a couple good parts, but mostly boring, random crap

"The dualities that abound in Jean-Luc Godard's 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her are ubiquitous at whatever starting point one chooses." - Bill Weber

Heartwarming. Adapting Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew to a contemporary teenage American setting was a stroke of genius.

The score is more for the wonderful presentation than for the hollowness it contains within.

#250

Again rejecting conventional standards of filmmaking, Godard makes 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her a film of near-perfection. An essay of frustration written with personality and depth, his film engages, entertains and challenges as it observes the thoughts and lives of Parisians caught in cycles, becoming a kind of Vivre sa Vie by way of Masculin Feminin (with all Made in U.S.A.'s colour) that perfectly demonstrates why Godard has for so long been the world's greatest director of films.

In this film Godard has broken away from narrative in favor of a cinema of association. Word and image play off of one another as he foregrounds the world of ideas and leaves behind the full range of human experience. While I'm sympathetic to the impulse of the film, Godard's insistence on emotionally distancing the audience and presenting what amounts to a lecture comes across as a dated technique. Presenting ideas is easy. Reflecting ideas in a recognizable human being is the real challenge.

Hollow, underdeveloped, unfocused. Silly vagaries. Faux-intellectualism. Abstract poetics mixed with tedious politics. This is the Godard I hate.

Godard totally went to shit during this period. I found it hardly poetic; just empty stream of consciousness.

224

Beautiful images, with a boring artso-fartso speech.

I appreciate what Godard is trying to do, but on the whole it really just isn't interesting to watch. He throws so much stuff out there that there are some good moments, and it's relatively interesting visually as well. Unfortunately he also throws out a bunch of stuff that's just juvenile, or stupid, or trite or simply underdeveloped. Despite having pretty clear running themes, the film has absolutely no focus or direction making the whole thing often tedious. It's also missing the playfulness

# 191

More half-baked bullshit from Godard. All empty philosphical musings, the kind of uninteresting crap like "what do words mean?" and "how do I know that blue wasn't misnamed green?" that might fascinate a pack of stoned college freshmen but leaves me absolutely cold. Just a random collection of stuff that has nothing to do with anyone's lives, means nothing, reveals nothing. And he gets off some adolescent potshots at consumerism and America. Bravo for your impotent raging against the machine!

zomg language

I didn't like it, but who says all good films are intrinsically for me anyway? Sometimes films take work, experience, time to understand and appreciate. It is foolish to think that we can understand all films based on one watch, a few minutes thought and then putting the DVD in the closet uncontent with what we have been shown. Maybe it just isn't time for me to understand what is going on here yet and I'm fine with that and I will be returning to 2 Or 3 Things in the future when I'm ready.

It's all convoluted wannabe philosophical bullshit, and I'm tired of it. I'm tired of being looked down on; Godard's contempt is ridiculous. Some may find it amusing, somewhat brave of him as a filmmaker, but I, for one, find it beyond disrespectful to have my intelligence tested like this.

I kind of like the fact that this is one of the most focused political films Godard made (in his New Wave period, at least); there's a very prominent prostitution-as-capitalism theme running through it. On the other hand, Godard being serious often bores me to tears, and that's certainly the case here - and sometimes his attacks are simply inane, like the stupid washing powder scene. His philosophy seems a tad under-developed, so 90 minutes of him explaining it isn't very interesting to watch.

252

Godard is at his best here when he ponders ideas of consumerism and communication. Typical for the director at this time and hardly groundbreaking themes for consideration, but nonetheless addressed in a poetic, lyrical manner quite at odds what emerges as his perspective. Ruminations on urban renewal in particular resonate, as the wonderful architectural photography is very much at odds with the director's seeming disdain.

Watching this film is the equivalent of taking a hammer and breaking every one of your own toes for the sole purpose of writing about the experience in a scholarly journal. It seriously is a masochistic experience and I can't help but feel that Godard is out there somewhere, vigorously masturbating to the collective pain of his audience. This film is highly recommended for use at Guantanamo Bay.