French New Wave
40 Episodes
There was cinema before the French New Wave, and there was cinema after. The explosion of creative innovation that emanated from France in the late 1950s and early ’60s forever altered the course of film history by opening up new avenues of stylistic experimentation and trumpeting the concept of the “auteur” director, whose aesthetic vision and thematic obsessions took center stage. Led by a coterie of passionate film critics and cinephiles who took up cameras—including the radical Jean-Luc Godard (BREATHLESS, PIERROT LE FOU), the romantic François Truffaut (THE 400 BLOWS, JULES AND JIM), the restless Agnès Varda (CLÉO FROM 5 TO 7, LE BONHEUR), the experimental Jacques Rivette (PARIS BELONGS TO US, CELINE AND JULIE GO BOATING), the modernist Alain Resnais (HIROSHIMA MON AMOUR), and the classicist Eric Rohmer (MY NIGHT AT MAUD’S, CLAIRE’S KNEE)—the French New Wave inspired filmmakers around the world by liberating cinema from commercial demands and reclaiming it in the name of unfettered personal expression.
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09:32Episode 1
French New Wave: In Their Own Words
Episode 1
In this program created in 2021 from archival interviews, directors Jean-Pierre Melville, Jean-Luc Godard, François Truffaut, Louis Malle, Claude Chabrol, Jacques Demy, and Agnès Varda discuss their work.
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01:01Episode 2
French New Wave Teaser
Episode 2
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1:21:12Episode 3
La Pointe Courte
Episode 3
Directed by Agnès Varda • 1955 • France
Starring Silvia Monfort, Philippe NoiretThe great Agnès Varda’s film career began with this graceful, penetrating study of a marriage on the rocks, set against the backdrop of a small Mediterranean fishing village. Both a stylized depiction of the complic...
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1:31:33Episode 4
Elevator to the Gallows
Episode 4
Directed by Louis Malle • 1958 • France
Starring Jeanne Moreau, Maurice Ronet, Georges PoujoulyFor his feature debut, twenty-four-year-old Louis Malle brought together a mesmerizing performance by Jeanne Moreau, evocative cinematography by Henri Decaë, and a now legendary jazz score by Miles Da...
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1:39:25Episode 5
Le beau Serge
Episode 5
Directed by Claude Chabrol • 1958 • France
Starring Jean‑Claude Brialy, Gérard BlainOf the hallowed group of “Cahiers du cinéma” critics turned filmmakers who transformed French film history, Claude Chabrol was the first to direct his own feature. His absorbing landmark debut, LE BEAU SERGE (“H...
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1:30:44Episode 6
The Lovers
Episode 6
Directed by Louis Malle • 1958 • France
Starring Jeanne Moreau, Jean-Marc BoryLouis Malle unveiled the natural beauty of Jeanne Moreau in his breakthrough, ELEVATOR TO THE GALLOWS. With his follow-up, the scandalous smash THE LOVERS (LES AMANTS), he made her a star once and for all. A deeply fe...
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1:40:00Episode 7
The 400 Blows
Episode 7
Directed by François Truffaut • 1959 • France
Starring Jean-Pierre Léaud, Claire Maurier, Albert RémyFrançois Truffaut’s first feature is also his most personal. Told through the eyes of Truffaut’s cinematic counterpart, Antoine Doinel (Jean-Pierre Léaud), THE 400 BLOWS sensitively re-creates t...
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1:30:26Episode 8
Hiroshima mon amour
Episode 8
Directed by Alain Resnais • 1959 • France, Japan
Starring Emmanuelle Riva, Eiji OkadaA cornerstone of the French New Wave, the first feature from Alain Resnais is one of the most influential films of all time. A French actress (Emmanuelle Riva) and a Japanese architect (Eiji Okada) engage in a ...
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1:49:45Episode 9
Les cousins
Episode 9
Directed by Claude Chabrol • 1959 • France
Starring Jean-Claude Brialy, Gérard BlainIn LES COUSINS (“The Cousins”), Claude Chabrol crafts a sly moral fable about a provincial boy who comes to live with his sophisticated bohemian cousin in Paris. Through these seeming opposites, Chabrol conjures...
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1:30:45Episode 10
Breathless
Episode 10
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • France • 1960
Starring Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg, Daniel BoulangerThere was before BREATHLESS, and there was after BREATHLESS. Jean-Luc Godard burst onto the film scene in 1960 with this jazzy, free-form, and sexy homage to the American film genres that inspi...
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1:21:45Episode 11
Shoot the Piano Player
Episode 11
Directed by François Truffaut • 1960 • France
Starring Charles Aznavour, Marie Dubois, Nicole BergerFrançois Truffaut is drunk on the possibilities of cinema in this, his most playful film. Part thriller, part comedy, part tragedy, SHOOT THE PIANO PLAYER relates the adventures of mild-mannered ...
