Vivre Sa Vie (1962) film review - an analysis of a perfect film
★★★★★
‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is a stunning, experimental French New Wave drama from visionary auteur Godard that follows the life of Nana, a young Parisian woman.
Director: Jean-Luc Godard. Starring: Anna Karina, Sady Rebbot, André S. Labarthe. 15 cert, 85 min.
In 1962, 2 years after ‘Breathless’, the film that would launch Jean-Luc Godard’s career and his status as an auteur of the French New Wave movement, Godard released the extraordinary experimental drama ‘Vivre Sa Vie’. ‘Vivre Sa Vie’, or ‘My Life to Live’, is a breathtaking, highly introspective look at the life of Nana, a young Parisian woman who dreams of becoming a film star. Over the course of this visually stunning French masterpiece, Nana becomes increasingly disillusioned with the world, eventually turning to prostitution as she yearns for a life of glamorous independence. Tackling real life issues in an intimate, personal way, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is a thoroughly engaging character study which is truly a showcase of Godard’s remarkable directorial capabilities. With its avant-garde cinematography and bold observation of societal problems, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ holds up even today as being an unerringly provocative work of art.
‘Vivre Sa Vie’ (1962) film poster artwork
'Vivre Sa Vie’ and the French New Wave
I do have a certain penchant for films of the French New Wave, but ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is one which is particularly close to my heart. Godard’s third feature length film is, for lack of a better word, incredibly human. Nana, the film’s female protagonist, is played by Anna Karina, Godard’s first wife and cinematic muse. Though there is a certain detachedness to the way Nana’s life is followed by Godard’s camera, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ captures excellently the various emotions experienced by Nana, and lingers on them in a painfully beautiful manner. The camera stays close to Nana throughout, using an extraordinary number of close-up shots to do so. The film itself is, of course, highly experimental in form, reflecting the French New Wave tendencies towards discontinuity and self-reflexivity. What is incredibly impressive, however, is the way in which Godard entwines such cinematographic experimentation with the difficult subject matter he documents. The result is something uniquely magical, a landmark in film history, but also a film which will stay with you for years to come.
Anna Karina as Nana in ‘Vivre Sa Vie’
A philosophical, thought-provoking character study
In 1962, during an interview about the film, Godard stated that ‘In Vivre Sa Vie I have attempted to film a mind in action, the interior of someone seen from outside’. Testament to this endeavour on the part of Godard is the realism ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ succeeds in achieving, the quaint but never dull documentation of Nana’s life, through which we garner precious information about her dreams, desires, fears, and doubts. ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is separated into 12 episodes by intertitles which appear anecdotal in their brevity and casualness. They describe small events and happenings in Nana’s life, with titles such as ‘A Cafe in the Suburbs’, and ‘Nana Wonders if She’s Happy’. Whilst one may suppose that such scenes would be exceedingly ordinary, worthy of little cinematic attention, Godard’s skilful use of camerawork and editing utilises such ordinary and everyday settings to reveal the complex interiority of Nana. A film motivated by events rather than action, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is a deeply philosophical and thought-provoking character study that refuses to engage in melodrama. Instead, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ offers a matter of fact attitude to life, an attitude that Nana herself seems to hold.
An analysis of the Oval Portrait scene
Warning: contains spoilers. One of my favourite scenes in the film is one which appears in the twelfth and final tableau, titled ‘The Young Man Again - The Oval Portrait - Raoul Sells Nana’. Having entered into prostitution to escape poverty, this scene comes towards the end of the film, when Nana declares to the young man she has been dating that she is in love with him. Following this declaration, she decides to tell her pimp, Raoul, that she is quitting the business. Prior to this, however, there ensues a scene in which the young man reads an Edgar Allan Poe story, ‘The Oval Portrait’, to Nana. However, it is not actually the voice of the young man that the viewer hears; the story is instead read by Godard himself via voice over. With this context, there comes an added layer of love and affection to the telling of the story. This is not only the young man reciting a story to Nana, but Godard reciting a story to his lover, Anna Karina.
The young man reads ‘The Oval Portrait’
‘The Oval Portrait’ is a cautionary tale about an artist who paints a portrait of his wife as she sits for him. Upon finishing his painting, the painter is amazed at how lifelike it is, exclaiming ‘This is indeed Life itself!’ Stepping back from the finished painting in triumph, he averts his gaze to his wife. She is dead.
‘The Oval Portrait’ displays, thus, the immortality of art juxtaposed against the mortality of love. However, it also makes reference to the lifelike manner in which Godard shoots his films. Just as the painter in Poe’s story manages to embody life within his painting, Godard strives to embody life in his films. ‘Vivre Sa Vie’, as many of Godard’s films do, contains a great deal of improvisation. Even the film’s non-diegetic music, which swells at seemingly random points in the narrative and ends just as abruptly, follows this improvisational structure. Godard also largely used first takes to construct ‘Vivre Sa Vie’, a technique which can be seen in the naturalistic spontaneity of Nana’s actions.
The ending of ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ explained
As Godard recites ‘The Oval Portrait’, close-up shots frame Nana’s head and shoulders as though she herself is posing for a portrait, her fate at the end of the film foreshadowed by the words of Poe. Nana, too, will die as she chooses love over her career. The final scene of ‘Vivre Sa Vie’, where Nana is shot and killed as Raoul attempts to sell her, is both unexpected and inevitable. It is inevitable in the way that her downward spiral over the course of the film suggests she cannot have a happy ending, but unexpected as it comes at a point in the film when Nana seems, finally, at peace with herself. The juxtaposition between the deterioration of her external situation and her mental and emotional growth is excellently posed by Godard. Is it really Nana’s life to live?
The ending of ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ can be cyclically linked back to the film’s beginning, which opens with a quote from Montaigne:
‘Lend yourself to others, but give yourself to yourself.’
The existential question implied here is one of choice and freedom, of how much control one can really exact over one’s life. Nana seems to believe in a Satrean conception of existentialism; that she is condemned to be free.
‘I think we're always responsible for our actions. We're free. I raise my hand - I'm responsible. I turn my head to the right - I'm responsible. I'm unhappy - I'm responsible. I smoke a cigarette - I'm responsible. I shut my eyes - I'm responsible. I forget that I'm responsible, but I am. I told you escape is a pipe dream. After all, everything is beautiful. You only have to take an interest in things, see their beauty. It's true. After all, things are just what they are. A face is a face. Plates are plates. Men are men. And life, is life.’
Nana’s fate at the end of the film seems, then, to be the price she must pay for such freedom.
Should you watch this before you die?
Overall, ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is a beautiful film, something unlike anything I have watched before or, I’m sure, anything I will watch in the future. Godard has the ability to convey an extraordinary amount of emotion and detail through his visual style, displaying the interiority of Nana through careful observation of her exteriority. ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is essential viewing for anyone who appreciates film as an artform, as Godard’s self-reflexivity and insertion of references to film history are a delight to experience. ‘Vivre Sa Vie’ is also, in my opinion, Godard’s best contribution to French New Wave cinema; a bold statement I am sure, but one I am not alone in making. Susan Sontag, in her essay on ‘Vivre Sa Vie’, went as far as to call it ‘a perfect film’.