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Film details
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Featuring
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Director
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Country
France
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Year
1962
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Genre
Drama
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Type
Film
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Category
Fiction
Alternative titles
- MY LIFE TO LIVE Alternative
- IT'S MY LIFE Alternative
Introduction
“Godard began to document the real contradictions of real people’s lives, and to move away from the kind of light romantic intrigues with which the Nouvelle Vague had become associated. Vivre Sa Vie marks the beginning of such a departure.”
Douglas Morrey, Jean-Luc Godard, 2005
Jean-Luc Godard cast his then wife Anna Karina as Nana, a shopgirl turned prostitute, in the third of their seven features together. Marking the high point of their collaboration – and their short-lived marriage – the film is a paean to the actress’s beauty, linking her to silent-era stars Louise Brooks (whose distinctive bobbed hair she shares here) and Maria Falconetti, whose performance in Carl Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) is watched by a tearful Nana in one of the most striking sequences.
Shot in black and white by Raoul Coutard, the film features one of the great cinematographer’s most celebrated shots, showing Nana and a customer in the record store where she works, before the camera turns to look out of the window.
Godard returned to the theme of prostitution in Paris in 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), as did Luis Buñuel in Belle de Jour (1967).
Cast & Credits
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Cast
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Nana Kleinfrankenheim
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Raoul
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Paul
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Yvette
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the cook
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Elizabeth
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a journalist
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Dimitri, a youth
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a young man
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Luigi
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the philosopher
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Arthur
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a client
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barmaid
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a policeman at typewriter
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a bystander
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concierge
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wounded man entering bar
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man by juke box watching Nana
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young soldier in bar
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an Italian
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voice reading "The Oval Portrait"
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Credits
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Direction:
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Director
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Right-hand Man
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Assistant Director
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Script Girl
Production:
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Production Company
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Producer
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Unit Manager
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Administration
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Production Secretary
Writing:
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[Screenplay]
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[From 'Où en est la prostitution?' by]
Photography:
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Photography
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Camera Operator
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Camera Assistant
Special Effects:
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Special Effects
Editing:
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Editor
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Cutting
Costumes:
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Costumes
Make-up:
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Make-up
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Hairstyles
Music:
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Music
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Songs
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Lyrics
Sound:
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Sound
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Boom Operator
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Mixer
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The Greatest Films of All Time 2012
Voted for by 12 critics and 9 directors.