Passion

For the '60s generation, Godard effectively reinvented cinema, but for many who came to movies in the '70s he trailed a reputation as a verbose, didactic, doctrinaire apologist for the 'lost causes' of May '68. Passion brought a chance to (re)discover what all the fuss was about. Reunited with cameraman Raoul Coutard after 16 years, and with a trio of great actors (Huppert, Schygulla, Piccoli), he orchestrates his personal passions for classical music, romantic painting, and the business of film-making around his favourite theme of how life relates to love. In a film studio, a Polish director is recreating in tableaux vivants a series of celebrated paintings by Goya, Ingres, Delacroix, Rembrandt and El Greco (breathtakingly lit and framed by Coutard), but the backers complain that there's no story. Outside, at the hotel, are many stories, but none is allowed to assume centre stage and focus your vision on a single narrative. Godard asks you to look everywhere at once, offering sounds and images that astonish the senses and tease the mind. It's a film you'll need - and want - to see several times.