Vivre sa vie

This 1962 fourth feature film from Jean-Luc Godard—arguably the most influential filmmaker of the 1960s—marks a major turning point away from the impassioned sketchiness of the auteur's first entries into the realm of carefully composed scenes and formal visual strategies. Inspired by a nonfiction exposé of prostitution in France and developed to showcase his wife and muse Anna Karina, Vivre sa vie (also known in the U.S. as My Life to Live) follows the journey of shop girl Nana (both a reference to the novel by Émile Zola and an anagram for “Anna”) from aspiring actress to hooker. Godard mixes character study with social commentary in 12 distinct tableaux shot in long takes by the great New Wave cinematographer Raoul Coutard. On the one hand, Vivre sa vie draws a provocative portrait of social and sexual politics, directed with Godard's distinctive gift for counterpoint and dramatic disassociation; on the other, it tells a moralistic tale of a shallow young woman who is ultimately punished for her ambitions and infidelities. DVD/Blu-ray extras include audio commentary by film scholar Adrian Martin, an interview with film scholar Jean Narboni, an archival 1962 TV interview with Karina, an excerpt from a 1961 French TV exposé on prostitution, and an illustrated essay on La Prostitution, the book that inspired the film. Also included is a booklet featuring an essay and interviews. Highly recommended. (S. Axmaker)