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Every Man for Himself



After a decade in the wilds of avant-garde and early video experimentation, Jean-Luc Godard returned to commercial cinema with this work of social commentary, star-driven and narrative while remaining defiantly intellectual and visually cutting-edge. Every Man for Himself, featuring a script by Jean-Claude Carrière and Anne-Marie Miéville, looks at the sexual and professional lives of three people—a television producer (Jacques Dutronc), his ex-girlfriend (Nathalie Baye), and a prostitute (Isabelle Huppert)—to create a meditative story about work, relationships, and the notion of freedom. Made twenty years into his career, the film was, according to Godard, a second debut.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New high-definition digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• Le scénario (1979), a short video created by director Jean-Luc Godard to secure financing for Every Man for Himself
• New video essay by critic Colin MacCabe
• New interviews with actor Isabelle Huppert and producer Marin Karmitz
• Archival interviews with actor Nathalie Baye, cinema­tographers Renato Berta and William Lubtchansky, and composer Gabriel Yared
• Two back-to-back 1980 appearances by Godard on The Dick Cavett Show
• Godard 1980, a short film by Jon Jost, Donald Ranvaud, and Peter Wollen, featuring Godard
• Trailer
• PLUS: An essay by critic Amy Taubin

I'm happy to see Criterion releasing some later Godard. I hope there's more to follow ("Nouvelle vague," for example). This will do, for now!

An interesting choice for Criterion to indulge in third period Godard, as this is pretty abrasive at-times, though filled with moments of Godard's typical playfulness (though less outwardly warm than his 60s work). I would have expected Nouvelle Vague first from the MIA in R1 titles, but this is a strong choice and they've clearly thought about this release with those generous extras. Plus, it'll be fun to experience all the meltdowns from casual Godard fans picking this up in a BN sale and hitting a cinematic brick wall

Is there some rights tangle with Nouvelle Vague? Delon's presence and the mystique which has grown up around its lack of American distribution make it seem like a sure thing for someone to release, CC or no (and hopefully in an edition as fine as this one).

This film had a restoration and tour around 2011 if I remember correctly (2010 the earliest), so not surprising Criterion released it (actually expecting it sooner).

This is one of Godard's works I've been interested in checking out for quite some time now, so it's nice to know that I'll be able to pick up this edition instead of having to import a copy (and the extras Criterion has put together look great).

domino harvey wrote:Plus, it'll be fun to experience all the meltdowns from casual Godard fans picking this up in a BN sale and hitting a cinematic brick wall

Considering the only post-Weekend Godard films I've seen include For Ever Mozart and Film Socialisme, neither of which I cared for in the slightest, there's a good chance I may very well have a meltdown! Although I am much more optimistic about this one... The slow motion clip I caught on YouTube in the interview between Godard and Dick Cavett was very enticing.

Those are two of the weaker late-period Godard films, at least. I'm thinking more of the DVDTalk rando buyers, not anyone here.

And while the two Dick Cavett Show appearances also appear in the special DVD that came with a copy of the Believer a few years back, the other four specials are still exclusive to that issue

nice one, but I would have prefered First Name Carmen (aka Prénom Carmen)- this one is available via iTunes but with hard-coded English subtitles (did they have increase the resolution ? they say HD- at the time when I bought it it was available only in 720p not at a higher resolution)

I really hope that Criterion will get his hands on this.
I'm afraid that this gorgeous Godard from the 80's won't be released on blu-ray. (Is it still StudioCanal which has the right for this movie?)

We have already on Blu-Ray from this era "Keep Your Right Up" (Soigne Ta Droite) via Olive and For Ever Mozart (via Cohen films)

and yes I have a little thing with Maruschka Detmers...

First Name Carmen is available and last I know of in print with Lionsgates as part of Studio Canal. Also Crit releasing post '68 Godard is one of those positive signs of the Apocalypse I never thought would happen, but am overwhelmed did. Between this and the recent Cohen releases it is a great time to be a fan.

knives wrote:First Name Carmen is available and last I know of in print with Lionsgates as part of Studio Canal. Also Crit releasing post '68 Godard is one of those positive signs of the Apocalypse I never thought would happen, but am overwhelmed did. Between this and the recent Cohen releases it is a great time to be a fan.

