I'm very fond of the essay. Montaigne would write about himself, his feelings, his reactions, his thoughts, until the audience said "Wait, I think that too." It's the equivalent of a mentalist's cold read, throwing out a bunch of vague clues like "Do you know someone ... I'm seeing the letter 'M'." Whereupon you remember Michael or Emma or mom.
Writing one, my usual technique is to present two or three situations chosen for the position I wish to take, and allow the reader to come to the conclusion I wish him to draw. It's the equivalent of a force in prestidigitation, where the magician has the subject choose a card.... but arranges things so the subject has no choice.
You may argue that these are cheats. I would respond that they aren't, but they can be used in fraud, and I think that's what Jean-Luc Godard has done in this movie about a prostitute played by Isabelle Huppert. Her character's name is, perhaps not coincidentally, Isabelle. According to her, Godard told her the character had 'the face of suffering;', and so she plays it with a low affect, like someone terrified that if they know she's afraid, they'll rip her to pieces. She and her colleagues are called on to do all sorts of nasty things.
Andrea Dworkin has been quoted as saying that all heterosexual relations are rape. I can't find anything like that, but let it stand that this is Godard's position in this movie. As with Montaigne, we are supposed to find the commonality between ourselves and the characters. However, I believe few of the women reading this consider themselves bawds, and almost all the men will reject themselves as their onerous and disgusting clients. And so neither the cold read nor the force works, and so we can reject his thesis.
An alternate interpretation can be found in his stated admiration for Kenji Mizoguchi, many of whose better remembered movies, to put it baldly, were about women in the same position of Mlle. Huppert. But Mizoguchi's women were trapped in a hidebound, misogynistic culture which offered them no choice. Mlle. Huppert is young and beautiful. The life of a waitress might have offered few luxuries in France in 1980, but it was a way out of the trap.
Of course we are not supposed to think things like that. We are supposed to look at Mlle. Huppert's suffering beauty and be overwhelmed by sympathy. There were times I was, and there were other times, like when Godard was playing tricks with the camera, that I was jerked out of the warm blanket and actually thought about what to do about this poor woman.
Which is something, any good mentalist, prestidigitator, or essayist would not give you the chance to do.
Writing one, my usual technique is to present two or three situations chosen for the position I wish to take, and allow the reader to come to the conclusion I wish him to draw. It's the equivalent of a force in prestidigitation, where the magician has the subject choose a card.... but arranges things so the subject has no choice.
You may argue that these are cheats. I would respond that they aren't, but they can be used in fraud, and I think that's what Jean-Luc Godard has done in this movie about a prostitute played by Isabelle Huppert. Her character's name is, perhaps not coincidentally, Isabelle. According to her, Godard told her the character had 'the face of suffering;', and so she plays it with a low affect, like someone terrified that if they know she's afraid, they'll rip her to pieces. She and her colleagues are called on to do all sorts of nasty things.
Andrea Dworkin has been quoted as saying that all heterosexual relations are rape. I can't find anything like that, but let it stand that this is Godard's position in this movie. As with Montaigne, we are supposed to find the commonality between ourselves and the characters. However, I believe few of the women reading this consider themselves bawds, and almost all the men will reject themselves as their onerous and disgusting clients. And so neither the cold read nor the force works, and so we can reject his thesis.
An alternate interpretation can be found in his stated admiration for Kenji Mizoguchi, many of whose better remembered movies, to put it baldly, were about women in the same position of Mlle. Huppert. But Mizoguchi's women were trapped in a hidebound, misogynistic culture which offered them no choice. Mlle. Huppert is young and beautiful. The life of a waitress might have offered few luxuries in France in 1980, but it was a way out of the trap.
Of course we are not supposed to think things like that. We are supposed to look at Mlle. Huppert's suffering beauty and be overwhelmed by sympathy. There were times I was, and there were other times, like when Godard was playing tricks with the camera, that I was jerked out of the warm blanket and actually thought about what to do about this poor woman.
Which is something, any good mentalist, prestidigitator, or essayist would not give you the chance to do.