In Alphaville, Jean-Luc Godard fuses a hardboiled detective story with science fiction. Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine), a hero Godard borrowed from a series of French adventure films, comes to Alphaville, the capital of a totalitarian state, in order to destroy its leader, an almost-human computer called Alpha 60. While on his mission, Lemmy meets and falls in love with Natacha (Anna Karina), the daughter of the scientist who designed Alpha 60. Their love becomes the most profound challenge
to the computer's control. Void of any flashy special effects, Alphaville uses 1960s Paris to depict the city of the future. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi
It remains an outstanding example of the filmmaker's power to transform an environment through the selection of detail: everything in it is familiar, but nothing is recognizable.
Modern audiences may be tempted to overlook the significance of Goddard's groundbreaking vision but that doesn't detract from its powerful influence on film and pop culture.
Made in the most creative phase of Jean-Luc Godard's career, this sci-fi-political allegory is visually brilliant and quite riveting in its first half before the film gets too didactic in the last reel.
A perfect example of Godard shaking up convention and exploring new ways of making cinema, Alphaville is challenging in places and thematically familiar in others.
This cold war allegorical sci-fi film is imaginatively made and proves that sometimes the most mundane images can become dazzling in the right context.
Technically sloppy but effective science fiction from the directorial stewardship of Jean-Luc Godard. To me, Godard is like the Jackson Pollock of filmdom - I appreciate his contributions to the art-form but I wouldn't want his stuff in my house.
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