Contempt

Contempt

1963
Drama
1h 42m
A French writer, Paul Javal, recently married to the beautiful Camille, is approached by Jerry Prokosch, a brash American film producer, to adapt the story of Ulysses into a screenplay for a movie to be directed by a German filmmaker named Fritz Lang.
Your probable score
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Contempt

1963
Drama
1h 42m
Your probable score
Avg Percentile 67.9% from 1744 total ratings

Ratings & Reviews

(1744)
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Rated 14 Aug 2007
100
99th
On fate and reason. The greatest movie ever made about the process of filmmaking, and an incredibly rich reflection, in a tragic key, on Western disorders of desire – psychological, sociological, historical and philosophical. Endlessly fascinating, and the differences from the novel are genius. Yes, as a romance, it's emotionally detached, but this is cinema on another plane. A singular achievement. See also: https://www.academia.edu/12693849/Totally_Tenderly_Tragically_BS_and_BB_2017_
Rated 04 Nov 2007
65
65th
Very cerebral and bookish but kind of giggling; vivacious and full of stylistic flair, Contempt is a typical Godard movie. As usual with Godard, the only thing I found missing here is emotional resonance. Watching his characters emote is like touching a hard, hollowed shell... He understands their mentality but I don't think he really cares about them. It may be a form of humor with him, but it's strikingly cynical. The pompous, sentimental soundtrack doesn't help and is way overused here.
Rated 11 Oct 2010
60
20th
Starts with rich promise, with astonishingly beautiful photography and interesting dynamics. It quickly wastes this potential, however, on a boring relationship melodrama that's so insipid, uninteresting and even irritating that I almost fell asleep. Has some interesting elements, but doesn't know what to do with them.
Rated 23 Jan 2013
30
8th
A dull, pretentious film about boring, selfish people being mean to each other, with an unconvincing performance by Brigitte Bardot's ass. Attempts to be a film about breakdown in communication, but where Antonioni's alienation comes from the modern environment, Godard's comes from the characters' general grumpiness. That said, the cinematography and music are both beautiful.
Rated 09 Sep 2017
81
76th
I assume that for this movie, Jack Palance wasn't even given a script. He didn't even know it was a movie. Godard followed him around, filming him groping women and terrorizing Fritz Lang and then built the movie around it.
Rated 25 Nov 2006
80
78th
Godard at his best: the photography is beautiful, the actors are beautiful, the dialogue is pretentious and virtually non-sensical, but the film is undercut by this overwhelming feeling of despair and futility that makes it fascinating.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
80
61st
Contempt is one of Godard's most serious and meditative works, and as such it lacks some of the freshness of Band of Outsiders, A Woman Is a Woman or even Breathless. But to make up for that it has gorgeous cinematography, great acting and painfully realistic characterizations. This one might appeal to people who generally don't like Godard that much.
Rated 28 Nov 2008
83
88th
Very rich and challenging flick. Lots of symbolism and odd color sceme builds up a special meaning if you dive into it. Story is about a couple who's been living together so long than they can read each other more than enough. Excellent acting and cinematography, and poetic lines and quotes.
Rated 11 Jan 2009
8
82nd
Not for everyone. Shows the futility of love and asks the question what is the price of selling out? Godard crafts a film that seeks to pay homage to what he loves - film. Although, I think he would've rather made a movie like Day for Night. "The cinema substitutes for our gaze a world more in harmony with our desires."
Rated 12 Aug 2012
60
50th
A relatively straight-forward movie about a perhaps simple, perhaps complex breakdown of a relationship. Add unsubtle parallelism and naïve social commentary and you have one rather overrated art film. It's certainly more sit-through-able than some of Godard's output (here's looking at you, 'Pierrot le fou'), but in my opinion the real masterpiece about cinema by a French New Wave director was made ten years later by Truffaut.
Rated 20 Jan 2013
88
81st
Godard at his subtlest and most human. Absolutely beautiful.
Rated 28 Jun 2015
85
74th
I enjoyed the use of a gun as a metaphor for his manhood. Not only didn't he use it, but he lost it the first time and then had the bullets removed by his wife the second time.
