Inside Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina’s intense working relationship
Jean-Luc Godard was the biggest name to emerge from the French New Wave, reshaping the landscape of cinema and revitalising it with new and experimental filming and editing techniques. While Godard was one of the New Wave’s pioneers, Anna Karina was undoubtedly the face of it.
Godard’s first film was Breathless, a now-iconic picture starring Jean Seberg and Jean-Paul Belmondo. Noted for its use of jump cuts and naturalistic, low-budget filming methods that gave it a documentary feel, Breathless inspired a whole generation of filmmakers, who were forced to reconsider the way films could be made and consumed.
Many of Godard’s films were made with actress Anna Karina in a leading role. Sadly, Karina’s star power has been strongly tied to Godard for the whole of her career, largely existing in his shadow. Yet Karina did so much more, and if it wasn’t for her, who knows if the films he cast Karina in would have been so successful.
While their working relationship proved so fruitful, things took a more intense turn shortly after when the pair married in 1961. At the time, Karina was just 19, and Godard was ten years her senior. According to Karina, the pair first made contact when Godard approached her to be in Breathless after he saw her in a Palmolive advert. She recalled: “He said, ‘You have to take your clothes off’. And I didn’t want to take my clothes off. […] So I left and, of course, I didn’t do the film.”
But Godard was desperate to have Karina in one of his films, so he approached her again to be in Le Petit Soldat. The director assured her that there would be no nudity and, instead, it would be a political film. Karina agreed, but because she was just 18 at the time, her mother had to fly from Denmark to sign the contract on her behalf.
Karina has described their tumultuous relationship many times, which began shortly after they began filming Le Petit Soldat. “We had something very special that you couldn’t get away from. It was magnetic. It all started in that film,” the actor commented. “We were all having a dinner party in Lausanne, and he wrote me a note that said: ‘I love you, come and meet me at midnight in a café called Café de la Prez’. I was with somebody else but I couldn’t help it, I was totally in another world. I don’t know if you understand that. I couldn’t stay away. I was totally fascinated. And then I lost all my friends because they all liked my other boyfriend more. So then we get to Paris and Jean-Luc asks me, ‘So, where do you go now? Where do I take you?’ And I told him, ‘You can’t take me nowhere; I have to stay with you! I have nowhere to go anymore!’”
After they wrapped Le Petit Soldat, Karina was approached by director Michel Deville, who wanted to have the young actress star in his first film. Due to the jealous nature that Godard possessed, he had to approve of her role before she accepted. Although he thought the script was terrible, Karina took her place in the film Tonight or Never, and Godard was impressed by her performance.
From there, Godard decided to cast Karina in more of his upcoming projects, starting with Une femme est un femme and then Vivre sa vie. Although it appeared that Karina was Godard’s muse, a term that diminishes the collaborative efforts between the pair, the relationship they shared was rather heartbreaking.
Karina was often left alone due to Godard’s sudden and unexpected trips away. On reflection, she explained: “Because he had friends everywhere, he would just leave like that. He was always carrying his passport. I could always see where he came back from because of the stamps and because he would always bring me a little present.” Yet Karina was unable to have the same freedom because women weren’t allowed to write their own cheques at this point: “It was another world,” she said. “The women had no rights to do anything at the time—just to shut up.”
Years later, during an interview with The Guardian, Karina recalled that she would be “sitting around the apartment without any food” because of Godard’s sudden departures. Karina has also referenced miscarriages and suicide attempts as occurring during their marriage, although she claims that the filming of Godard’s Bande a part “probably saved [her] life”.
Despite being “one of the most celebrated pairings of the 1960s”, Karina and Godard divorced in 1965. Frequent fighting on set, Karina’s struggle with her mental health, and Godard’s regular absences lurked beneath what appeared to be a powerful cinematic duo. Karina once vulnerably revealed: “I know he didn’t mean to hurt me, but he did. He was never there, he was never coming back, and I never knew where he was. He drove me a bit crazy.”
Regardless, the actor was dedicated to Godard’s love of filmmaking and still starred in multiple of his films around the period of their divorce, such as 1965’s Alphaville and 1966’s Made in the USA. Karina also starred in numerous films separate from Godard, such as Jacques Rivette’s The Nun, Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Chinese Roulette, and Luchino Visconti’s The Stranger, to name just a few.
However, in 2016, Karina revealed that she hadn’t seen Godard for years, stating that he was now living as a recluse. She sadly died in 2019, and Godard passed away this week, September 13th 2022.