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Filmed in the UK in 1969, this documentary by Godard and the Dziga Vertov Group represents an analysis of production and the status of women in capitalist society and a speculation about class consciousness and the need for political organization.
The second short is a collaborative effort by Godard and Dziga Vertov. It was filmed in the UK in 1969, and the subject was an analysis of corporate greed, women in capitalist society, class consciousness, and political organization. A group of trade unionists and employers argue on which would benefit their respective classes whilst shortcutting their workers’ pay and benefits.
The two directors begin the film with a day of work at a Mini Cooper car factory in the UK. It covers sleazy smiling bosses and their workers toiling away all to the tune of a narrator offscreen regaling the Maoist communist manifesto. The narrator seems to be a father or professor giving his youthful and later older sounding daughter or student a dissertation on class struggles and worker exploitation. It is a fantastic display that the prior Un Comme de Autres was lacking. The main message is that in a bourgeois society the wealthiest class dominates and keeps all the money. On the other hand communism’s goal is to strengthen the worker and boost the greater good for the economy. Once again the short features the dueling kind of narration of the previous film but it’s much more fluid.
The camerawork was my favorite part of this film. It is constantly on a track slowly focusing on the hard-working assembly line and the vivid red cars being completed. The camera also spends 5 minutes or so on a woman’s nude torso while discussing patriarchy, feminism, and better conditions for workers. The most compelling part of the short is a gap-toothed Anglo news presenter spouting anti-immigration, pro-capitalism, and other hateful fear mongering jingoism we still hear in the US and the UK. A nice reprieve is when the group of British hippie girls going through Beatles songs and cheekily changing the lyrics to fit their message of left-wing politics and revolution. Godard is a radical artist and I appreciate him trying something different after being so successful with his previous films like “Breathless” and “Weekend.”
Now available on a Special Edition Blu-ray from Arrow Video
