Band of Outsiders (1964)

A triangle: Franz, Arthur, and Odile. Franz, a young man with Alain Delon good looks, has met Odile in an English class. She lives in Joinville with wealthy benefactors and has mentioned to Franz that Mr. Stolz keeps a pile of 10,000 franc notes unlocked in his room. Franz tells his friend Arthur, a swarthy guy whose shady uncle is pressing him for money. Arthur and Franz, who mimic American movie tough guys, case Odile's house, pressure her to assist them with a burglary, and make passes at her as well. She's alternately compliant and distressed. Will they pull off the heist? (imdb)
Cast and Information
Directed By: Jean-Luc Godard
Written By: Jean-Luc Godard, Dolores Hitchens
Starring: Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Brasseur, Anna Karina, Sami Frey, Georges Staquet, Jean-Claude Rémoleux, Danièle Girard, Chantal Darget, Louisa Colpeyn
AKA: Bande à part
Country: France
Where to Stream

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Magb | 100 98th |
There are so many great scenes in this movie. Take for instance the entire English class scene, Franz and Arthur reading progressively worse newspaper articles, the dancing in the café, the minute of silence, Odile singing on the Metro, Franz's story about the compulsive liar, the fucking insane race through the Louvre, and of course the ridiculous shootout at the end. It makes me want to see every single Godard film, just to get more of these fantastic moments.
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Alex Watkins | 5 91st |
One of the most playful movies I've ever seen; very quick, loose, and entertaining throughout, with a fresh-faced cast and an upbeat musical score. Even when the movie spirals into a minor tragedy towards the end, it swings back to a happy ending. It never takes itself all that seriously, which makes it a very easy watch. The movie is filled with great moments entirely insignificant to the plot, and that's what really makes it shine. That, and the gorgeous photography.
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Nathan S | 4 74th |
New Wave 101. Displays that "youthful iconoclasm" (thank you, Wikipedia) like nothing I had seen before. It's full of scenes that are playful, interspersed with moments of somber romance to provide some weight. Godard used several techniques that are radical even by today's standards.
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frederic_g54 | 5 21st |
Exercises in style are more often than not exercises in futility if that said exercise isn't backed up by a compelling narrative and/or characters I care about. Case in point: not sure what's so great about a pair of unlikeable hipsters harassing a naive girl into helping them rob a faceless side-character who - considering how much dough he has lying around (?) - should seriously improve security around his house. At least Anna Karina is a cutie.
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Barthalen | 75 68th |
Stylish, sure, but the characters are definitely lacking (and mostly unlikeable). Despite that, there are a lot of individual moments that seem daring and must have been refreshing for its day. The playful use of background music, dropping it as soon as it wasn't needed anymore, was pretty neat.
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djross | 88 97th |
Remarkable composition of nihilistic disinterest and joie de vivre, with numerous fantastic moments. Clearly an inspiration for PULP FICTION, but while Tarantino may have a facility for intricate and amusing dialogue, he has never been capable of capturing the tiny but expressive details of the interaction between the actors that is portrayed here with such great virtuosity.
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2 | gleeb | 69 32nd |
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There are some interesting scenes, but as a whole, I find it hard to give a damn about anything that's happening in this flick.
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Stain | 20 19th |
Another air pocket from Godard
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2 | owen1218 | 65 38th |
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Arthur is a horrendous misogynist douchebag. Franz is only a little better. Odile is your basic sexist caricature, a woman who is naive, passive to any suggestion, and completely absorbed in her appearance. This wouldn't bother me as much if Godard didn't want me to like Franz and Arthur, and laugh at Odile.
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KasperL | 70 65th |
This revered New Wave classic didn't do a lot for me but I can appreciate that everything is kept simple here by Godard who often gets on my nerves with going on referencing sprees and by trying to destroy (or reinventing, however you want to put it) the language of cinema. This one, though, has a plot and narrative progression and everything.
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MartinTeller | 88 91st |
Pure cinema, my favorite Godard.
