Mireille Darc, Jean Yanne , Jean-Pierre
Kalfon , Valerie Lagrange, Jean-Pierre Léaud , Jean Eustache,
Paul Gégauff
Jean-Luc Godard's vision of a bourgeois
apocalypse, Weekend savages consumer society and gleefully deconstructs
narrative. A typical middle-class couple's casual sojourn into the
country lands them in the most nightmarish traffic jam in history.
In a single, 10-minute long dolly shot, Godard reveals a seemingly
interminable snarl of smashed and burning cars, bored motorists,
and dead bodies. The couple then finds themselves mixed up with
a band of forest-dwelling Maoists who rape, loot, and cannibalize.
As in much of Godard's late 1960s work, a plot summary only hints
at the film's rebellious absurdity. Constructed as a series of digressions,
the film shatters all cinematic conventions. Characters directly
address the camera (at one point, the male protagonist complains
to the audience about how ludicrous the film is, at another an African
garbage collector with no obvious connection to the film speaks
his mind to an off-camera interviewer); music wells up at inappropriate
times only to stop suddenly; and the camera spins and moves without
any respect for traditional cinema space. Although the film is dated
by its valorization of the once-fashionable ideology of Maoism,
its cathartic chaos and experimental style still make Weekend a
wicked romp for the cinematically adventurous. |