Godard's films often seem more like essays than "movies" per se. While this film can be called narrative only in the loosest definition of the term, and contains much of the direct philosophizing that has characterized Godard's late oeuvre, it struck me as being so immediately and intensely cinematic. This is absolutely a film. What do I mean by that? I guess I mean that it can't, perhaps shouldn't, be analyzed and translated into an essay synopsizing its ideas, which are undeniably rich.
First and foremost, this is a work about the images on screen, and what images they are. I didn't get to see Goodbye to Language in 3D, but I can only imagine it to be an almost overwhelming experience. The painterly grace of Godard's imagery cannot be overstated. (To think of the lively but crude camera-work of his early films when compared with the spectacular aesthetic grace on display here is to imagine an incredible artistic journey, perhaps the most radical maturation ever witnessed by an auteur.) Using a variety of different cameras and mediums, this seems to be Godard's most urgent attempt to capture life- in-the-world through cinema. The dude is really old now, and I suspect he may intend this as a final statement, him saying goodbye to the language to which he has devoted his life.
I also think it might be Godard's single most affirmational work. There is still plenty of the sardonic world-weariness we have come to expect from the man, but at heart this is a work about the way joy gives birth to pain, yet somehow manages to occasionally interrupt and sooth pain. Godard seems to be embracing life as he prepares to leave it, perhaps in hope of achieving the state of mind of the dog that is one of the film's three main characters: to love something more than one loves one's self.
First and foremost, this is a work about the images on screen, and what images they are. I didn't get to see Goodbye to Language in 3D, but I can only imagine it to be an almost overwhelming experience. The painterly grace of Godard's imagery cannot be overstated. (To think of the lively but crude camera-work of his early films when compared with the spectacular aesthetic grace on display here is to imagine an incredible artistic journey, perhaps the most radical maturation ever witnessed by an auteur.) Using a variety of different cameras and mediums, this seems to be Godard's most urgent attempt to capture life- in-the-world through cinema. The dude is really old now, and I suspect he may intend this as a final statement, him saying goodbye to the language to which he has devoted his life.
I also think it might be Godard's single most affirmational work. There is still plenty of the sardonic world-weariness we have come to expect from the man, but at heart this is a work about the way joy gives birth to pain, yet somehow manages to occasionally interrupt and sooth pain. Godard seems to be embracing life as he prepares to leave it, perhaps in hope of achieving the state of mind of the dog that is one of the film's three main characters: to love something more than one loves one's self.