Breathless [Criterion Collection] [2 Discs]

Dedicated to Monogram Pictures, Jean-Luc Godard's debut feature fused the raw energy of American gangster movies with the lyrical ingenuity of French cinema to kick-start a revolution in international filmmaking. Shot without a script on a shoestring budget, Breathless stars Jean-Paul Belmondo as Michel, a Parisian hood on the lam after killing a policeman. He soon winds up in the bed of an American woman (played by Jean Seberg), who ultimately turns him in to the authorities. Establishing many of Godard's recurring themes -- the love-hate relationship with American culture, the macho bravado, and the obsession with female beauty and deceit -- as well as the free-wheeling, modernist, jump-cutting narrative technique, Breathless is raw and vital, a giddy celebration of film itself. It revolutionized the medium upon its initial release and looks none the worse for wear decades on.