Jacques Rozier's Adieu Philippine never got the attention or admiration it deserved as one of the key films of the French New Wave. Almost impossible to find, the film (and Rozier's reputation) have floundered while its contemporaries have become enshrined as masterpieces of world cinema. And this just isn't fair. Adieu Philippine combines the visual flamboyance of early Godard with the honest human drama that propelled the work of Truffaut. It manages to be a movie about a teenage love triangle that doesn't feel sappy or artificial. Though they are young and foolish, Rozier's subjects aren't the vapidly self-absorbed teens that polluted so many of Godard's films with esoteric monologues about philosophical baby-babble and half-smoked cigarettes. They feel like actual people young enough to make mistakes yet old enough to realize how foolish they are. Here is a film full of the energy and excitement of youth. Beautifully shot, the city of Paris and the beaches of Corsica have rarely looked so vibrant and inviting. Adieu Philippine achieves almost everything Godard set out to do with Breathless (1960) intellectually and artistically. And Rozier did it without heavily relying on a single editing gimmick, too.
8/10
No comments:
Post a Comment