Regarding First Name Carmen I own the Lionsgates box set (3 DVD -which also includes Passion and Detective (with Julie Delpy qui joue de la flûte) zone 1 US (StudioCanal logo at the beginning of each movie)- and I agree that this release is a good sign.

knives wrote:First Name Carmen is available and last I know of in print with Lionsgates as part of Studio Canal. Also Crit releasing post '68 Godard is one of those positive signs of the Apocalypse I never thought would happen, but am overwhelmed did.

Uh, it already happened a long time ago with Tout va bien!

I consider that them giving (fortunate) lip service to Gorin.

Fantastic announcement, though I guess it means that Michael Witt's reconstruction of the 1980 Rotterdam version will never see the light of day on home video. Unsurprisingly, I suppose.

I think this is the first time Criterion has worked with the Film Desk. No more Godard in their library, but plenty of other Criterion-ready titles.

In a great month this is easily still the most surprising and exciting release for me. The extensive extras are awesome. But the happiest aspect for me is that there will be no R1 DVD-only Olive Films or Zeitgeist dump of this title as we witnessed for, say, The Devil, Probably, which also came from Film Desk in a re-release a few years back. Late period Godard films are full of inventive beautiful images that are best served on Blu-ray.

FerdinandGriffon wrote:I think this is the first time Criterion has worked with the Film Desk. No more Godard in their library, but plenty of other Criterion-ready titles.

Is the Film Desk mentioned in the solicit? Monsieur Verdoux and The Long Day Closes are in the Film Desk catalog, but the Film Desk isn't mentioned on the Criterion releases, and the Film Desk doesn't mention Criterion on their website. Olive's The Devil, Probably included no mention of Film Desk either. On the other hand the Zeitgeist and Kino releases (the Garrels, We Won't Grow Old Together, Promised Lands, etc.) have the Film Desk logo on the packaging. It's possible the Film Desk doesn't have the video rights to any of these films (being exclusively a theatrical distributor) but has a co-branding arrangement with Zeitgeist and Kino. In that case it wouldn't really matter if Criterion works with the Film Desk or not, since they could independently obtain the video rights from the licensor(s).

The sell sheets have Gaumont's logo for Every Man for Himself.

Yeah, can't say for sure what's going on now. All I know is that when I asked Jake Perlin (of the Film Desk) about home video plans back in 2011, he said he was shopping it around to Criterion, amongst others.

Calvin wrote:Fantastic announcement, though I guess it means that Michael Witt's reconstruction of the 1980 Rotterdam version will never see the light of day on home video. Unsurprisingly, I suppose.

That's a real shame as it was fascinating.

I've received my Blu-Ray yesterday :

in the New video essay by critic Colin MacCabe : there's 2 High-Def video excerpts from 2 J-L Godard movie in the Criterion collection (beside "Breathless" and "Vivre sa Vie" (and Week-end) : "2 ou 3 choses que je sais d'elle" (2 or 3 Things I Know About Her) (Marina Vlady in HD ) and the red socks "papaaaaa paaaa paaaa paaaaa paaaaa" dim(TM) sequence from "Tout Va Bien".
I hope that Criterion still have the rights for these 2 movies and that it implies in a way that perhaps in a next not so distant future we will get an HD-Blu upgrade of "2 or 3 Things I Know About Her" and "Tout Va Bien". [-o<

If Tout va Bien may be upgraded that also hopefully means that Letter To Jane: An Investigation of a Still will be done too!

Pshew, just made my way through the copious three hours plus of extras on this disc. Most of what's here is pretty good, but man, you can safely skip the tortuous Wollen video magazine piece, which is trying to do some kind of half-assed avant garde thing with its camerawork and the question and answer session is awkward and embarrassing for both interviewers and interviewee alike. The unease of everyone on camera in that piece is nearly matched by the German interview with the two cinematographers, neither of whom look pleased to be participating (especially Berta). The Baye and Yared pieces appear to be from an earlier French release of the film, with the Huppert, Karmitz, and MacCabe pieces being the commissioned/in-house work, the "scenario" having appeared on the earlier Artificial Eye DVD and the Cavett shows on the Believer's JLG disc. It's funny how almost every interview features a new fantastic anecdote about what an enormous asshole Godard is, tempered always by how intelligent the interview subject found him on the whole and their general respect/admiration (Baye in particular comes off as quite smitten with JLG!)

Calvin wrote:Fantastic announcement, though I guess it means that Michael Witt's reconstruction of the 1980 Rotterdam version will never see the light of day on home video. Unsurprisingly, I suppose.

More on this for those curious

Definitely something I'm looking forward to when I get the disc. Especially the Cavett stuff.