La Chinoise (1967)

Im Rahmen von Track 04

 

La Chinoise (F 1967, R: Jean-Luc Godard)

 

La Chinoise dwells on the interactions of a group of Maoist students as they hunker down in a comfy flat — it belongs to the parents of a friend, away for the summer — to discuss politics, ideologically purify themselves, fall in and out of love, and prepare to assassinate a Soviet cultural ambassador. (In the era of French intellectuals’ love affair with the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the status-quo Soviets were almost as big an enemy as the Americans.)

All of this is presented in highly self-aware fashion, with direct address and immaculately designed frames. (At times, you wonder if the characters are in love with Maoism so much as they are with the color red.) That playfulness lightens the didacticism. We’re invited to wonder about the authenticity of these characters we see onscreen: Is their lack of artifice, and the performers’ lack of actor-ly affect, a sign that they are merely mouthpieces, or does it actually speak to their sincerity? The Village Voice