A Woman Is a Woman · reception & legacy

1961 · Jean-Luc Godard

How A Woman Is a Woman has been received, argued over, and remembered.

The arc

A commercial disappointment in France in 1961 and a puzzler for critics who'd expected another Breathless, it's since been embraced as Godard's warmest, most purely charming film — the sunlit entry point to his 60s run.

What's debated

Fans still argue over whether it's the perfect gateway Godard or 'lesser' Godard — pure candy-colored charm versus the sharper films around it — with a side debate about whether Angela is a character or just a camera adoring Anna Karina.

Its footprint

The couple's silent argument conducted via insulting book titles is one of the most gif'd and imitated scenes in the French New Wave, and Karina's look in this film — the winks, the sailor stripes, the primary colors — is a whole Tumblr/Pinterest aesthetic unto itself; there's even a cheeky Jeanne Moreau cameo where she's asked how Jules and Jim is going.

Where it stands

A Letterboxd darling of the Karina–Godard cycle — the one cinephiles hand to people who think they hate Godard.

★ Did you know? Anna Karina won the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 1961 Berlin Film Festival for the role, where the film also took a special prize — she was 20, and it was her first lead for Godard, whom she married that same year.

Named by the director

Influences Jean-Luc Godard has publicly named — the director's own word, distinct from the inferred lines of influence.

Gene Kelly — Godard said the film sprang from his nostalgia for the Hollywood musical, dreaming of it as a musical starring Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse.
Cyd Charisse — Named alongside Kelly as the dream star of the MGM-style musical Godard said he was evoking rather than actually making.