Godard's Breathless

Patricia is intimately framed as she sits in bed. Her outward gaze translates as restless and reflective, mirroring the camera's marked disinterest in Michel. Meanwhile he remains focused on her: his caresses distract us, pulling the camera away from her face and along her legs, even as she struggles with her emotional vulnerability. "It's true that I'm afraid, because I want you to love me."

The audience is made complicit by this camerawork, pawing hand in glove at this foreign, fragile young girl. Michel's trite reassurances, duly disregarded, continue to reinforce our sense of shame. As she points out, we don't know what she is thinking. There is the implicit accusation that we don't even care.

She then confronts us: "I'd like to know what's behind that face of yours." The camera dutifully, ponderously pans over to Michel's face, and he sits, smoking, stupid. He mimes Bogart, again the impersonal and meaningless gesture, and she, empty, notes, "I've been looking for ten minutes, and I know nothing... Nothing."