Public Comment

Along with all those who love the art of cinema, I mourn the death, apparently by assisted suicide, on September 13 of Jean-Luc Godard. Moreover, as someone who was closely linked with Godard throughout his tempestuous film career, I feel his death in quite personal ways. While I always supported what Godard tried to convey of the world in political and cinematic terms, and in spite of having many personal interactions with him, I never found Jean-Luc Godard a warm, likeable human being. Quite the contrary. He was always cranky and elusive, even when he knew how much I understood and supported his efforts. Godard was the ultimate contrarian. If he asked you what you were doing, and you replied, “I’m teaching film,” Godard would pointedly retort, “I’m learning about film.” Thereby one-upping you and scoring brownie points. 

Look. It’s possible that Godard resented my criticism of the rebuke he and Jean-Pierre Gorin gave to Jane Fonda in their film LETTER TO JANE. And it’s also possible he didn’t like my critique of the “everyman for himself” mentality of his film SAUVE QUI PEUT/LA VIE, even though I acknowledged how Godard in that film might well be trying to help viewers get out of the trap of viewer identification with a lead character and instead deal with the film as addressed to them as sentient, open-minded film viewers. 

On the other hand, what can I say about the time in San Diego when I told Godard that Herbert Marcuse, a friend of mine, was interested in meeting him, Godard just shrugged this off, saying “À quoi ça sert?” When I replied, “Ça sert au mouvement progressif,” Godard just shrugged it off. To me, this was a betrayal, 

Much later, in an unpublished artIcle, I severely criticised Godard for the anti-Jewish subtext of his film ÉLOGE DE L’AMOUR. Look. Criticism of Israel for its persecution and oppression of Palestinians is legitimate and much-needed, I argued; but the kind of criticism Godard levelled against Jews in general in Godard’s film was deplorable. (I gave a version of this unpublished article a few years ago in a talk at Pacific Film Archive after a screening of ÉLOGE DE L’AMOUR.)So, finally, now that Godard is gone, I’m left with my mixed emotions and a lifetime of intimate or not so intimate involvement with Jean-Luc Godard. The very last film of his I saw was ADIEU AU LANGAGE, a film that marked Godard’s farewell to human affairs and a retreat into nature and the animal world, the latter represented by his wife’s dog, who featured prominently in this film and was given star-billing in the list of characters. The only human characters in this misanthropic film are a couple, mere ciphers, who walk around nude and talk endlessly, even on the toilet, about sex, death, and shit. While I share some of Godard’s pessimism about humanity, what I mostly appreciate about ADIEU AU LANGAGE is Godard’s beautiful imagery of nature, the changing of the seasons, and the life of his wife’s dog, who is shown swimming exuberantly in swift mountain streams in the Swiss Alps.Godard’s images of wildflowers in this film are worthy of Claude Monet. For me, this is at least one final affirmative moment I can take from my lifelong, complex involvement with the career and person of the great, innovative filmmaker that was Jean-Luc Godard.