“Godard’s adaptation of Alberto Moravia’s novel – perhaps it was more of a springboard – had a million-dollar budget, half of which went to its star Brigitte Bardot, with a sizable portion of the rest going to Jack Palance and to Fritz Lang. With what little was left, Godard made what many now consider to be one of his greatest films in five weeks. Palance is the producer who brings screenwriter Michel Piccoli and his wife (Bardot) to Cinécittà to work on Lang’s adaptation of The Odyssey, and the conflicts between commerce and art, the ancient and the modern, the legendary and the mundane, the tender and the cruel commence.
Shot in sun-splashed CinemaScope with achingly romantic music by Georges Delerue, Contempt unfolds amid the airiest and most fabulous of apartments and villas, and against dazzling seascapes, with a complex color scheme dominated by retina-searing red. Godard’s vibrant vision shines through in this spectacular new Studiocanal/Rialto Pictures restoration, unveiled for the first time at the 2023 Cannes Festival.” -Film at Lincoln Center/Film Forum
