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Fascinating classic French New Wave film from Truffaut

Kenji Fujishima | East Brunswick, NJ USA | 08/30/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Other than seeing him in Steven Spielberg's CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, I have never been much acquainted with the films of much-acclaimed French New Wave filmmaker Francois Truffaut. Recently, though, I decided to try one of his most famous films, JULES AND JIM, and, for the most part, I was not disappointed by it. Having seen Jean-Luc Godard's seminal BREATHLESS just recently on DVD, I was able to appreciate some of the similarities in style between the two films. The first half of JULES AND JIM, especially, is full of technical wizardry: Truffaut not only uses Godard's pioneering jump-cut technique, but also uses the occasional freeze fame to emphasize particular small moments (like Jeanne Moreau's facial expressions at one point), plays with his film's aspect ratio (filmed in 2.35:1 widescreen Franscope by Raoul Coutard, who also did similarly distinguished work in BREATHLESS) and even interspersing WWI newsreel footage into the film, in the manner of Orson Welles in CITIZEN KANE and THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS. But, as with all great filmmakers, all of this technique is not merely the empty stylings of a virtuoso visual artist. Not only does the technique bring a fascinating alive-ness to the picture; it emphasizes the joy in the lives of the three main characters before WWI and its sad aftermath set in.



Truffaut's characters are also fascinating to watch, their situations equally so. Here is a romantic triangle like no other I've ever seen, but the focus isn't necessarily on the two men who love the same woman. As the Amazon.com editorial review suggests, the film may be named after its two main male characters, but it really belongs to Catherine, the self-proclaimed "free spirit" female who is loved by almost every man she meets and yet never feels the need to settle with just one. She is a powerful and fascinatingly enigmatic character, indeed "ultimately unknowable." Yet what spirit we notice when we first see her onscreen! Who wouldn't be resisted by her adventurousness and sheer energy at first, especially the way Jeanne Moreau irresistibly plays her? And then we see how manipulative and restless she can really be, and we start to feel a little sympathy toward the gentle man who married her, Jules: this is perhaps the first woman he has truly admired and loved, and now that he has gotten her, he desperately wants to hold on to her, even going so far as to put up with her cheating ways. Jim, of course, feels a bit of jealousy when Jules marries her, but he keeps it to himself, as a good friend must...until Jules allows him to carry on an affair with her. Even then, though, she becomes unhappy with Jim when she cannot conceive of a child. All of these threads converge into an ending that is both shockingly sudden and lyrically poetic; you'll understand Jules' feeling of "relief" after the film is over, and perhaps you'll likely echo it yourself, after having watched these characters live the way they have.



The central performances are all first-rate. Oskar Werner and Henri Serre as Jules and Jim both exhibit convincing chemistry at the beginning of the film: you can tell they've been good friends for a long time. As the film progresses, though, Werner truly stands out as the long-suffering Jules: he draws you into his ambivalent, complicated feelings toward Catherine, and easily earns some audience sympathy. And Jeanne Moreau truly brings Catherine, the real protagonist of the film, to vivid life. She is always convincingly in character, and never makes Catherine's actions feel lightweight or inconsequential, like some other less-skilled movie stars might do.



I found the narration of the movie kind of a distraction at times. Voice-over narration can be convincing in some movies (the recent SEABISCUIT used it quite effectively, I think), but in JULES AND JIM I find it a bit too explanatory of characters' emotions, too much of a narrative shortcut---in short, perhaps a bit of laziness on Truffaut's part. If less was merely explained and more was suggested by visual means, the film might seem more like a real film, less like a filmed novel, with passages being quoted from it verbatim.



In the end, though, that blemish is a comparatively small one, one that doesn't diminish the lyricism and beauty of this film significantly. JULES AND JIM remains a magnificent achievement from the French New Wave, a fascinating, emotionally complex, and above all human film about a woman whose attempts at being in control of her life slowly takes its toll on the lives of the two others who love her so. Highly recommended."