Jean-Luc Godard

Contempt

Contempt

Jean-Luc Godard’s subversive foray into commercial filmmaking is a star-studded Cinemascope epic. Contempt (Le Mépris) stars Michel Piccoli as a screenwriter torn between the demands of a proud European director (played by legendary director Fritz Lang), a crude and arrogant American producer (Jack Palance), and his disillusioned wife, Camille (Brigitte Bardot), as he attempts to doctor the script for a new film version of The Odyssey. The Criterion Collection is proud to present this brilliant study of marital breakdown, artistic compromise, and the cinematic process in a new special edition.

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Film Info

  • France
  • 1963
  • 103 minutes
  • Color
  • 2.35:1
  • French
  • Spine #171

Special Features

  • Digital transfer, supervised by cinematographer Raoul Coutard
  • Audio commentary by film scholar Robert Stam
  • The Dinosaur and the Baby (1967), a conversation between Jean-Luc Godard and Fritz Lang
  • Two documentaries featuring Godard on the set of Contempt: Bardot et Godard and Paparazzi
  • Jean-Luc Godard interview excerpt from 1964
  • Interview with cinematographer Raoul Coutard
  • Original theatrical trailer
  • Optional English-dubbed soundtrack
  • New and improved English subtitle translation

    Cover by Michael Boland, based on a theatrical poster by Giuliano Nistri

Purchase Options

Special Features

  • Digital transfer, supervised by cinematographer Raoul Coutard
  • Audio commentary by film scholar Robert Stam
  • The Dinosaur and the Baby (1967), a conversation between Jean-Luc Godard and Fritz Lang
  • Two documentaries featuring Godard on the set of Contempt: Bardot et Godard and Paparazzi
  • Jean-Luc Godard interview excerpt from 1964
  • Interview with cinematographer Raoul Coutard
  • Original theatrical trailer
  • Optional English-dubbed soundtrack
  • New and improved English subtitle translation

    Cover by Michael Boland, based on a theatrical poster by Giuliano Nistri
Contempt
Cast
Brigitte Bardot
Camille Javal
Michel Piccoli
Paul Javal
Jack Palance
Jeremiah Prokosch
Georgia Moll
Francesca Vanini
Fritz Lang
Himself
Credits
Director
Jean-Luc Godard
Screenplay
Jean-Luc Godard
From a novel by
Alberto Moravia
Cinematography
Raoul Coutard
Screenplay
Alberto Moravia
Producer
Georges de Beauregard
Producer
Carlo Ponti
Producer
Joseph E. Levine
Music
Georges Delerue
Sound
William Sivel
Editing
Agnès Guillemot
Unit managers
Philippe Dussart
Unit managers
Carlo Lastricati

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Jean-Luc Godard

Writer, Director

Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard

A pioneer of the French new wave, Jean-Luc Godard has had an incalculable effect on modern cinema that refuses to wane. Before directing, Godard was an ethnology student and a critic for Cahiers du cinéma, and his approach to filmmaking reflects his interest in how cinematic form intertwines with social reality. His groundbreaking debut feature, Breathless—his first and last mainstream success—is, of course, essential Godard: its strategy of merging high (Mozart) and low (American crime thrillers) culture has been mimicked by generations of filmmakers. As the sixties progressed, Godard’s output became increasingly radical, both aesthetically (A Woman Is a Woman, Contempt, Band of Outsiders) and politically (Masculin féminin, Pierrot le fou), until by 1968 he had forsworn commercial cinema altogether, forming a leftist filmmaking collective (the Dziga Vertov Group) and making such films as Tout va bien. Today Godard remains our greatest lyricist on historical trauma, religion, and the legacy of cinema.

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