Famed Franco-Swiss director Jean-Luc Godard, who basically fueled French New Wave cinema with his debut 1960 feature “Breathless,” has died. He was 91.
Confirmed yesterday by his family, Godard reportedly died peacefully in his home surrounded by his close ones. His last film was 2018’s “The Image Book” which premiered at Cannes.
Considered an anti-establishment maverick, he was famed for his long takes, fourth wall breaking and all sorts of other playing around with cinematic form, which revolutionised the art of cinema for generations to come.
“Breathless”, for example, used handheld cameras, improvisation, and jump-cuts, offering a highly kinetic film that some consider one of the most seminal works of cinema since “Citizen Kane”.
He turned down multiple attempts to lure him to Hollywood and famously was critical of everything about it, including Steven Spielberg.
His biggest commercial hit was “Contempt,” starring Brigitte Bardot as the wife of a disillusioned scriptwriter (Michel Piccoli). Other famed titles included “Week-End,” “Pierrot le Fou,” “Alphaville,” “Bande a Part,” “The Little Soldier,” “La Chinoise” and the more recent “Goodbye to Language”.
Over the years, he became increasingly reclusive – only returning to narrative cinema with a few films in the 1970s and 1980s and his ambitious late 1990s multi-part project “Histoire(s) du Cinema”.
Source: Variety
