"Breathless" Response

Just because a move is important, doesn’t mean that it’s inherently good. I understand the place that Breathless (1960) has in cinema history and how important it was that it subverted the standards of filmmaking in the way that it did, but it ended up making a film that was tiresome to watch. Immersion was never goal of the film, and this much is obvious; the movie reminds you that it’s a movie at every possible turn by breaking cinematic rules designed to aid in the comprehension of the elements on screen.
The most notable way that Breathless challenges convention is through its editing and cinematic techniques. Breathless is characterized by jump cuts, discontinuous movement between shots, and unconventional framing. The opening police chase is the most dramatic example of these techniques, but they’re prevalent throughout the entire film. In addition to the cinematography, Breathless also shows dialogue differently from many other films, largely discarding the shot-reverse-shot method. Instead, the characters talk around one another, both in their blocking and framing as well as the dialogue itself.

The only problem is that many of these techniques result in a movie that is a burden to watch. Many cinematic conventions exist to aid comprehension, and when you break them it makes the easier more difficult to comprehend. I understand breaking rules for a reason, but most of the time in Breathless it feels that the rules are being broken just to show that they can be broken, which I don’t find particularly interesting. Breathless is a film that needed to exist, but I don’t think that the film itself is worthwhile.