Rated 06 Sep 2015
85
90th
Simultaneously Godard's most orthodox effort (in both form and content) and his densest, its themes spanning marital dissatisfaction and the process of filmmaking to art vs. commerce and the artist's ego. Its metafictional sensibilities become a mirror to reflect Godard's own production issues in the making of the film that becomes, at once, a Greek tragedy, a character study, and a subversive melodrama. Sumptuous photography completes one of Godard's best and most interesting films.
Rated 26 Feb 2016
80
88th
Mr. Goddard, your film opens with a bare ass shot of Brigitte Bardot. Genius! I originally flubbed the your in that sentence with you're. However, I think, "Mr. Goddard, you're film," actually would work as a sentence. This movie is so into movies Fritz Lang is a lead character AND actor.
Rated 25 Nov 2018
59
27th
Some beautiful images of the Italian coast and not much else. Godard continues to fail to understand the importance of emotion, both with regard to his characters, and with regard to the audience. Ideas are worthless if you can't execute them properly. Bardot isn't a good actor. Probably most of interest to those who habitually project themselves onto everything around them, rather than anyone wanting to find meaning that exists outside of themselves.
Rated 06 Mar 2007
4
70th
An excellent film; though a bit challenging, and without a particularly strong emotional pull, it's still completely fascinating. It's got stellar cinematography and some absolutely great acting. (Palance is almost electrifying.) Godard's direction, and the great score, used at all the right moments, help to immerse the viewer deep into the film. Tough but rewarding.
Rated 19 Mar 2007
82
67th
Is this more about filmmaking or relationships? I'm not sure but it does an effective job at showing how a relationship can slowly be poisoned beyond repair. There are fights and discussions but there's no real place you can pinpoint as the tipping point, it's very gradual and organic and very well done.
Rated 14 Aug 2007
75
54th
A pretty good movie, perhaps a bit too heavy on the symbolism. Gorgeous cinematography.
Rated 04 Jan 2009
90
92nd
Down from 95 on rewatch. Still fantastic, but the drop from first half to second half is even more noticeable. NB: fuck studio canal for this awful Blu ray. The criterion DVD I saw it on the first time looked better!
Rated 26 May 2009
90
96th
Simply one of the greatest works of the nouvelle vague and a true evidence of godards love to cinema. Coutards cinematography is just amazing, and he really is one of the greatest photographers ever and maybe the most innovative in film history. Not to forget the music which is so affecting that you feel part of this film from the first to the last minute.
Rated 01 Nov 2009
4
74th
Godard's most conventional offering, and my favorite of his films so far. A love story that appeals more to the intellect than the heart, and though it doesn't have great emotional leverage, these are among Godard's most comprehensively realized characters. He takes an objective perspective in the disintegration of a marriage: as Paul and Camille wage psychological warfare, neither is completely guilty or innocent. For all its turmoil, these are a smooth three acts with very natural progression.
Rated 25 Nov 2009
70
59th
Weird movie
Rated 10 Feb 2011
75
35th
I suppose I have to rewatch this to see what the fuss is all about; I watched it for a class, and was none too enthused.
Rated 06 Sep 2011
30
5th
An unbearable, totally unrealistic, meaningless, utterly dysfunctional and god-awfully boring film. The best thing about it is - HUGE SPOILER ALERT! - the death of Camille and Jerry; although Paul and Francesca should also die and Fritz should retire. I mean, this film he was supposedly shooting seemed even worse than "Le Mépris" itself. Picture that.
Rated 06 May 2012
40
4th
I urge you to read the book. A thousand times better than this..
Rated 30 Jul 2013
7
92nd
godard's best and most philosophically coherent film.
Rated 22 Mar 2015
71
50th
Finely crafted and multi-layered and everything, but at its core, two hours of 'she doesn't love him any more'. Who cares?
Rated 28 Oct 2015
73
47th
her name was KAMÄ°L. REALLY
Rated 31 May 2018
90
95th
Best relationship crisis in a chronicle about humanity's constant changing motivations. Visual poetry (flat scene), meta-cinema, Greek tragedy, Dante's Inferno, Italy' locations, JLG personal life interwines during the production of Odyssey's Lang - unhappy producer Prokosch hires a playwright (Piccoli) to supervise new script, but he flirts with his wife (Bardot) as their love go sour between sharp and kind words. Ends with car accident (Prok and Bardot die) and Lang finishing the film.
