Breathless (1960 film)

Breathless
Theatrical release poster
FrenchÀ bout de souffle
Directed byJean-Luc Godard
Screenplay byJean-Luc Godard
Story by
Produced byGeorges de Beauregard
Starring
CinematographyRaoul Coutard
Edited byCécile Decugis
Music byMartial Solal
Production
company
Les Films Impéria
Distributed bySociété nouvelle de cinématographie
Release date
  • 16 March 1960 (1960-03-16)
Running time
90 minutes
CountryFrance
Languages
  • French
  • English
BudgetFRF 400,000(US$80,000)[1]
Box office2,295,912 admissions (France)[2][3]

Breathless (French: À bout de souffle, lit.'Out of Breath') is a 1960 French New Wave crime drama film written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard. It stars Jean-Paul Belmondo as a wandering criminal named Michel, and Jean Seberg as his American girlfriend Patricia. The film was Godard's first feature-length work and represented Belmondo's breakthrough as an actor.

Breathless is an influential example of French New Wave (nouvelle vague) cinema.[4] Along with François Truffaut's The 400 Blows and Alain Resnais's Hiroshima mon amour, both released a year earlier, it brought international attention to new styles of French filmmaking. At the time, Breathless attracted much attention for its bold visual style, which included then unconventional use of jump cuts.

Upon its initial release in France, the film attracted over two million viewers. It has since been considered one of the best films ever made, appearing in Sight & Sound magazine's decennial polls of filmmakers and critics on the subject on multiple occasions. In May 2010, a fully restored version of the film was released in the United States to coincide with the film's 50th anniversary.

  1. ^ Marie, Michel. The French New Wave: An Artistic School. Translated by Richard Neupert. John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2002. 65.
  2. ^ Box office information for film at Box Office Story
  3. ^ "The Nowhere Inn (2021)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 10 December 2021.
  4. ^ Film: Video and DVD Guide 2007. London: Halliwell's. 2007. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-00-723470-7.