In Praise of Love

In Praise of Love:

Is it just me or is Godard starting to slip in to an unconscious and distorted oblivion? “In Praise of Love” was layered with so many ideals that once again they were all lost, and once again I was left shaking my head. How can one film have three separate love stories (if you want to call them stories), knock Spielberg, tackle pompous Americanism, deal with a film within the film and give us a history lesson on the French Revolution…all while adding extremely thick dialogue coated with “deep” and often random thoughts? The answer; it cant. It was a mess--if it was not for the cinematography and the lack of color contrasted with the overuse of color—I would have fallen asleep.

I hate to sound bitter, but Godard’s modern works simply are unbearable. Like an athlete who hangs up the sneakers after his knees give out, it looks like Godard should have hung up the scripts and camera. It seems the flaws that actually helped make earlier films more beautiful and real, have been overexposed and equate to an explosion of sleep worthy modern Godard films.

I also have a slight problem with Godard completely contradicting himself. I may have misinterpreted it (which is most likely the case, since this film was so poorly put together) but he seems to take a feminist stand. Correct me if I am wrong, but he makes a statement against female nudity in American cinema. This is strange, since the last five films I have watched had dozens of naked females in the shots. He also once had a fascination with female prostitutes, and used them as main characters. Is he saying it is only okay when he does it? Why cant American cinema also be misogynistic? His point is not what bothers me, what bothers me is his obvious contradictions. It was as if he was searching for anything to attack Hollywood cinema.