A Married Woman

Commercialized and superficial Charlotte has to choose between her husband (Pierre) and her lover (Robert). She tells her lover that she is will leave Pierre and marry him. However, when she is with Pierre she makes love with him and tries to successfully raise his son. I believe the small boy in the film had a separate birthmother. Pierre tells Charlotte that he wants to have a baby with her, Charlotte responds by telling him he already has one, Pierre states that the boy is not hers. Robert also wants to have a baby with Charlotte, which was stated in one of many overdone scenes of close-up touching.

In between measuring her breasts and fantasizing over lingerie advertisements and in vogue magazines, Charlotte discovers that she is pregnant. This is a strange predicament since she is having sex with two men that both want to conceive a child with her. This issue is left unsolved and the audience is left wondering what happened.

The movie is filled with symbolism and long philosophical rants that are often broken into categories or chapters. I particularly enjoyed Pierre’s co-workers definition of intelligence; in fact this may have been my favorite part of the film. I do believe Godard added this scene to reveal Charlotte’s stupidity. She was the exact opposite of the given in depth definition of intelligence.

Again, the female lead irked me. She was an incredibly materialistic person who was mostly influenced by main stream media and pop-culture. She needed to fit the “ideal”. I found it hilarious when she was measuring her bust—it seemed to be the most complicated and inaccurate way to measure anything! The magazine told her to draw imaginary lines after every measurement. Charlotte seemed pleased because she was very close to having “the perfect bust”.

All around I was pretty disinterested in the film, mainly because I was disinterested in Charlotte and both of her lovers. Pierre seemed both spineless and demanding. He must have known she was unfaithful since he once had her followed. It was almost like he used his wife’s infidelity as a way to control her. He would ask her questions such as “Have you been a good girl?” It seemed he used this against her to get what he wanted sexually.

Robert was simply a boring character. As far as I am concerned he was just a part of the many overdone close ups of male and female limbs.