Détective (1985)
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard

Film Review

In this film, Jean-Luc Godard takes a conventional detective thriller and manages to produce something quite original - although the end result is far from accessible.

The film is loaded with Godard's cinematographic devices - such as rapid inter-cutting of apparently unconnected scenes, dialogue interrupted by unexpected musical intrusions, and some blatant allegorical imagery.  However, whilst such techniques were fresh and exciting in Godard's early career, the same approach now looks rather tired and distinctly depassé in this 1980s thriller-drama.  Instead of adding depth to the film, this cinematographic artistry seems merely to render an already complicated story virtually incomprehensible.

This is a shame because the film could have succeeded as a conventional drama - it does have a very strong cast (which includes the (in)famous singer Johnny Hallyday) and the plot (if you have the patience to follow it) is not without merit.  In the search for originality in his art, Godard is apparently hampered by his own past achievements.  Nowhere is this more apparent than in this film.

Film Synopsis

In one room of an upmarket Parisian hotel, two detectives who go by the names Uncle Prospero and Neveu are sedulously investigating the murder of a royal personage on the premises two years ago.  In another room of the same hotel, the boxer Tiger Jones is preparing himself for his next match, in the company of his manager Eugène and promoter Jim Fox Warner.  The latter is counting on Tiger to improve his financial situation after he lost a staggering amount of money on an earlier disastrous venture, so understandably he becomes concerned when the boxer's girlfriend keeps plying him with sweets.

Jim's already strained nerves would be even more on edge if he knew that two suspicious-looking couples are in the vicinity, both eager to settle past scores with him.  First there is Émile and Françoise Chenal, to whom Jim owes a large sum of money, and then there are a pair of cool Mafiosa types who have come to teach the promoter a lesson he won't forget in a hurry.  Within no time the destinies of these four sets of individuals become inextricably linked, leading to an outcome that could not be bloodier...