Article
Jean-Luc Godard in 5 filming locations

In order to escape the police pursuing her, Patricia (Jean Seberg) enters this Parisian cinema. With its only auditorium, its programming is focused on American films that were banned during the German occupation. Jean-Luc Godard did not choose this cinema by chance to shoot his film. The director is assisted by Pierre Rissient, one of the leaders of the mac-mahonian movement, whose spirit is to leave more room for the mise en scène than the script. This establishment was inaugurated in 1938, it has today an Art et essai program.

Pierrot le fou has not only marked entire generations of moviegoers but also, and forever, the sumptuous landscape of the Calanque de la Treille on the island of Porquerolles. Anna Karina pronounces there her famous ritornello “What can I do? I don’t know what to do.” A line that the actress has totally improvised on the set. One day, during a break, she starts throwing pebbles into the water, like a child, and Jean-Luc Godard watches her, fascinated. This scene, he finds a way to include it in his film. As for the famous striped dress, the filmmaker did not call on his renowned costume designer, Gitt Magrini, but simply went to the Prisunic and took three identical ones. A chance because during a scene in the water, the dress began to shrink by drying becoming a tank top. A detail that Anna Karina remembered in 2018. The shooting of Pierrot le fou lasted only 44 days.

Would Contempt have had as much impact on the cinema if it had been filmed elsewhere than at the Malaparte villa in Capri? A surprising residence for a mythical film. An architectural jewel planted in the middle of a fantastic setting on a cliff of Capri. Although it is very isolated and impractical, the house attracts paparazzi by the mere presence of Brigitte Bardot. Jean-Luc Godard even has to chase some of them into the rocks to make them run away. Built between 1938 and 1943, the Villa Malaparte was designed by the architect Adalberto Libera for the controversial Italian writer Curzio Malaparte. Contempt required 32 days of shooting, shared between the Cinecittà studios in Rome and the Villa Malaparte in Capri.

Madeleine Zimmer (Chantal Goya) is a young woman dreaming of being a popular singer. She crosses paths with Paul (Jean-Pierre Léaud), 21 years old, an awkward and shy boy, but also with his friend Robert (Michel Debord), a politically committed and very enthusiastic man. After Stockholm, the actors continued shooting this film, which was made without a script and whose scenes were sometimes improvised and whose dialogues were chiseled the day before, in Paris. We discover Madeleine coming out of La Locomotive, a nightclub in the basement of the Moulin Rouge, the famous cabaret of the capital. The soundtrack of Masculin féminin is therefore interpreted by the singer and written by her husband, Jean-Jacques Debout. The six tracks were compiled by RCA Victor in 1966.

At the beginning of A Woman is a Woman, Angela Récamier (Anna Karina) enters the café. His apartment is located just above this brewery. This establishment, as its name indicates, is decorated with several portraits of Napoleon Bonaparte. During the shooting, Anna Karina, Angela’s interpreter, actually became pregnant, thus making her role a reality. At the time, the actress is married to the Franco-Swiss director.