Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

just watch it!

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Blistering performances.

"Masculin Feminin" is a definitive example of French New Wave filmmaking. It is experimental, comic, risky, wild, and fun, a spectacle that find cinematic magic within even the most subtle and mundane of situations. Although it is often listed as nothing more than a drama, this is also an extremely funny movie, perhaps one of Jean-Luc Godard's very funniest. From the opening moments, bizarre comic mischief is springing left and right. Through unexpected surrealism and occasional violence, Godard masterfully weaves dark humor into this often tragic love story.The performances are also quite exceptional. Jean-Pierre Léaud further stabilizes his spot among the greatest French actors, and Chantal Goya is no less than absolutely charming and delightful. The characters are well developed-often likable, but sometimes despicable, like most human beings. There are times in which you, as an audience member, agree with their actions and beliefs, and there are times in which you must disagree. Through their ups and downs, "Masculin Feminin" explores a youthful couple's relationship in a unique and hysterical way. Fusing satire, sadness, fantasy, and comedy, "Masculin feminin" is very much a Jean-Luc Godard love story, meaning that it is heavily stylized, but also heavily realistic, just not in the conventional sense.

This is about bored kids in Paris around 1965. France has been dealing with Vietnam since it was called French Indo-China. The U.S. has dived in head first. A couple of young men fancy themselves reactionaries. Their actions are silly and innocuous but they feel they should be doing something. What they actually do is talk a lot. They ask endless questions. Paul, played by Jean-Pierre Leaude, the little boy in "The 400 Blows" is a naive brat who wants to be hot stuff but can't pull it off. He imagines himself like Belmondo but can't even master the cigarette trick that the great one used. The women are really in charge here, although they haven't figured things out that well either. One pretty young thing is a gorgeous, though quite wholesome, pop music star. This role doesn't seem to get her much credibility with her friends, particularly with Paul. She is a celebrity but no one can figure out why. They go to movies, hang around a cafe, but can't feel good in their own skins. Jean Luc Godard lets his characters live, but his point is less tactile.

Sometimes movies can make me feel really stupid, simply because I don't feel like I understand them. This is also really the case with this movie. Don't get me wrong, it's still a good watch but at the same time I really don't see or understand what it is exactly trying to do or say.I don't get the movie its symbolism and messages but even despite that the movie remains a good and interesting one to watch. Yet at the same time I'm also still constantly thinking; why are you showing me all of this and what are you trying to tell with your story and certain moments. Not to sound too disrespectful but it's a quite pointless movie, since I got nothing out of it and in my opinion also is a movie you can very easily do without.It's one of those movies that seems to be a random slice of life. I can really like these kind of movies, if they tell an intriguing enough story. And I wouldn't exactly call this movie a very involving one, mainly since it isn't always going anywhere with its story. It's still interesting to see the characters do their things and interacting with each other but I only did wish that sometimes the movie would have a more clear point to all of it. Technically I can't say anything bad about this movie. It's obviously capably directed by Jean-Luc Godard and the movie has good, atmospheric black & white camera-work, like you would expect from a French genre movie of the '60's.If this movie sounds like it's right up your alley, by all means go and watch it but to me most people this movie will still be a bit of a pointless watch. No not bad, just redundant. 7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Masculine Feminin is my favorite Godard movie! Chantal Goya's Ye-Ye score gives the movie an incredibly youthful freshness. The innocent naiveté of Ye-Ye is presented as an oxymoron in a French culture being deluged by Pop Culture and consumer materialism. Paul prefers classical music and despite his Marxism has fairly traditional sexual values. France lost its innocence with this movie. While I would call this movie tame by our our celeb sex tape standards, France restricted access to this movie to those over 18. Some interesting sexual / bisexual stuff that is subversively alluded to. The Swedish sex film (a mise-en-abîme) and the homosexual kiss in the cinema bathroom are self-explanatory. (The later echoes James Baldwin's opening in Another Country.) Godard can didactically beats it over your head - witness his prescient comments on the American involvement in Vietnam, yet in the same movie he can be remarkably subtle. Did Paul commit suicide or was it an accident? What is Madeline's relationship with Elizabeth? Godard chronicles France in transition from the hegemony of the Catholic ethos to the student uprising, which would occur in 1968.It is ironic when you consider the national trauma of the NAZI invasion and the Gallic intellectual cynicism; however, the Beatles and the Sexual Revolution seems to have come later to France. Individualism and consumerism overcoming a group mentality whether Godard's Marxism or the mainstream Catholic Church. Odd Paradox when you consider the traditional association of the French with libertines. Hmm....Léaud later said he trembled when he did the bathroom scene with Goya. Goya wouldn't do a nude shower scene even behind a frosted glass. (BB is wonderful eye candy in Mepris if that is what you want.) While Masculin Femin is cavalier about prostitution, it is deeply engaged in the structural transformation occurring in France in how men and women define their sexual roles.I'm not a movie critic but I enjoyed watching and re-watching this movie. I think it is a more entertaining movie than Breathless or Contempt from the fun perspective. Jean-Paul Belmondo defines cool in the same way as Marcello Mastroianni in La Dolce vita but I'm talking about how a movie can go beyond style and talk about human relationships. On a superficial note, BB is nice in Mepris but as an incurable romantic I'm still drooling over Miss Elsa Leroy's fuzzy sweater in M/F.I think when Godard later becomes more experimental and didactic he loses his mainstream audience. I am one of that mainstream audience and that is truly my loss. :(