Band of Outsiders

( 4 )

Overview

One of pioneering director Jean-Luc Godard's most accessible films is this French spin on Dolores Hitchens' novel Fool's Gold. It tells the tale of three disaffected youths who plan a burglary, leading to deadly results. The alienated young trio is marvelous, particularly Anna Karina, and the early scenes of their clearly overdeveloped fantasy lives are splendidly handled. Something of a companion piece to Godard's classic À Bout de Souffle, its young characters have the same odd mixture of fatalism and ...
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Overview

One of pioneering director Jean-Luc Godard's most accessible films is this French spin on Dolores Hitchens' novel Fool's Gold. It tells the tale of three disaffected youths who plan a burglary, leading to deadly results. The alienated young trio is marvelous, particularly Anna Karina, and the early scenes of their clearly overdeveloped fantasy lives are splendidly handled. Something of a companion piece to Godard's classic À Bout de Souffle, its young characters have the same odd mixture of fatalism and starry-eyed naïveté that is, by turns, appealing and tragic. Trivia buffs should note that the film gave its name to Quentin Tarantino's production company A Band Apart, and several of its scenes are echoed in his Pulp Fiction.
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Editorial Reviews

Barnes & Noble - Eddy Crouse
In 1963, director Jean-Luc Godard deftly changed gears from the CinemaScope corrosion of Contempt to the rough-and-ready black-and-white of Band of Outsiders. From the outset of the rinky-dink credits, the film never relents on charm, dwelling in the same petty-crime mind-set that haunted Breathless -- and in a world where characters are as likely to talk to the audience often about other movies as to each other. Living with her aunt in the permanently overcast outskirts of Paris, Odile Anna Karina finds herself caught between two semi-tough nuts, Franz Sami Frey and Arthur Claude Brasseur, who, among other ploys, infiltrate Odile's language class in order to pass her suggestive notes. Not unlike Godard himself, this unsteady trio is already in firm command of filmic gestures, and consequently Band of Outsiders is suffused with a slew of ecstatic only-in-the-movies moments. Woven throughout the loopy, romantic plot are Brasseur’s resonant impression of a gunshot from Billy the Kid, a light-speed run through the entirety of the Louvre, and a hilarious, whispered voice-over that updates latecomers as to what’s transpired 15 minutes into the film. Although the boys eventually rope Odile into a fatally botched heist, the story remains effervescent. The scene where all three dance the Madison remains sublime and eternal, marking this possibly as the most purely pleasurable of Godard's films.
All Movie Guide - Louis Schwartz
Bande à part is the story of three alienated French youths (Odile, Arthur, and Franz) who attempt an ill-fated burglary. Bande à Part is one of the easiest Godard films to follow because its story is presented linearly and without disruptive montage. Although the film does not generate much narrative tension, it does capture the atmosphere among Odile, Arthur, and Franz. Bande à part contains two of the most memorable and exciting scenes of the French New Wave: a scene in which Odile, Arthur, and Franz run through a museum, and a scene in which they dance to a jukebox in a cafe. The dance scene has been borrowed in many films, including Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Rio Das Mortes and Hal Hartley's Simple Men. Bande à part is driven by its actors and the chemistry among them. It uses their interactions to document the feeling of being young and French in the early 1960s.
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Product Details

  • Release Date: 3/25/2003
  • UPC: 037429170236
  • Original Release: 1964

    • Rating:

  • Source: HOMEVISION
  • Format: VHS

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits
Anna Karina Odile
Claude Brasseur Arthur
Sami Frey Franz
Louisa Colpeyn Mme. Victoria
Michel Delahaye Doorman at School
Danièle Girard English teacher
Jean-Luc Godard Voice Only
Claude Makovski Pupil
Ernest Menzer Arthur's uncle
Georges Staquet Legionnaire
Technical Credits
Jean-Luc Godard Director, Screenwriter
Antoine Bonfanti Sound/Sound Designer
Francoise Collin Editor
Raoul Coutard Cinematographer
Philippe Dussart Producer, Production Manager
Agnès Guillemot Editor
Michel Legrand Score Composer
René Levert Sound/Sound Designer
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Customer Reviews

Average Rating 5
( 4 )
Rating Distribution

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4 Star

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