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Bookmark this pageA Bout de Souffle (1959)
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Godard's first feature, adapted from an existing scenario written by François Truffaut, spins a pastiche with pathos as joyrider Belmondo shoots a cop, chases friends and debts across a night-time Paris, and falls in love with a literary lady. Seberg quotes books and ideas and names; Belmondo measures his profile against Bogart's, pawns a stolen car, and talks his girlfriend into a cash loan 'just till midday'. The camera lavishes black-and-white love on Paris, strolling up the Champs-Elysées, edging across café terraces, sweeping over the rooftop skyline, Mozart mixing with cool jazz riffs in the night air. The ultimate night-time film noir noir noir... until Belmondo pulls his own eyelids shut when he dies. More than any other, this was the film which epitomised the iconoclasm of the early Nouvelle Vague, not least in its insolent use of the jump-cut.Author: CA
User reviews of this film
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- zipping through said...
- Posted on Aug 31 2009 20:24 Has it really been 30 years since Jean Seberg left us ? It seems like yesterday. Beautiful, beautiful girl in 'Breathless' !
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- just me said...
- Posted on Apr 22 2009 13:52 6 stars
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- just me said...
- Posted on Apr 22 2009 13:51 Classic. The scenario written by Truffaut ; the quick, 'jump-cut' editing ; Jean Seberg ; Paris : everything is enchanting & perfectly matched. Classic.
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Cast & crew
Director: Jean-Luc Godard
Producer: Georges de Beauregard
Cast: Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg, Daniel Boulanger, Jean-Pierre Melville, Henri-Jacques Huet, Liliane Robin, Roger Hanin, Jean-Luc Godard full cast
Genre(s): Film Noir
Rated: PG
Duration: 90 mins
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