How Jean-Luc Godard Breathed New Life Into the Movies

There are many filmmakers that could be considered truly influential but there are few that could be considered as daring as Jean Luc-Godard. And there are even fewer that could claim to have transformed the medium of cinema in their first film! His first feature film, Breathless (À Bout de Souffle) released in 1960 and it dazzled audiences with its frantic style. There is a reason why Roger Ebert himself said of Breathless:

“Modern movies began here…no debut film since Citizen Kane in 1942 has been this influential” — Roger Ebert (2003)

The release of Breathless signified the beginning of La Nouvelle Vague (or The French New Wave), a film movement that was brought about by a group of young critics writing for a film magazine called Cahiers du Cinema. Unhappy with the safe, unexciting direction that cinema was going in, they decided to take matters into their own hands. Among this group was Francois Truffaut, Jacques Rivette and of course Jean-Luc Godard.

Films of this movement were made on a small budget and shared certain qualities that separated it from those that came before it. One of those was that the films were often shot on location as opposed to expensive studios. This meant that directors had to work with natural light and sound, giving their films a gritty, uniquely realistic documentary…