Overview
“Bande à part (Band of Outsiders)” is a 1964 French drama film about a tragicomedy about two men and a woman who conspire to commit a robbery.
Written and directed by Jean-Luc Godard. Black & white. 97 minutes.
The screenplay is an adaptation of the 1958 crime novel “Fools’ Gold” by Dolores Hitchens.
Music by Michel Legrand.
Plot Outline
In Paris in winter, a young woman named Odile (Anna Karina) meets a man named Franz (Sami Frey) in an English language class. Both Franz and his friend Arthur (Claude Brasseur) try to seduce Odile. Odile becomes more attracted to Arthur, who is a rude and greedy man, than Franz, who is a gentle man.
Odile tells Franz that there is a great deal of money stashed in the villa where she lives with her aunt Victoria and a man named Stoltz in Joinville, a Parisian suburb.
Arthur and Franz plan to steal the money from Odile’s villa. Odile also takes part in the plan.
Commentary
“Bande à part” is an entertaining film fusing a romantic story of a love triangle with crime drama in the film noir style.
It is among Godard’s most accessible and popular films.
The dance scene in which Odile, Arthur and Franz dance to a R&B tune in a café, and the scene in which they attempt to break the world record for running through the Louvre museum, are memorable.
The dance scene influenced “Simple Men” (1992) directed by Hal Hartley and “Pulp Fiction” (1994) directed by Quentin Tarantino.
Bernardo Bertolucci replicated the Louvre scene of this film in his “The Dreamers” (2003).
