2 or 3 Things I Know About Her

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!

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.

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

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

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.

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

even if it were good political philosophy (it isn't), it's terrible cinema. there isn't much more to say about the worst of godard's interminable tedium.

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.

Beautiful images, with a boring artso-fartso speech.

Completely defies categorization in the conventional sense; in one respect it's about a woman who works as a prostitute for some extra cash, but it's periphery to the plotless essay-like exploration of the capitalist borne ills of modern society. It's an airy meditation of various philosophical questions in the postmodern world, but it's also very playful, whimsical, and capricious. A lesser artist wouldn't have the range to pull off such a brilliant dynamic in such an unconventional context.

This movie is a thankfully short, yet endless rambling rant that if often incoherent, uncategorised, and flat. Apart from some impressive cinematics that actually match and accentuate the philosophical narration, like the coffee scene, there's not much here to sink your teeth into in this stream-of-consciousness improvisational-esque washing-machine of a film.

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

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

This is the most whispery Godard film I've seen yet. Basically, he tries to get all of his points across through whispers, and through characters talking to the camera. There are sometimes where what Godard says clicks. There are others when you are shaking your head at his attempt to sound philosophical or something. As with any Godard film, it looks nice and there are some good moments (the kid's dream, the coffee cup) but mostly it's just lame. (My 100th Criterion film)

# 191

Never have I heard a philosophy vocabulary used to say so little. And I've seen The Fountainhead.

Godard's willingness to eschew and challenge conventional cinema/storylines can lead to things like Contempt or Band of Outsiders, or it can be this and be banal and aimless. Sure, there are definitely things tying it together thematically but the experimental nature of it comes across as shallow and, if we're being honest, boring as hell. It was really hard to get through this and my mind wandered, making listening to his philosophies especially difficult. Even his delivery is tedious.

I really didn't get this. Maybe next time.

Less than 20 minutes into the film and the whispering narrator really started to get on my nerves. I know this was making commentary on consumerism but the movie felt too shallow and vapid which in addition to the narration just had my eyes straying to the clock every few minutes.

(Viewed on 6/02/13): Godard's rambling essay films make a strong case for why cinema shouldn't be strictly about ideas. Raising questions is fine, but cinema is better at exploring states than ideas. It's no coincidence that the best moments of 2 or 3 touch on the problems of contemporary existence, such as consumerism and urban blight as a result of sterile modern architecture. There are some fascinating moments, but the overall analysis of 'postmodernity' is restricted by his leftist dogma.

224

There's a softness here, a disinterestedness, and a calm methodology that I find very pleasing. Cohesiveness is blurred through distance. I'm not interested in Godard's ideas, even less his dated politics, but essay films are often pleasing for the vague reasons I hint towards. I believe I have an odd way of approaching cinema and have yet to figure out what I'm talking about myself.

The philosophical musing aren’t always interesting or as smart as Godard think they are. Lot of it feels underdeveloped. Some of the socio-economical and political commentary, especially his flirting with communist China and hang up on The Vietnam War, are dated. But there are some insightful moments. Above all cinematically surprisingly this was very engaging. Which stems from Godards obvious joy in deconstructing conventions. And while it doesn’t all succeed a lot of it works.

zomg language

81.000

It's July 18 2018--I just finished watching this. And I relate to this on so many levels in my life right now. I feel like Godard is very much both an extreme thinker and an extreme feeler... and I love seeing them clash/synthesize. I also love the little shots/scenes of all the minor characters. And wow, the mid-late 60s were such a great time for fashion and cultural aesthetics. :) ALSO: the coffee scene.

That pinball machine noise totally sucked my brain out.

has godard read saussures cours de linguistique générale or not?

30 dias de JLG - Filme #1. Apesar de já ter assistido dezenas de filmes do Godard, ainda me falta muito para completar sua filmografia de 133 filmes, vou assistir 30 deles agora (entre curtas, médias e longas) e o que faltar deixo para o centenário. Interessante ter assistido esse logo depois de Mulheres da Boca, aqui Godard coloca a mulher prostituída como alegoria da sociedade de consumo, por mais peculiar que isso seja, daria uma excelente double feature com o They Live do Carpenter. Mubi.

"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

There are not many things I know about this one.

I didn’t really take to this it seemed overly french art house and philosophical. There was nothing I warmed to that made me want to unpack it more.

80.750

(Rewatch) Yeah, it really is pretty dry even by Godard's usual standards, but even so i can definitely appreciate it a lot more now. It helps that i actually know something about what he's talking about, i mean it's basically a movie all about semiotics and phenomenology so i can't help but sort of like it. That said, it's interesting to see him making tentative steps towards a more poetic approach that i think was still beyond his grasp at this point (which would come to fruition in the '80s).

252

Give him points for trying to turn movies into something they're not: intellectual. If you want.

I don't know, maybe this is how people talked in France in 1967, but this is one of those Godards where the kind of people I'd cross the street to avoid sit around and have philosophical conversations that are unlike any I have ever seen in the real world. I don't know whether it's smart or just thinks it is, but it's boring enough that I don't particularly care. It's the kind of art film that gives art films a bad name. At least it's fairly short.

mostly a film made by lots of random and mostly nonesensical scenes. sure, there are some beautiful women and really interesting shots here and there, but in the end its all just a mess of artsy fartsy bullshit with a half baked theme thrown on top of it.

#250

Godard has managed to do the seemingly impossible in the cinematic climate, deliver a dangerous film.

It's like Godard took a one-sided essay from a leftist magazine and some stylish shots showing life in poverty in Paris' bad economy and just mixed it all together without ever considering the audiences enjoyment in the process. Godard's directing style is stylish as usual, but without any remotely interesting content to go with it it becomes painfully boring. This film serves only to educate, in a hollow, shove it in your face way. And the pseudo-intellectual poetry...ugh.

chaotic and mesmerizing.