Overview
La Chinoise (1968) Learning Beyond the Classics
Jean-Luc Godard is a director on whom many film studies term papers have been cranked out but who also remains just outside of the American mainstream, by and large. He is also a critical figure in the French New Wave and the French student protests in May 1968. His dark comedy here, which was completed in 1967 and released in the U.S.A. in 1968, focuses on a group of students who have embraced Maoist ideals and strive to incite revolution through terrorist violence. Two of the members, Guillaume (Jean-Pierre Léaud) and Véronique (Anne Wiazemsky), are romantically linked, though their relationship is strained by their commitment to the cause. The group eventually plots to assassinate a high-ranking Russian government official who is visiting Paris, but things don't go according to plan.