This film screened on Sunday 16th  August 2015. 

Taking place largely within the confines of a Parisian apartment, Godard’s anti-narrative, Brechtian adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s The Possessed depicts a Maoist cell of five young revolutionaries, led by Guillaume and the more authoritative Véronique. As an expression of her disaffection, Véronique is determined to use extreme violence to shut down her university, an undertaking she is advised against by philosopher Francis Jeanson in a critical conversation between the pair on terrorism and politics. While the figures in this visually striking, absurdist and daring film are drawn as deeply committed in skittish, improvised performances, they are also presented as a disordered, discordant group whose intentions, however eloquent, remain misguided and confused. 

This screening is part of Anger is an Energy: Cinema of Protest, our season throughout August that features films – from a range of time periods and national cultures – that examine how some of cinema’s most creative and daring directors have tackled and responded to sociopolitical dissent.