Emblematic director of the New Wave with work as prolific as it was protean and sometimes revolutionary, Jean-Luc Godard died at the age of 91. Many tributes salute the memory of the filmmaker.
Sacred monster of cinema, co-founder of the New Wave film movement, holder of a Honorary Oscar, two Honorary Caesars, a Golden Bear and a Silver Bear in Berlin, a Golden Lion in Venice and in 2018 a special Palme d’Or , Jean-Luc Godard died at the age of 91, after resorting to assisted suicide, a practice authorized and supervised in Switzerland, as revealed the newspaper Liberation who announced his death this morning.
In the wake of the announcement of his death, a shower of tributes were paid to the director, from Alain Delon to Brigitte Bardot, via the Cannes Film Festival, the French Cinematheque where the British Film Institute.
“It was like an appearance in French cinema. Then he became a master of it. Jean-Luc Godard, the most iconoclastic of New Wave filmmakers, had invented a resolutely modern, intensely free art. We are losing a national treasure, a look of genius” commented the President of the Republic on his Twitter account.
The Minister of Culture, Rima Abdul Malak, logically split a reaction to the announcement of his death. “Jean-Luc Godard burned through all the codes of cinema, sweeping the world with a wave of audacity, freedom and irreverence. He leaves us an unforgettable ‘image book'”.
“Jean-Luc Godard leaves behind him 100 films including almost as many masterpieces in 60 years of career. But according to his words he did not “make films, he made cinema” commented the Academy of Cinema Arts and Techniques, posting an excerpt from his speech when the filmmaker received his first Honorary Cesar in 1987, presented by Isabelle Huppert.
The Cannes Film Festival also salutes the memory of Godard, recalling in passing that he was one of those who had interrupted the holding of the festival in May 1968, when the revolt of the students rumbled. “I talk to you about solidarity with workers and students, and you talk to me about close-ups and tracking shots. You are idiots” had struck the filmmaker at the time.
“Jean-Luc Godard is the Picasso of cinema. With his intuitions and his flashes. Ahead of his time, he played with words, images and colors. He improvised milestone films, obscure and seductive World cinema is an orphan” commented Gilles Jacob, the former president of the Cannes Film Festival, in a statement collected by AFP.
“We are losing a national treasure”
On the side of the talents of the cinema, the comments are in unison. To start with Alain Delonwhich the filmmaker had directed in 1990 in the film Nouvelle Vague. “A page in the history of cinema is turning… Thank you, Jean-Luc, for the beautiful memories you left us. Know that I will always be proud to have Nouvelle Vague in my filmography” the actor told AFP.
Moving message also posted by Brigitte Bardot, who filmed Le Mépris with him; one of Martin Scorsese’s favorite movies. “And Godard created Contempt and it was out of breath that he joined the firmament of the last great star creators” she wrote, accompanying a photo in which the two are entwined and from behind.
“Jean-Luc Godard understood the extent to which cinema could be used as an instrument of revolt and revolution” recalled the actress Macha Méril at the microphone of France Interwhose film A married woman, in 1964, launched his career.
Although he may have given in to Hollywood sirens for a long time and be based in Los Angeles, Antonio Banderas never forgets European cinema, thanking the filmmaker “to have expanded the boundaries of cinema”.
A great actor and director in his spare time, Stephen Fry paid tribute to him, recalling that he saw his film A bout de souffle 15 days ago, which starred a duo for eternity, Jean-Paul Belmondo and John Seberg.
Edgar Wright, still very much a cinephile and transfixed lover of the physical medium of films, also reacted. “RIP Jean-Luc Godard, one of the most influential iconoclastic filmmakers of all. It was ironic that he himself worshiped the Hollywood studio filmmaking system, because perhaps no other director inspired so many people to pick up a camera and start shooting…”