2 or 3 Things I Know About Her

We’re in the final stretch of our retrospective Jean-Luc Godard  The Spirit of the Forms, but there’s still a ton of challenging and rewarding works to dive into. The final six days offer films from the 1960s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s and, with the inclusion of Film Socialisme, our current decade.

From Shakespeare adaptations to Tide laundry detergent, Friday offers an eclectic group from the Godard canon. Today, the filmmaker himself stars in a few of his movies. Keep Your Right Up (1:15PM) and King Lear (5:15) see Godard both behind and in front of the camera, and the masterful 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (7:30PM) features his soothing voiceover narration. Of that particular film, The Chicago Reader’s Dave Kehr wrote, “though poorly received on its first release, this 1966 film seems in retrospect one of Godard's most stimulating investigations of images and surfaces—the meanings they convey and the webs they spin.” Helas pour moi (3:15pm) featuring Gérard Depardieu and the Anna Karina-starring Made in U.S.A (9:30pm) also screen today.

The weekend brings even more riches. Saturday gives us the massive, 10-hour Six fois deux (screening in two parts), Godard’s first television venture. Part One will get started at 12:00pm, while Part Two will play at 6:00pm; can you go the distance with us? Sunday’s screenings include Le Petit Soldat, a very early Godard film made right after Breathless. We then jump 44 years into the future with Nôtre Musique, an emotional and worthwhile elegy on religion and its political implications. Godard also stars in this one (this time playing himself). Proving the expansiveness of the retrospective, Godard’s latest film, Film Socialisme, screens at 5:30pm, while Keep Your Right Up (9:45pm) and King Lear (7:45pm) play once more for those who couldn’t make it out on Friday.


Histoire(s) du Cinema

If you wound up loving Six fois deux so much on Saturday and found yourself needing to see it just once more, the television program gets an encore screening on Monday afternoon (Part One at 12:00pm and Part Two at 6:00pm). For the Jean-Luc completists out there, more Godard short films screen for free in our Amphitheater at 6:30pm, and for the politically-inclined, Struggle In Italy and Ici et Ailleuers (7:30pm) and Les Carabiniers (9:00pm) close out the night.

Tuesday and Wednesday bring even more provocative work of marathon length. France/Tour/Detour/Deux Enfants, a sociological study running five hours and twelve minutes, kicks off Tuesday evening (6:00pm), as our Godard Shorts Programs concludes with Program 4 screening for free in our Amphitheater (6:30pm). Wednesday provides an encore screening of Nôtre Musique at 5:00pm and, signaling the retrospective’s final bow, comes to a close at 7:00pm with a screening of Histoire(s) du Cinema, a sprawling, four-and-a-half-hour eight-part series that took Godard over 10 years to complete.

Need help deciding what to see? Check out our recent roundup of recommendations from the members of the NYFF Critics Academy here