The way that I look at Goddard's movies, is that they are meant to stimulate you like a Rorschach test--so that what you get out of it, is more a function of who you are, at that particular time, than anything Goddard creates.
The politics of Masculine Feminine are certainly dated, at least as far as the United States is concerned. But still, it is interesting that this "revolutionary talk" among the young precedes the May 1968 student/worker riots in France by over two years.
The most lasting part of the movie, I think, is the "sexual politics" that is on display throughout the film. Jean Pierre Leaud is good, as he so often was, at playing the unsure yet cocky young male. And Chantal Goya, as Madeline, is certainly a poster child for the self-centered hip youth of the 60s.
But the filming of "sexual politics" has been done so much now in movies --particularly in Independent film--that watching Masculine Feminine now, for the first time, can make it seem fairly clichéd. Everything from Sex, Lies, and Videotape, to many of the films of Whit Stillman (such as Metropolitan and Barcelona) cover the same territory is a much more accessible way, in my opinion.
But it is an early display of how the Coca Cola generation was relating to each other--and it was filmed at the moment that it was happening--it has the feel of a documentary.
My own favorite scene is when Madeline's friend, Catherine, is standing in her kitchen, eating an apple, while "verbally fencing" with Paul's friend, Robert. There are other moments in Masculine Feminine which have the same recognition of reality, (of testing and tension between the sexes) but this is the longest such scene, and it was a delight to watch.
The politics of Masculine Feminine are certainly dated, at least as far as the United States is concerned. But still, it is interesting that this "revolutionary talk" among the young precedes the May 1968 student/worker riots in France by over two years.
The most lasting part of the movie, I think, is the "sexual politics" that is on display throughout the film. Jean Pierre Leaud is good, as he so often was, at playing the unsure yet cocky young male. And Chantal Goya, as Madeline, is certainly a poster child for the self-centered hip youth of the 60s.
But the filming of "sexual politics" has been done so much now in movies --particularly in Independent film--that watching Masculine Feminine now, for the first time, can make it seem fairly clichéd. Everything from Sex, Lies, and Videotape, to many of the films of Whit Stillman (such as Metropolitan and Barcelona) cover the same territory is a much more accessible way, in my opinion.
But it is an early display of how the Coca Cola generation was relating to each other--and it was filmed at the moment that it was happening--it has the feel of a documentary.
My own favorite scene is when Madeline's friend, Catherine, is standing in her kitchen, eating an apple, while "verbally fencing" with Paul's friend, Robert. There are other moments in Masculine Feminine which have the same recognition of reality, (of testing and tension between the sexes) but this is the longest such scene, and it was a delight to watch.