HISTOIRE(S) DU CINÉMA - MOMENTS CHOISIS

Jean-Luc Godards Histoire(s) du cinéma Moments choisis is a thought-provoking 35mm condensation-cum-summation of his multi-part video series Histoire(s) du cinéma. In an early montage the director likens his spectators to the brother and sister characters of Charles Laughtons Night of the Hunter, cast adrift on a treacherous, mythopoetic river of dreams. This and one other sequence a superb aural and visual deconstruction of Hitchcock, kicked off by a repeated dissolve between The Birds fleeing schoolchildren and stock-footage of wartime bombers attacking their targets are reminders of why Godard remains a vital and important cinematic figure. The director himself has suggested that every cut is a lie; Godards approach, then, is the continual juxtaposition and superimposition of «lies» in an ongoing search for truth. Thus, Histoire(s) du cinéma Moments choisis mimics the workings of its creators mind: one thought, one reference leads inexorably to others, sight and sound mirroring the inherently questioning nature of the human soul. (Keith Uhlich)

«Not half a dozen men have ever been able to keep the whole equation of pictures in their heads», F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote in «The Last Tycoon». Godard is one of them.
(Jim Hoberman)