Legrand, in a bar, around pool tables, with the camera rotating 360º. Interesting to note that Anna Karina would return to dancing in a bar in an iconic scene from the film Band À Part, also directed by Godard, released two years after Vivre Sa Vie.
Even as a prostitute, Nana does not appear naked at any time and we also do not see sex scenes between her and her clients (there is only a hint in a brief passage in the hotel room where she worked as a prostitute).
Godard makes several quotes throughout the film, as usual. Starting with the intertitles that precede each of the 12 frames, which take us back to silent films, which used this device to change scenes. He also silences dialogues twice, putting subtitles so that we know what they are talking about, another reference to silent films, which were also in black and white. It puts an impacting scene from The Passion of Jeanne D'Arc of two more minutes, trying to make a parallel between the suffering of Joan of Arc, masterfully played by Renée Jeanne Falconetti, and the suffering of Nana, who cries at the same moment that the heroine also cries knowing that she will die at the fire. Godard also quotes The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas, shows a character reading Complete Works, by Edgar Allan Poe, and has a great dialogue between Nana and a gentleman at the bar table (Brice Parain), in which Plato and German philosophers are quoted, and they still philosophize about true love.
The soundtrack, composed by Michel Legrand, is a special case. In some scenes, the instrumental music punctuates what is going on with the main character, but is abruptly interrupted, as if it couldn't explain Nana's feeling.
The original title - Vivre Sa Vie - can have two connotations, as it can be read as living your life or as living as a prostitute, since, as in Portuguese, at the time the film was shot, prostitute was also called a woman of life.
Finally, Vivre Sa Vie has a tragic ending, a hallmark of several of Godard's films. This moral lesson at the end is what bothers me, but even so, it's a great movie and should be seen and reviewed by those who really love cinema.
The script is not intended to explain much about Nana. Right off the bat, in a sensational shot, when she and the man she's talking to at a bar are shown from the back, but you can see Nana's face in the mirror in the background, we know the man is her husband who's separated, who left her son with him and who needs money. But it doesn't show us why. These are facts that interest the viewer to understand Nana's decision to prostitute herself.
Nana is cold, doesn't show feelings, with rare exceptions, namely, in the movies when she cries watching The Passion of Jeanne D'Arc, 1928 silent film directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, and when she happily dances Swing! Swing! Swing!, music by Michel Legrand, in a bar, around pool tables, with the camera rotating 360º. Interesting to note that Anna Karina would return to dancing in a bar in an iconic scene from the film Band À Part, also directed by Godard, released two years after Vivre Sa Vie.
Even as a prostitute, Nana does not appear naked at any time and we also do not see sex scenes between her and her clients (there is only a hint in a brief passage in the hotel room where she worked as a prostitute).
Godard makes several quotes throughout the film, as usual. Starting with the intertitles that precede each of the 12 frames, which take us back to silent films, which used this device to change scenes. He also silences dialogues twice, putting subtitles so that we know what they are talking about, another reference to silent films, which were also in black and white. It puts an impacting scene from The Passion of Jeanne D'Arc of two more minutes, trying to make a parallel between the suffering of Joan of Arc, masterfully played by Renée Jeanne Falconetti, and the suffering of Nana, who cries at the same moment that the heroine also cries knowing that she will die at the fire. Godard also quotes The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas, shows a character reading Complete Works, by Edgar Allan Poe, and has a great dialogue between Nana and a gentleman at the bar table (Brice Parain), in which Plato and German philosophers are quoted, and they still philosophize about true love.
The soundtrack, composed by Michel Legrand, is a special case. In some scenes, the instrumental music punctuates what is going on with the main character, but is abruptly interrupted, as if it couldn't explain Nana's feeling.
The original title - Vivre Sa Vie - can have two connotations, as it can be read as living your life or as living as a prostitute, since, as in Portuguese, at the time the film was shot, prostitute was also called a woman of life.
Finally, Vivre Sa Vie has a tragic ending, a hallmark of several of Godard's films. This moral lesson at the end is what bothers me, but even so, it's a great movie and should be seen and reviewed by those who really love cinema.
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