Michel Poiccard (Jean-Paul Belmondo)’s opening line “After all, I’m an arsehole” sets the tone beautifully. From there he embarks on a crime-spree that is motivated neither by malice nor desperation, but because it is his default setting. He is immune to remorse. From car theft to extortion to mugging to the murder of a policeman he doesn’t hesitate and doesn’t bat an eyelid. He is amoral and thoroughly ambivalent to society moving instinctively according to his code “informers inform, burglars burgle, murders murder, lovers love”. Indeed he even considers the love he has for Jean Seberg’s Patricia to be something to regret. He is just a mixed-up kid, aping Bogart and playing at life. To Michel we are what we are by nature and we simply have to follow our course without deviation, to him it is that simple. He speaks of his love for and disdain for France and the French and Americans and other things, but the words ring hollow. Belmondo speaks these sentences whilst emoting others (he really gets behind “never use the brakes. As old man Bugatti used to say ‘I build cars to run not to stop” and you can see that ‘run not stop’ ethos lives within him throughout the film). When Godard positions him in front of a poster that shouts ‘live dangerously until the end’, Michel’s raison d’être is encapsulated in a moment. Building the film around a character as reprehensible as Michel Poiccard (strip away Belmondo’s charm and what’s left isn’t pretty) would have made for a very difficult and perhaps shallow viewing experience- indeed the storyline can probably be comprehensively summarised in a sentence. This is why Patricia is so important. She too is a mixed-up kid, she too has a kind of dubious morality and she too offers platitudes and opinions without conviction, but she is redeemable and fundamentally good whereas Michel is fundamentally rotten. Her emotional wrangling (“I don’t know if I’m unhappy because I’m free or free because I am unhappy”) is an important counterpoint to Michel’s animal instinctiveness. Her role is also important as it permits Godard to question such things as the female role (French feminism at this time was a vital political force), infatuation, mortality, love and sensuality and- perhaps most importantly- predestination and happiness. On a philosphical basis, there is a tremendous amount in À Bout de Souffle to consider.
The thing which I love about À Bout de Souffle probably more than any other film, though, is its cool. I know that it’s childish to label something cool or even to love something because you think it’s cool but I don’t care- maybe I’m just a mixed-up kid too! The look of the film whether by pragmatic inspiration or design is, there’s no other word for it, breathtaking. Jim Jarmusch- who I love dearly- built a career on this stuff. The whole film is shot on a hand-held and allows Godard and his cinematographer Raoul Coutard (the only men involved in shooting the film) to focus in on faces and follow them around- there is a marvellous scene in the Travel Agents as they firstly follow Michel as he approached the desk, then Michel and Tolmatchoff (Richard Balducci), then Michel again and as he leaves we follow the arriving Detectives as they repeat his journey just a step behind him. The film also utilises high-angle shots from rooftops and balconies showing Michel and Patricia in the context of the busy city. Their story is at once immediate and yet one of many thousands of stories. Another aspect of the spliced scenes is the insistent urgency that they give the story, along with the great jazzy soundtrack- and in particular the piano/trumpet refrain- by Martial Solal, a real zest and vigour. I honestly can’t speak highly of this film, I love it in more ways than my paltry descriptive powers will allow me to express. It means the world to me.
