The editing often appears abrupt, disregarding the raccord between two consecutive shots. However, instead of harming it, it imparts a remarkable touch of personality. [spoiler] This can be observed when Michel flirts with Patricia in his car. The editing introduces a new shot with each new flirtation, sacrificing visual continuity in a self-referential montage. In one of his attempts to steal cars, Michel disappears running from right to left in one shot, only to reappear from the left in the next, contrary to the recommendations of classical norms. [/spoiler]

On the other hand, the realistic treatment of sound is sacrificed. [spoiler] Sound effects (such as gunshots) and the music used vary in volume and realism between shots. [/spoiler] This is a consequence of the technical equipment employed.

It's worth noting that in some scenes, characters address the audience, as seen at the beginning of the film when Michel turns to the camera to address the audience (which is known as breaking the fourth wall): [spoiler] "If you don't like the beach, if you don't like the mountains...". And at the end, when he declares, "I'm fed up and tired," in a kind of public confession that marks the final outcome, leading to his death. [/spoiler]

Moreover, the film frequently employs narrative elements that make explicit references to the plot. [spoiler] Typically, these are titles appearing on cinema posters introduced in close-ups clearly alluding to the film's resolution. On another occasion, as Michel and Patricia enter the cinema with a close-up of them kissing, the dialogue from the projected film is heard, containing explicit references to one of the key themes: the impossibility of love. [/spoiler]

To conclude, something that not many people know is that Raoul Coutard, the director of photography, recounted that Jean-Luc Godard expressed the decision to depart from conventional practices during filming, opting for the use of natural light. In the film selection process, Coutard mentioned Ilford HPS as his preferred choice. Upon consulting Ilford in England, they were informed that HPS film was not available for cinema, only for photography. The factory produced 17.5-meter film strips for photography, with different perforations than those of cinema cameras.

Faced with this limitation, Godard decided to splice multiple 17.5-meter strips to form film reels, using the Cameflex camera with perforations more similar to Leica. Despite professional skepticism, this choice was implemented. Additionally, to enhance results with HPS, experiments were conducted with the photo developer phenidone. In collaboration with chemist Dubois from GTC laboratories, they successfully doubled the emulsion sensitivity.

However, a challenge arose when attempting to develop the film in a phenidone bath, as GTC laboratories faced technical limitations. The laboratory machines were set to process 3000 meters of film per hour, all using the same bath according to Kodak standards. Although Godard requested special treatment for his 1000 meters in 24 hours, the laboratories initially refused due to incompatibility with their standard procedures.

Luck favored the production, as GTC laboratories had an unused machine, designated for tests, which allowed the development of the Ilford films in a bath designed by themselves, with the flexibility to manage time at their discretion. Coutard emphasized that the worldwide success of "À bout de souffle" is undoubtedly attributed to Godard's imagination, his decision-making at the right moment, and also to Godard's determination in splicing pieces of 17.5-meter Ilford film, miraculously securing the use of a machine at GTC laboratories.

The use of high-sensitivity film allows, consequently, shooting in natural indoor and outdoor settings with minimal additional lighting, resulting in a photograph with grain yet sharpness that resembles the tones of "american black" (noir films) often referred to. But it's not merely an "aesthetic touch"; it's about capturing these natural spaces as documentary images, as manifestations of life in its development (there are numerous outdoor shots where pedestrians look at the camera with curiousity), within an authentic, unaltered context that corresponds to recognizable places, identified by the viewer as part of their own life.

A key film of the late Fifties/early Sixties French New Wave, À bout de souffle (Breathless) opens with suave lowlife Michel Poiccard (Jean-Paul Belmondo) stealing a car. When he's caught speeding on the way to Paris and pursued by the police, Michel kills the officer. Desperate to collect some money owed and make his escape to Italy, he hides out with Patricia (Jean Seberg), an American girl he had slept with once and who is oblivious to the danger he's in.

This is one of the most influential films of all time in its liberal use of jump cuts, in idolizing American noir films and transferring that aesthetic to a foreign country, and its allusions to other films and even self-referentially to itself. Goddard left plenty of signs that he was seeking to overturn the staid French mainstream tradition, such as when Michel rebuffs a hawker selling Cahiers du cinema (the French film magazine), or when Patricia interviews a film director named Parvulesco, who is none other than Godard's New Wave comrade-in-arms Jean-Pierre Melville.

À bout de souffle is undeniably dated. Even knowing all that context around its creation and reception, I found it hard to be really bowled over and cannot award the film a full five stars – and I am a great fan of Godard’s subsequent work. Still, there's a lot to like. I'm particularly fond of the film's dialogue, which revels in French slang that hitherto had not been consider "proper" for art, most of which goes over Patricia's head and some of which Michel explains. In that sense one might compare the film to Raymond Queneau's novel Zazie dans le métro from the same time. The sexual frankness of its young characters might surprise younger viewers who would place this social upheaval to later in the 1960s.

Jean-Paul Belmondo spends much of this film in just his boxers after his "Poiccard/Kovacs" character pinches a car, kills the pursuing police officer and the ends up taking refuge with his new journalism student friend "Patricia" (Jean Seberg). She's not quite aware of the extent of the trouble her new beau is in when he sets about trying to convince her that he has some cash coming and that they should go and live in Italy. His identity isn't exactly unknown to the cops either, and with his face plastered over the front page of every newspaper in Paris, his chances of attaining his idyll are beginning to look remote - especially as he has precisely no self-awareness as he travels the city for all to see. Of course, it has to be only a matter of time before "Patricia" finds out the truth about him - but what will she decide to do? It's essentially a two-hander between the pair and they gel well as the story gathers pace. Seberg's character is engaging and it's easy to see why she falls for the enigmatic and charming criminal who exudes about as much menace as a wet cabbage. There's a fun interview scene when she is charged with quizzing the writer "Parvulesco" (Jean-Pierre mMlville) - a rather pompous individual who announces his life's ambition is to become immortal and die. I guess that might have been how "Poiccard" might have looked at things too - though maybe not the second element too soon. Now the editing. Hmmm. It's messy. Might that be deliberate or just an intern with some sellotape and a blunt razor blade? It's another talking point for this quirky and entertaining crime drama - with a difference.