Rated 12 Nov 2018
55
8th
I'm calling it. Godard is a hack.
Rated 19 Dec 2019
85
54th
I guess I'm missing something here. The plot may have some subtleties but no particular emotion came through and scenes were unengaging, in large part as Bardot is an incredibly wooden and inexpressive actor here. The music was noticeably over applied and over dramatic detracting from what there was to enjoy visually.
Rated 17 Jan 2021
80
73rd
Everything in this film is beautiful: the CinemaScope, the dolly shots, the score, and Bardot. It is a dense film that probably rewards those who make films more than the rest of us.
Rated 01 Dec 2006
98
94th
True classic. Features one of the longest scenes ever. Great story, great acting.
Rated 13 Feb 2007
91
90th
A truly beautiful film. Very heavy, but still accessible. The crumbling relationship is pretty emotionally painful to watch. The most moving film I've seen in a while.
Rated 07 Apr 2007
0
8th
Snippets of Mme. Bardot in the nude are intercut completely randomly, as if to say to the audience, "Well... this is what most of you are here for. Here it is." Godard is interesting in that he's the only major filmmaker who seems to really HATE his audience. A lot of people aren't going to like my saying that, but, like Joe Bob Briggs says, this isn't Communist Russia
Rated 17 Apr 2007
95
96th
# 49
Rated 22 Oct 2007
92
93rd
Magnificent camerawork combined with a fascinating take on Homer's Odyssey gives this both a visual and a literary sensibility. As the marriage breaks down over the course of the film, the reasons constantly seem just out of reach, as if it were a mystery even to the couple. The Viaggio in Italia on the marquee was a nice touch. Bergman had to have watched this before he scripted Scenes from a Marriage.
Rated 04 Jan 2008
60
55th
okay, it's not THAT bad.
Rated 01 Mar 2008
98
96th
# 45
Rated 29 May 2008
10
99th
It isn't my favorite Godard, but this is the movie that made me really start liking him.
Rated 30 Jun 2008
100
71st
Perfect movie.
Rated 13 Jul 2008
82
82nd
Compelling. Very understated, requires a fair amount of concentration.
Rated 28 Jul 2008
90
91st
Flashy. Not a lot of emotional weight behind it, it is a really original, adventerous flick.
Rated 27 Aug 2008
90
99th
Godard did it with Contempt what Baz Luhrmann couldn't do with Romeo Juliet. And I loved Luhrmann's modern translation of the classic.
Rated 08 Oct 2008
4
55th
I watched this for Fritz Lang and enjoyed what I came for /review
Rated 22 Oct 2008
55
32nd
I was mostly left frustrated and dim by this monotonous, flooded "grumpiness". All the scenes with Lang were funny and perceptive, but too much of this film was ill-tempered, unaffecting nagging... The script has a lot of tasty remarks and the solicitous framing are charming, but I can't help leaving this film with a feeling of sad displeasure. Definitively the least arousing Godard till now.
Rated 19 Dec 2008
97
94th
56
Rated 07 Feb 2009
77
79th
It takes Ulysses 10 years to return home because he doesn't want to. Ulysses doesn't rush home to Ithaca because he was unhappy with Penelope even before he went off. Had he been happy, he'd have stayed home. He used the Trojan war to get away from his wife.
Rated 07 Apr 2009
78
89th
Good Movie
Rated 16 Apr 2009
87
75th
Maybe not the best Godard, but still very good. There's a lot more to this movie than it seems.
Rated 02 Jul 2009
3
74th
A film to stimulate both the intellect and the senses.
Rated 07 Sep 2009
85
83rd
A great film that shows the life of a screenwriter during the making of a film, and the relationship that is driving him. The film is engaging, but also hard to watch. The relationship, and the fight between the two was so emotionally overwhelming, it was quite incredibly done. The Fritz Lang cameo was great, and the film he was directing (in the film) was a great way to reference the story of Paul and Camille, if not a little too head on. A great looking picture with an emotional quality.
Rated 24 Oct 2009
9
91st
I don't know what's so bad about JLG. He makes good movies. Not being a French Intellectual doesn't detract any "fun" from his movies...
