GODARD’S NIGHTMARE ROAD TRIP

By Raymond Benson

Jean-Luc Godard was the bad boy of the French New Wave. Whereas his contemporaries such as Francois Truffaut were “safe” and “accessible,” Godard liked to shock people. A lot of his work, especially in the sixties, was also political in nature—this was a man unafraid to scathingly portray French bourgeois society at its worst and trumpet his views on class discrepancy with the ferocity of a bull dog. In other words, he enjoyed pissing off audiences.

Released in 1967 with the opening titles caveat that “children under 18 should not see this film,” we are told at the beginning that Weekend (or Week End or Week-end, depending on what country you’re in) is a film “found on the trash heap.” It is one of the darkest and most vicious black comedies ever made, and naturally, it is one of Godard’s best pictures. It is simultaneously fascinating, repulsive, and hilarious, and not for the faint of heart. But discerning fans of art house cinema should eat it up.

The story, as it were, involves a bickering married couple (Mireille Darc and Jean Yanne, both of whom were major French TV stars at the time the film was made) who have plans to kill each other and run off with their respective lovers. But before that can happen, they have to murder Darc’s father so she will inherit his wealth. They set off across country to her parents’ home and find themselves on a nightmare journey through a landscape of traffic jams, automobile accidents (and fatalities) at nearly every juncture, and violence. The humor comes with the couple acting as if it’s all part of everyday life.

One celebrated sequence is a lengthy tracking shot along a road backed up with vehicles. As our anti-heroes attempt to pass the idling cars and trucks to move to the head of the line, we’re treated with all kinds of sight gags (such as one car that’s facing the opposite direction and wedged between two vehicles going the right way). We laugh and laugh. Then, when we finally reach the front of the traffic jam, we see that the cause was a bad accident, and entire families are lying bloody in the road. The couple drives through the scene as if the holdup was a minor nuisance. Later, when the couple’s car is also in a collision and catches fire, Darc is more upset about her Hermes handbag getting burned than the fact that she and her husband are covered in blood and the car is destroyed. That’s the kind of movie Weekend is.

Criterion’s new digital restoration with uncompressed monaural soundtrack is superb. The cinematography by Raoul Coutard always had a color documentary feel to it, but the Blu-ray brings out a sharpness hitherto unseen in prints. Extras include archival interviews with the stars and assistant director, an archival piece on Godard featuring on-set footage, and more. The thick booklet contains an essay by critic/novelist Gary Indiana, selections from a 1969 interview with Godard, and excerpts from a Godard biography.

Weekend was a comment on French society in 1967, and the irony today is that the film might be even more relevant in our own present world.

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