The Golden Age Of Hollywood
The Top 200 Movies

150
A Bout de Souffle
(Breathless)
Release date 16th March 1960
Country : France
Running time : 87 mins
Genre : Drama / Thriller
Starring Jean Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg
Screenplay by Jean Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut
Directed by Jean Luc Godard

A young car thief kills a policeman and goes on the run with his American girlfriend. Eventually she betrays him to the police.

The film which really announced the arrival of the French New Wave with the involvement of two of its main protagonists Truffaut and Godard. It is daring in its use of jump cuts and other elements which draw attention to cinematic technique but in other ways is highly conventional in its borrowing from US gangster films. It does get caught up in awkward chit-chat which is a bit dull and something its director over-indulged in later on but its entertaining enough and was very influential.
 
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An unnecessary US remake with Richard Gere appeared in 1983.

A film all dressed up for rebellion but with no real tangible territory on which to stand and fight. Peter John Dyer 

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DVD available from Fox Lorber :
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Written content copyright Derek McLellan,2005.
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