Why so much hype?

Very well executed

Simply A Masterpiece

good back-story, and good acting

The Plot.Paul Javal is a writer who is hired to make a script for a new movie about Ulysses more commercial, which is to be directed by Fritz Lang and produced by Jeremy Prokosch. But because he let his wife Camille drive with Prokosch and he is late, she believes, he uses her as a sort of present for Prokosch to get get a better payment. So the relationship ends.This genre of self absorbed film-making went out of style 40 years ago. And it shows. It's very dated.The Technicolor and CinemaScope are cool but the movie is not engaging. And the music drags.BUT...there's Bridgette Bardot's ass. OMG. Perfection a la mode. What happened to her? She turned to dogs for love and turned into a fat old hag.

Jean-Luc Godard's Contempt is a beautiful film visually and an ugly film thematically, depicting the disintegration of a marriage. One wonders how Godard, who had just married the ravishing Anna Karina the same year Contempt was released, managed to write a film so pessimistic about the union of marriage and how it corrupts both parties mentally.The eye-popping color scheme of Contempt, thanks to Raoul Coutard's predictably wonderful cinematography as well as CinemaScope, a specific kind of anamorphic lens for widescreen shooting, is one of the defining reasons for this film's greatness. The process of CinemaScope enhances the color extraordinarily, adding a new layer of vivid texture to the film and a spot-on visual scheme throughout the film. Ordinary things like walking along the beach, admiring the ocean, or just simple conversations staged inside unremarkable buildings become a feast for the eyes simply because Godard uses this delightful method of shooting.But what a way to use the film's visual scheme to contrast it with its overall bleak tone. The film revolves around an American film producer Jeremy Prokosch (Jack Palance) who decides to adapt Homer's renowned and iconic piece Odyssey for the big screen. He hires famed director Fritz Lang, who treats the film as if it were an artistic indie film and not the epic he had envisioned. Prokosch decides to hire Paul Javal (Michel Piccoli), a writer and playwright, trusting him to handle Homer's work with the respect he knows it deserves.Paul, however, begins to feel increased pressure with adapting this work, as well as opposition in line of his own personal artistic expression as well as studio interest. To add to his already filling plate, Paul's marriage to the incredibly beautiful Camille (Brigitte Bardot) is on the rockiest of waters with persistent fights occurring between the two as well as Camille's hot and cold attitude towards him and their marriage.Godard's Contempt is a multilayered piece of work to say the least. The film can be taken as a surface examination of a marriage in total jeopardy, and perhaps a depiction of the death of a practical union between two impractical people, or simply seen as an on-screen showcase for the issues and opposition Godard faced when he began making films on his own in the 1960's. I've already established that Godard is a rebel filmmaker in every regard; he consciously set out to fight against typical French filmmaking conventions and, in turn, pushed French cinema through an unthinkable New Wave movement, redefining cinematic aesthetics, tampering with narrative convention, and even adding deeper morals and themes provided with new visionary techniques and darker tones to films.He puts his talents and his desire to destroy and construct to use with Contempt and, in turn, makes a fascinating film. Rotten Tomatoes' consensus on the film states that it is "essential cinema" and blends the ideas of "meta" and "physique," a statement I couldn't agree more with. Godard has always been big on abstraction with film to, at times, treading the line of being inaccessible in what he's trying to say. The best way that I've heard his work put, by a colleague, is that his films "are like having an intellectual conversation." So many ideas are getting tossed around, most of his films lack central ideas (one thing I've been known to critique with his films), and some I find to be next to impossible in trying to extract even some meaning out.Contempt is definitely abstract and lives up the description of "meta;" various scenes leave a viewer confused and questioning what they were supposed to take away from a certain part. However, the overarching theme of the decline of marriage and artistic creativity remains accessible and digestible through the abstraction. Just by the inclusion of Fritz Lang, one of Godard's biggest cinematic influences, we can evidently see that Godard is commenting about how warped studios become in money, profits, and the meticulous "Hollywood/film accounting" process that they forget about the visionaries, the film stylists, and those who have original ideas that desperately need to find ways out in the public. Cinema had to inherently be discovered by rebels, illusionists, and subversive artists, and these are the same people that are finding the film industry a harder and harder place to break out, let alone work. Through Paul Javal, Godard details this struggle beautifully.As stated, the film's style - or "physique" - is dashing in every regard. When one sees stills from the film taken out of context, one can easily infer Contempt to be a film masquerading in a more positive light than it actually is. However, make no mistake, as Contempt deals with the disintegration of a marriage in its darkest form. If capturing how difficult it was to make a film when you're barricaded by philistines wasn't subversive enough, Godard dares enter the realm of showing how marriage itself is a practical union between two people but people themselves aren't always practical. Look at the character of Camille, who seems to play psychological mind-games with her husband, never really solving anything and just getting him to dance around a whirlwind of mixed singles and unidentified irritations she seems to form overnight.After watching what I deem Godard's "happiest" film so far, his sophomore effort A Woman is a Woman, entering into Contempt's world was a rough wakeup call. Godard is one of the moodiest filmmakers I have yet to discover. I'd love to catch him on a good day, but he's so much more thought-provoking, alive, and blustering when he's angry.Starring: Michel Piccoli, Brigitte Bardot, Jack Palance, and Fritz Lang. Directed by: Jean-Luc Godard.