Rated 13 Jan 2010
97
94th
52
Rated 09 Mar 2010
80
81st
watched: 2010, 2013
Rated 22 Aug 2010
30
9th
I tried to watch this movie three times...
Rated 23 May 2011
85
58th
Stirring, though the scene in the apartment was curiously underwhelming.
Rated 12 Jun 2011
80
85th
"Le Mépris" is unconventional and cerebral -a symbolic and ultimately triumphant meditation on love and film. I can't fully explain why I found it so compelling -was it the vivid interaction between the protagonists, Godard's atypical visual style or perhaps the seemingly inexhaustible stock of shots of Brigitte Bardot's arse? Perhaps it's the combination of those elements, maybe the sheer unpredictability of the story, but I found this to be a challenging, inspiring (if imperfect) masterwork.
Rated 30 Jul 2011
20
6th
It took me days and days to get through this movie. Couldn't hold my attention for shit, and I'm not sure who's fault that is. Maybe mine. Maybe not.
Rated 09 Aug 2011
99
95th
...Wow...
Rated 26 Aug 2011
90
80th
Wonderful cinematography, score and cast.
Rated 18 Nov 2011
82
63rd
Bardot is terrible, Lang is great. Amazing music (it's only one song or so, but it's a very good song).
Rated 30 Nov 2011
98
96th
#50
Rated 25 Mar 2012
70
54th
started off nicely and I especially liked the apartment scene. after that brigitte bardots annoying and obstinate bitch of a character as well as the ridiculously overused short sound track got the best of me and I had to suffer through the rest of the movie. the ending with the car accident was pretty cheap as well.
Rated 24 Apr 2012
86
83rd
86.000
Rated 21 Jun 2012
9
90th
Damn, I really need to play catch up with Godard's oeuvre. "Contempt" may be end up as one of his most admirable efforts, a seemingly unfilmable tale of fading love that seems to inhabit the realm between painful reality and luscious fantasy, like an uncharted journey into the unconscious that seeks to defy critical analysis. Great direction and cinematography all around, with the limited casting and sublime soundtrack giving the film a very intimate feel.
Rated 23 Aug 2012
30
12th
I don't know, there should be so much to appreciate in this - sometimes it kind of felt like Antonioni mixed with Varda's Happiness somehow if that makes any sense. I just don't care much for Godard I guess, except Vivre sa Vie - I liked that.
Rated 28 Sep 2012
92
76th
Wherein Godard demonstrates just how fake fiction really is.
Rated 10 Nov 2012
95
95th
10 Kasim 2012, Zevahir & ulvi erotizmine biraktim kendimi; Ah Godard, ah Bardot, al gotur beni.
Rated 12 Dec 2012
42
16th
Beautiful cinematography. I shall draw a veil over the rest of it.
Rated 03 Feb 2013
84
63rd
It's easy to make The Odyssey, all you need is a girl, a room, and a deeply haunting string section.
Rated 28 Mar 2013
79
59th
It took quite a ways in before I began to warm up to this. But at some point things started to click and I began to recognize what a thoughtful, interesting, gorgeous movie this is. The constantly interjecting music theme was at first obnoxious, but I think there was a definite purpose for it. I also noticed at least three shots where we can see the reflection of the film crew; in any other movie I chalk this up to a production goof, but here I have a feeling it was intentional. Neat movie.
Rated 28 Mar 2013
75
56th
It feels so simple (the frequency with which I see it called intellectually stimulating is baffling), its comments on the film industry are obvious, and the relationship drama gets a tad repetitive. Admittedly I'm focusing on the negative: it is still very good, and gorgeously shot, but it isn't invigorating like his best films are.
Rated 18 Sep 2013
85
83rd
85.000
Rated 19 Oct 2013
8
80th
Never trust an American with a loud car.
Rated 05 Feb 2014
90
85th
A story told more by glances than it is by its dialogue. It's all about missing meaning in subtlety and it acts as a criticism of cinema making it far too easy for the audience.
Rated 18 Feb 2015
50
22nd
blabla blablabla relationship issues blablabla blabla writing issues blablabla + beautiful pictures & good soundtrack
Rated 02 Sep 2016
90
85th
(...)Le Mepris ist in gewisser Weise ein Experiment: Jean-Luc Godards erste Big Budget Produktion mit einem grossen Star: Brigitte Bardot. Es war ein einmaliger, mehr oder weniger befriedigender Auslug. Immerhin kann man alle nachfolgenden Filme Godards auch als Reaktion auf Le Mepris sehen.(...)
