The more it's avant-garde ,the more it's dated.
28 July 2003
One of these countless pseudo cinema vérité works which throve in the sixties in the wake of Godard and the events of 1968.This one is for highbrows ,die-hards.The rest of us can taketo their heel,or else they will yawn their head off.

Segment one is "l'indifference" :the beginning is some kind of illustration of Phil Ochs's song "outside of a small circle of friends"(1967);but soon enough is enough and when the reluctant driver appears ,it totally fails to convince.

Segment two is the most "avant-garde" ,so to speak ,of the lot: a dreadful pot-pourri of OM,Christian religion,group psychology(?).Some equivalent of one of Yoko Ono's pieces of work circa late sixties.

Segment three is Pasolini's contibution to this bill of fare:his favorite actor ,Ninetto Davoli,is wandering (dancing?)in the streets ,hoding a big paper flower(that's the title of the short).Let He who Hath understanding see the meaning.

Segment four is Godard's "l'amour".There are two sides:the political one,which focuses on Cuba,and some kind of self-criticism:his dogma ,his refusal to consider the movie as a story:at least here he says that it's not because you 've seen a lot of movies that you know the cinema;and that the seventh art is like maths before Euclide;and he goes not as far as to say that the nouvelle vague was Euclide.Modest,for a change.That does not make his segment interesting for all that.

Segment five takes place in an Italian university where student exchanges trivia about the Bourgeoisie's stranglehold on the culture.Plus ça change..

The precedent user complains about the different languages that they used in the different segments:now English,now Italian ,now French,even German;it's all in the cinema vérité game!

If you want to see a beautiful contemporary political movie that will not give you a headache ,take Luigi Comencini's "lo scopone scientifico" instead.
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