That's why, la Cinémathèque decided to celebrate this anniversary until october 18th.
Here's a list of 10 movies that have changed the french cinema for ever.
Le Beau Serge, de Claude Chabrol - 1959
The Nouvelle Vague's first movie. Chabrol shoots "Le Beau Serge" in the Sarde, where his grandparents were pharmacists. An unexpected legacy allows him to produce the film, and later on the first movies of Phillippe de Broca, Rivette and Rohmer. "Le Beau Serge" stages the character of François, who returns to his village after many years away. He finds his friend Serge who had a trisomic child and sank into alcohol.
Les 400 Coups, de François Truffaut - 1959
The success that Truffaut meets with "Les 400 Coups" shows to the critics and to the public that it's possible to make films beyond the classic production process. The movie is a perfect example of what is la Nouvelle Vague: long outdoor scenes shot, realistic ambiance, fast and little expensive shooting. "Les 400 Coups" is a chronicle of Antoine Doisnel's difficult childhood.
Hiroshima Mon Amour, d'Alain Resnais - 1959
"Hiroshima Mon Amour" is presented in Cannes the same year as "Les 400 Coups", but out of competition not to offend the United States. Marguerite Duras signs the scenario of this fragmented film, which mixes poetry and reflections on the contemporary history.
L'eau à la bouche, de Jacques Doniol-Valcroze - 1960
The first movie of the founder of Les Cahiers du Cinéma. Doniol-Valcroze requests for Serge Gainsbourg to compose the music of the film and also the song L'eau à la bouche which gives it the title. The film is a romantic intrigue between three couples in a castle.
A bout de souffle, de Jean-Luc Godard - 1960
Inspired by the American macabre film, "A bout de souffle" bewilder by its freedom of speech and style, and blow up the conventions of the traditional cinema. Godard films a Belmondo smoking and saying "Si vous n'aimez pas la ville, allez vous faire foutre! ". Truffaut finds the idea of "A bout de souffle" and Chabrol acts as a "technical adviser" on the shooting.
Lola, de Jacques Demy - 1961
In Nantes, a dancer of cabaret finds the father of a child whom she had formerly. Demy works for Lola with Raoul Coutard, the director of photography of Godard and Truffaut, and also Georges de Beauregard, the producer of numerous films of la Nouvelle Vague.
Paris nous appartient, de Jacques Rivette - 1961
The shooting of Jacques Rivette's first movie met many difficulties which Truffaut will tell "Les Films de ma Vie". To finance his film Rivette has to, for lack of producer, borrow eighty thousand francs from Les Cahiers du Cinéma. Paris nous appartient can be ended when Truffaut and Chabrol decides to coproduce it.
Adieu Philippine, de Jacques Rozier - 1962
Liliane and Juliette, inseparable friends fall in love with Michel, a young machinist. Jacques Rozier will have to wait three years before his film finds the road of theaters, mainly because of a long work of postsynchronizing. The movie meets also some issues because of the complex relationship between Rozier and his producer Georges de Beauregard, who finds hthe movie too expensive and too long.
Cléo de 5 à 7, d'Agnès Varda - 1962
Cléo, hypochondriac diva, considers herself affected by a cancer. The film, like its main character, hesitates between gravity and lightness. Varda is faithful to her technique of " cinécriture ": it is the image which creates the story and not the opposite. The casting of "Cléo" is made of the many important actors of la Nouvelle Vague: we can see Jean-Luc Godard, Anna Karina, Eddie Constantine, Jean-Claude Brialy, Michel Legrand...
Le signe du lion, d'Eric Rohmer - 1962
Several members of the team of Les Cahiers du Cinéma make their appearance in "Le signe du lion", of whom Jean-Luc Godard in the role of an obsessional music lover. The film is the story of a musician who organizes a party in the name of a rich dead aunt of whom he thinks (in a wrong way) to inherit.