I hate Godard. I think that he's cold and pretentious and relies too often on technique and shock value to see his films through. Sometimes this works out well. Sometimes it doesn't. I am probably the only cinephile on the planet to think that Breathless was a steaming pile of crap, although I found both Alphaville and Masculin Feminin satisfyingly artistic and absurd. This one isn't bad either, and, apparently, unlike Godard's contemporaries, I found that Cinemascope suits his style very well. If this is selling out, I'm all for it.I was quite pleased to see Brigitte Bardot as I've always enjoyed her work. Other points of interest include the long panoramic shots of the Capri landscape and that really lovely string movement which kicks in about the same time. I'm not much of a fan of Jack Palance, but I was impressed that he was able to portray such a thoroughly unlikeable character so well. Fritz Lang was mildly annoying as the put-upon film director, and his character seem to exist solely of advancing the entirely wrongheaded notion that the director is the true and only auteur, and producers and writers and script-girls and cinematographers are all roadblocks between the director and his Art.One reviewer mentioned that this film is "difficult". It is not difficult. Good films shouldn't be difficult, they should be enjoyable. Symbolism, and imagery in particular, should exist to facilitate understanding of the themes, not to merely propel the work into highbrow territory. I found the symbolism in this film to be both clear and effective, and was therefore never confused. This is art film done right.

No, I'm really not a person that likes everything that is French and 'old'. As a matter of fact, I'm not too big on Jean-Luc Godard and really don't like all of his movies. This movie however was one I nearly fell in love with.In all truth and honesty, I was absolutely taken by its movie its style and approach. It's visuals were splendid and its subject manner was truly an unique and great one as well. It's a sort of a shame that the movie somewhat lost me in its middle part and its end also definitely wasn't as great as the beginning but overall this remains a movie I really admire and can be positive about.Of course it's being an artistic movie but what I like about it is that its being quiet and subtle art. It doesn't ever goes over-the-top with any kind of weirdness and instead really takes its time to subtly show and tell you what this movie is all about.The movie does truly feel like a moving painting. It's also because of the compositions and camera-work that the movie uses. It's filled with long shots, in which the camera is also occasionally slowly moving but never toward its subjects. It's being a very subjective, observing movie that views everything from a distance and doesn't use close-ups or any other movie tricks to bring out or emphasize certain emotions. I absolutely loved the cinematography and not just because of its use of vibrant colors.It makes the movie almost an hypnotic one and completely sucks you in. Because of the movie its approach and overall style of storytelling, you are forced to constantly keep paying attention, which will suck you all the more into the movie itself. Even when there is very little happening or being said, it still feels like there is plenty going on in this movie and I also most certainly won't call this a boring one.The movie is already a very special one for the fact that is stars the legendary director Fritz Lang in it, who is playing himself. He probably did it as a favor and out of respect for director Jean-Luc Godard, since Lang never starred in anything. It's basically good and fun to watch all actors in this, who each speak their own language. French, English, German and Italian gets constantly spoken throughout the entire movie, no doubt to also emphasize the differences and contrasts in the characters, who all have their own ideas about finishing a particular Fritz Lang directed movie. Besided the name of Lang, also the names of Brigitte Bardot and Jack Palance should arouse certain people's curiosity.But the movie does not only tickle the brain and is a feast for the eyes, it's easily great to the ears, due to the wonderful classical musical score by Georges Delerue.A true mesmerizing viewing experience!8/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/