Rated 24 Nov 2017
83
71st
A little too French for me, as in: something profoundly basic, primal, and real under a layer of a kind of pretentious, icily detached intellectualism. Exactly the same vibe I got from reading Sartre. In spite of all that, it still affected me and that is no small feat. It's a little like an infuriating, depressing Before Sunrise...or an unfortunately restrained "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"
Rated 18 Jan 2018
80
68th
ilk izleyiÅŸ: 70
Rated 28 Sep 2018
70
48th
Even though Bardot is stunning, the photography gorgeous and the music hauntingly beautiful, Le Mépris stumbles because of its overly slow tempo, drawn-out scenes and the story's general lack of substance. Meditative turns into boring when it doesn't work. There is a surprising amount of humor, too, although the tone is dry.
Rated 24 Nov 2018
70
53rd
Fritz Lang: "The way the last lines are written, when you've read the other two, is no longer about God's presence. It's God's absence that reassures Man. Strange, but true."
Rated 27 Jan 2019
60
35th
As much as I loved watching Bardot mope for two hours, that's not really a movie. (In fact, it felt a lot like watching Breathless over again.) Here we have a decaying relationship stuck in a meditation on filmmaking, but to me, it just feels insubstantial. I loved Camille's theme (even when blasted in all the wrong places), and the photography was beautiful, so that helped bump up my 2/5 score to a 3/5.
Rated 01 Dec 2019
100
99th
godard's best film !!
Rated 24 Dec 2019
96
94th
Should watch it again at some point.
Rated 22 Jan 2020
85
89th
Aquário
Rated 09 May 2020
82
62nd
As with many Godards, it works better as an intellectual exercise than an emotional one...but that’s a little awkward given the subject matter. As a movie about the process of filmmaking and selling out, it’s real good, but the marriage sections don’t always have the same impact. Still, the amazing score and great cinematography and blocking do a lot of heavy lifting, making it largely effective by the end.
Rated 03 Jun 2020
99
99th
Sublime subversion.
Rated 11 Jul 2020
69
33rd
An excellently photographed relationship in decline.
Rated 21 Oct 2020
73
79th
amazing light and limpidity, brillant primary colors
Rated 30 May 2021
87
86th
One must suffer.
Rated 22 Feb 2022
75
68th
"i re-read the odyssey last night"
Rated 30 Jul 2022
86
88th
This is my favorite Godard to date. Amazing cinematography and some great staging to show the distance developing between the couple. Bardot gives an interesting performance. The music, repeated throughout the film at a volume slightly too loud, really drags you in. Palance is amazing and usually hilarious in the scenes he's in as the American film producer, and it's fun seeing Fritz Lang on the other side of the camera. The ending seems very abrupt and kind of pointless. Will watch again.
Rated 18 Oct 2022
68
37th
Pretentious art film. Waste of time. Last half of it is not so boring, but meaningless. First half is both. It centers on some pseudo-philosophy about the Odyssey, with does not reflect in the narrative in more that a speculative sense. Besides this, it's just random fights between a writer and his stupid, immature wife.
Rated 25 Jan 2023
76
50th
This movie might be about the fragility of love, but Bardot's character feels boring and spoiled, so the moral sounds more like "don't get attached to hot but empty women". The ending is unexpected and unfitting. Anyhow, the appearance with Fritz Lang make it a film worth watching.
Rated 12 Mar 2023
44
38th
Bardot is awful, fuck that apartment scene felt like it lasted hours. I only really enjoyed Lang and the cinematography, Godard is up his own ass here.
Rated 28 Sep 2023
100
99th
Things unsaid, phrases repeated, moments unseen and history mirrored- a collection of small gestures masterfully (but subtly) manipulated by Godard. Often transcends its appearance as an intimate domestic drama and reaches towards ideological truths that should reverberate in the spine of any creative working in late-stage capitalism. Everything just came together for me in my appreciation for Godard here.
Rated 30 Dec 2023
90
88th
There's a kind of delightful irony that his film that feels like a savage attack on commercialism is also his most commercial film.

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