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Moribunny | 55 44th |
A love triangle, a robbery, and abundant scenes of young people procrastinating: Band of Outsiders has all of old French cinema's favorite tropes, averagely written. It also has the kind of smug minimalist hipness peculiar to Godard, but what little charm it gave his previous films had dwindled by now. I don't find this movie to be as substantial as others do.
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1 | CatScandal | 65 53rd |
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Lots of interesting techniques and directorial touches, but ultimately the story doesn't feel worth telling. More interesting as a student of film than as a lover of film.
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TedDedon | 86 76th |
Strikes a good blend between the crime-drama and comedy aspects and is very entertaining throughout. The editing and direction excells. It's certainly among the best of the french new wave.
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roujin | 70 78th |
Girl and a gun. That's all you need.
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laertes | 82 98th |
If ever your grandchildren ask you: "Hey, oldtimer, what was the meaning of the word "cool" ?", show them this movie. Godard innovating cinema with a rapid-fire of on- and off-camera ideas. No wonder Tarantino named his production company after this.
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Obdurate | 85 80th |
It's an endearing and adventurous movie; the classic dance scene and moment of silence scene prove that. It's funny while working well as a crime drama, with fun dialogue and compelling characters. Ultimately, it's not as experimental as some other Godard films, but the accessibility does not mean it's sub-par. This is brilliant film making.
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Neonman | 36 2nd |
Three reprehensibly uninteresting characters badly stage a "heist", but what they're really doing is spending a lot of time being bored, or mugging it for the camera in this badly edited piece of shit film that becomes so unsure of what mood it's in (Serious? Comical? Meta?) that it becomes laughable when the "heist" takes place. Odile is a horribly impressionable character, but she'd have to be to make this "story" go anywhere.
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Stradivarius | 80 70th |
Plenty of great superficial moments, but very uneven overall. The quality of the direction seems to drop and scenes in an otherwise relaxed-pace film can seem rushed when it comes to plot-centric portions.
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QVT | 90 92nd |
There are so many great scenes. The minute of silence and the Louvre race were my two favorites. It ends up not being as coherent as some of Godard's other films. Those two scenes are must watch though.
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arkadia | 93 92nd |
Wonderful. Beautiful and yet always watchable. Fun and yet thoughtful. Tongue-in-cheek and yet sincere.
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Bown | 86 80th |
A little slow to begin with, but very fun. It was weird to see Karina play a very unsexy, mousey character after having see her be very sultry in her previous roles for Godard.
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SirRobbie | 80 81st |
I just love the "dance" scene.
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bing | 75 66th |
It's experimental and pretty unashamedly political meandering makes me wonder why Godard even bothered with the chain-of-fools plot.
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Noblet | 87 89th |
Pretty similar to Shoot the Piano Player, with its amusing little moments, a gangster plot with a beautiful girl at the center, and great editing. The characters are far less annoying than the ones in Breathless, and I really liked the ending as well.
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ShaqFilmClub | 100 85th |
5 Shaqtaculars
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Antares | 60 26th |
Sometimes, being new doesn't make something a masterpiece, and I felt that Godard was more interested in being fashionably different as opposed to making an interesting film. Sure, it does have it's share of crafted shots, but as a whole the story was lacking in creativity. I will admit that just looking at Anna Karina was worth the effort of watching this film, but aside from her, the rest was pretty shallow and a bit self exalting on the part of the director.
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bakcheia | 100 98th |
Perfect, stylish, and memorable in every way possible. This is most definitely Godard's defining work.
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karamazov. | 29 35th |
Ugly and unpleasant pitcher, which I guess is the point or whatever. Rare divergence w/ perennial #1 TCI lisa-. 74th avg. percentile PSI.
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lisa- | 6 83rd |
maybe a formalistic deconstruction of noir tropes, and in a slightly different way than à bout de souffle, but more visible is that this is possibly the most human thing godard has made.
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nobamba | 60 61st |
I liked Breathless and Vivre Sa Vie, but this didn't connect with me as much as I thought it would. It's stylish and the music is good. The movie takes a while to ramp up and you have to sit through philosophizing. Fav scenes: dance scene but it does go on for too long; running through the Louvre (can't do that anymore).
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Average Percentile 67.65% from 1588 Ratings | ![]() |