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1:32:49Episode 12
Zazie dans le métro
Episode 12
Directed by Louis Malle • 1960 • France
Starring Catherine Demongeot, Philippe NoiretA brash and precocious ten-year-old (Catherine Demongeot) comes to Paris for a whirlwind weekend with her rakish uncle (Philippe Noiret); he and the viewer get more than they bargained for, however, in this ana...
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Lola
Episode 13
Directed by Jacques Demy • 1961 • France, Italy
Starring Anouk Aimée, Marc MichelJacques Demy’s crystalline debut gave birth to the fictional universe in which so many of his characters would live, play, and love. It’s among his most profoundly felt films, a tale of crisscrossing lives in Nante...
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1:30:47Episode 14
Chronicle of a Summer
Episode 14
Directed by Jean Rouch and Edgar Morin • 1961 • France
Few films can claim as much influence on the course of cinema history as CHRONICLE OF A SUMMER. The fascinating result of a collaboration between filmmaker-anthropologist Jean Rouch and sociologist Edgar Morin, this vanguard work of what Mor...
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2:22:05Episode 15
Paris Belongs to Us
Episode 15
Directed by Jacques Rivette • 1961 • France
Starring Betty Schneider, François Maistre, Giani EspositoOne of the original critics turned filmmakers who helped jump-start the French New Wave, Jacques Rivette began shooting his debut feature in 1958, well before that cinema revolution officially ...
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1:30:52Episode 16
Cléo from 5 to 7
Episode 16
Directed by Agnès Varda • 1962 • France
Starring Corinne Marchand, Antoine Bourseiller, Dominique DavrayAgnès Varda eloquently captures Paris in the sixties with this real-time portrait of a singer (Corinne Marchand) set adrift in the city as she awaits test results of a biopsy. A chronicle of ...
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1:46:26Episode 17
Jules and Jim
Episode 17
Directed by François Truffaut • 1962 • France
Starring Jeanne Moreau, Oskar Werner, Henri SerreHailed as one of the finest films ever made, JULES AND JIM charts, over twenty-five years, the relationship between two friends and the object of their mutual obsession. The legendary François Truffau...
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1:23:52Episode 18
Vivre sa vie
Episode 18
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • 1962 • France
Starring Anna Karina, Sady Rebbot, André LabartheVIVRE SA VIE (a.k.a. MY LIFE TO LIVE) was a turning point for Jean-Luc Godard and remains one of his most dynamic films, combining brilliant visual design with a tragic character study. The lovely Anna ...
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1:48:15Episode 19
The Fire Within
Episode 19
Directed by Louis Malle • 1963 • France
Starring Maurice Ronet, Léna Skerla, Jeanne MoreauAfter garnering international acclaim for such seminal crowd-pleasers as THE LOVERS and ZAZIE DANS LE MÉTRO, Louis Malle gave his fans a shock with THE FIRE WITHIN (LE FEU FOLLET), a penetrating study of i...
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1:56:33Episode 20
Muriel, or The Time of Return
Episode 20
Directed by Alain Resnais • 1963 • France
Starring Delphine Seyrig, Jean-Pierre Kérien, Nita KleinAlain Resnais's MURIEL, OR THE TIME OF RETURN, the director's follow-up to LAST YEAR AT MARIENBAD, is as radical a reflection on the nature of time and memory as its predecessor. The always luminou...
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1:24:27Episode 21
Bay of Angels
Episode 21
Directed by Jacques Demy • 1963 • France
Starring Jeanne Moreau, Claude MannThis precisely wrought, emotionally penetrating romantic drama from Jacques Demy, set largely in the casinos of Nice, is a visually lovely but darkly realistic investigation into love and obsession. A bottle-blonde Jean...
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55:21Episode 22
Suzanne’s Career
Episode 22
Directed by Eric Rohmer • 1963 • France
Bertrand bides his time in a casually hostile and envious friendship with college chum Guillaume. But when ladies' man Guillaume seems to be making a play for the spirited, independent Suzanne, Bertrand watches bitterly with disapproval and jealousy. With ...
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1:57:56Episode 23
The Soft Skin
Episode 23
Directed by François Truffaut • 1964 • France
Starring Jean Desailly, Françoise Dorléac, Nelly BenedettiFrançois Truffaut followed up the international phenomenon JULES AND JIM with this tense tale of infidelity. The unassuming Jean Desailly is perfectly cast as a celebrated literary scholar, ...
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1:32:08Episode 24
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
Episode 24
Directed by Jacques Demy • 1964 • France
Starring Catherine Deneuve, Nino CastelnuovoThe angelically beautiful Catherine Deneuve was launched to stardom by this dazzling musical heart-tugger from Jacques Demy. She plays an umbrella-shop owner’s delicate daughter, glowing with first love for a h...