Keep Your Right Up!

"No commercial potential" is how Frank Zappa used to describe his music, and the same goes for this inscrutable 1987 comedy by pioneer of the French New Wave, Jean-Luc Godard, who at the age of 70 is still rigorously enthralled to his singular muse. The most accessible segments concern a filmmaker (portrayed by Godard) addressed as the Idiot (ostensibly either a reference to Dostoyevsky or Jerry Lewis), who has been offered financing for a movie if he can deliver it in 24 hours. Meanwhile, a techno-pop group works on a recording, while narrative diversions include philosophical musings and an allegorical enactment of the fable of the grasshopper and the ant with Jane Birkin in the grasshopper role. This is, of course, the type of movie that sends those not on Godard's wavelength scurrying to read other critics who may "get it." So it is no small comfort that the New York Times noted that Keep Your Right Up!, which was never released theatrically in the United States, arrived with "its strangeness undiminished and its mysteries intact." My sentiments exactly. Still, Godard's legendary cinematic stature makes this an optional purchase for larger foreign film collections. (K. Lee Benson)[DVD/Blu-ray Review—July 2, 2013—Olive, 85 min., in French w/English subtitles, not rated, DVD: $24.95, Blu-ray: $29.95—Making its latest appearance on DVD and first on Blu-ray, 1987's Keep Your Right Up! sports a fine transfer, but no special features. Bottom line: as lesser Godard film makes its high-def debut.]