Live stream preview

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Watch this video and more on The Criterion Channel

Start your free trial

Already subscribed? Sign in

Sight and Sound Critics’ Poll: Greatest Films of All Time

Breathless

1h 30m

Directed by Jean-Luc Godard • France • 1960
Starring Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg, Daniel Boulanger

There 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 inspired him as a writer for “Cahiers du cinèma.” With its lack of polish, surplus of attitude, anything-goes crime narrative, and effervescent young stars Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg, BREATHLESS helped launch the French New Wave and ensured that cinema would never be the same.

Up Next in Sight and Sound Critics’ Poll: Greatest Films of All Time

  • Bicycle Thieves
    1:29:23
    Bicycle Thieves

    Bicycle Thieves

    Directed by Vittorio De Sica • 1948 • Italy
    Starring Lamberto Maggiorani, Enzo Staiola, Lianella Carell

    Hailed around the world as one of the greatest movies ever made, the Academy Award-winning BICYCLE THIEVES, directed by Vittorio De Sica, defined an era in cinema. In poverty-stricken postwar ...

  • Rashomon
    1:28:32
    Rashomon

    Rashomon

    Directed by Akira Kurosawa • 1950 • Japan
    Starring Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyo, Masayuki Mori

    A riveting psychological thriller that investigates the nature of truth and the meaning of justice, RASHOMON is widely considered one of the greatest films ever made. Four people give different accou...

  • Stalker
    2:41:51
    Stalker

    Stalker

    Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky • 1979 • Soviet Union
    Starring Alisa Freindlikh, Aleksandr Kaidnovsky, Anatoly Solonitsyn

    Andrei Tarkovsky’s final Soviet feature is a metaphys­ical journey through an enigmatic postapocalyptic landscape, and a rarefied cinematic experience like no other. A hired gui...

×