Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #162331 in DVD
• Released on: 2006-02-28
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Format: PAL
• Original language: German, English, French
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish
• Running time: 110 minutes

Album Description
PAL/Region 0. Pierro escapes his boring society and travels from Paris to the Mediterian Sea with Marianne, a girl, who is chased by hit-men from Algeria. They lead a unortodox live, always on the run. Features Jean-Paul Belmondo. Directed by Jean-Luc Goddard. *Please note you will need an All Code DVD player to view. 2006.

Amazon.com essential video
Ferdinand (Jean-Paul Belmondo) is a man who has married for money and is terribly disillusioned with his life. When forced to go to a dinner party he does not want to attend, he throws a temper tantrum and returns home early. When driving Marianne (Anna Karina), the babysitter, back home, they fall in love and decide to run away from Paris. They embark on a series of escapades that begins with running illegal arms for extra cash and runs the gamut: love, death, ennui, boat chases, murder, betrayal, revenge, lost cash, and almost anything else you can think of, and all with a sense of reality that is an interesting contrast to the typical American film. Jean-Luc Godard (Breathless, Alphaville) blends different genres with great success and achieves moments of cinematic poetry in this quasi-epic of modern malaise. Also a cameo by the Hollywood director Samuel Fuller is something to watch for. Be aware that Godard is for people seriously interested in cinematic art. --James McGrath

Customer Reviews

About the DVD...
My exposure to Godard films were through VHS tapes. I was too young to watch his 60's films in their original formats. The transfer is not too great but good enough. The colors are right, it is thankfully letterboxed, etc. even if there are a few image distortions, artifacts and the sharpness and overall quality leaves a lot of room for improvement. There is something very wrong, however, with the sound especially towards the fifth chapter (that's the 5th access in the chapter search of which there are only 6 - thanks to Fox/Lorber!) Thankfully, this is a subtitled film (can't be switched off/on, they're pasted on the screen) otherwise, even the French won't understand the French dialogue. The noise distortion is terrible, but could it be Godard's deliberate way to convey sound since it is the part in which the CB radios or walkie-talkies were being used in the scene? My impression is that the technician in charge was probably asleep or didn't care when this noise distortion was taking place and the DVD didn't go through quality control which could have fixed it. I haven't seen the original so I don't know but since this is a Godard film, anything goes. But then the distortion continued even after that scene so any reasoning to defend Fox's negligience on this matter proved futile. I found it terribly distracting and I thought it pulled down the quality all the more of this already mediocre DVD transfer. Is this the best version yet? How does the VHS version rate? Fox/Lorber is hit and miss with DVDs. They did good with Seven Beauties, Last Year at Marienbad, and the already LD Criterion-restored Umbrellas of Cherbourg and 400 Blows but did very poorly with A Woman is a Woman, several Truffaut films and even the relatively recent Padre Padrone. What a shame that a company like Fox/Lorber gets the rights to release these great Foreign films but doesn't have the interest to come up with quality transfers. I think this is a waste of our hard-earned money to buy the DVDs that they produce. Next time you buy from Fox/Lorber, read the reviews... otherwise just rent or wait for a better re-release in the future.

Wild and wonderful Godard. Washed out lousy transfer
I saw a print of this film in NYC in the late 80s. It was pristine, colorful and a great experience. Along with Truffaut, Godard epitomized the French New Wave of the '50s and '60s, and this film along with "Woman is a Woman," was one of his best. The use of color is amazing. Sadly, the source print for this DVD is oddly washed out, contains a few tears and pops in the sound track. It's hard to believe there wasn't a better copy available for Fox Lorber to use.

pitiful joy
The five stars go to the movie, not to the dvd edition.This is a joyful, playful, charming movie by Godard, of course. But the dvd edition is simply infamous and shows and amazing contempt for the viewer.The picture quality is poor, the sound is even worse and half of the subtitles can't be read. Although the letterbox format has been respected, no one has bothered to place the subtitles in the lower black fringe. When the white letters happen to be on white and pale colours you can't read a thing. Godard does not seem to be much fancied at Fox/Lorber quarters: they haven't spent a dime on this edition.