The Chinese

I've heard some claim this as Godard's seminal work. I wouldn't say quite that, but its a great, and I think misunderstood, piece of work. Everyone discusses this film as if it were a critique of the May '68 Movement, forgetting that it was released the year before, and probably filmed two years before. Everyone thus views it as a satire of the past, when it fact it is a frightened critique of the contemporary. Godard does indeed think the "Maoists" the film follows are dilettantes, as the May '68 Movement proved to be, primarily, composed of. But he also wants desperately for a more militant presence to assert itself, and lead the contemporary situation into a more legitimately revolutionary direction. The seminal scene of the film is in the last act, when the student radical meets with her professor "radical" on a train. Both sides issue futile maxims. Godard overlays the words "this situation must change!" over their conversation. The pseudo-revolution of the 1960s, Godard prays, can become a real one. In retrospect, this is somber