Jean-Luc Godard	...	(Director)
Jean-Luc Godard	...	(Writer)
Anne Wiazemsky	...	Veronique
Juliet Berto	...	Yvonne
Jean-Pierre Léaud	...	Guillaume
Michel Semeniako	...	Henri
Lex De Bruijn	...	Kirilov
Omar Diop	...	Omar
Francis Jeanson	...	Francis
Blandine Jeanson	...	Blandine
Eliane Giovagnoli	...	Son ami
Raoul Coutard	...	Cinematographer
Delphine Desfons	...	Editor
Agnès Guillemot	...	Editor

Summary: Among Godard's films, la Chinoise currently stands as my favourite. Very Brechtian in its form, it does not let the audience enter a state of complacency and let the plot flow: it demands attention.

The bare plot is simple enough, and I won't outline it here, but what is great about this film is its spirit. I daresay it captures the atmosphere of the times - of a contemporaneous flat of young political activists - perfectly. I stress the word 'atmosphere', as that is the first thing that draws you in. The little things, the note-writing on the walls, posters, paintings, books, the way the people in the flat sit, stand, study, listen to the radio, and relate to each other, all of these paint in successive strokes the atmosphere of the flat.

But then the camera moves and decides to show the crew and the equipments and so we are not even allowed to forget that this is a show. The characters come forward in an interview like monologue (we can't hear the interlocutor) and tell you about themselves, how they came to be in that flat, their political beliefs, etc. They may just be playing their parts and reciting dialogue but one gets the feeling that they are also speaking for themselves (a character (Guillaume) explicitly says that he is!)

Now for the most demanding part of the film, the actual 'text', shall I say? Apart from incessant quotes from the Red Book, the actual dialogues and talks in the film are quite intellectually demanding, and in fact quite enlightening at times. I do recommend a second view to get more out of the film. I was especially impressed by the talk between Véronique and the Professor-activist in the train. I shall not go into details (and raptures) about the intellectually stimulating bits of the film, but if you're not looking forward to an intellectual engagement with what is said (and shown) in the film, I definitely do not recommend this.

This film is not a slag-off of the maoist-student movement in France, as the bare plot may suggest, it is rather a constructive engagement with what was happening in the times. I think the end note is that of hope rather than pessimism, though with clauses: it is but a first step, as Véronique says. A naïve hope perhaps, and dangerous too in this naïvety, but a hope nevertheless. We see at the end each of the characters going out and trying to work towards their hopes. There is no closure. We are left to make up our own minds.