Subversion and Affective Intermediality in Jean-Luc Godard’s 'Adieu au langage' (2014)

Abstract

It is said that cinematic intermediality is linked to multisensoriality and the synesthetic experience of the viewer. In fact, Pethö asserts that even films which maintain the illusion of reality can be highly intermedial and through film, the real world can be “perceived ‘as if’ filtered through other arts (like painting) or (…) reframed, disassembled by other media” (2011b). The intermediality of cinema is based on the “(inter)sensuality of cinema itself, [on] the experience of the viewer being aroused simultaneously on different levels of consciousness and perception” (Pethö 2011b). The article focuses on the affective aspects of intermediality as encountered in Jean-Luc Godard’s late period, and more specifically, in his film Adieu au langage. Just as he did in his former film Film Socialisme, Godard engages in several stylistically similar experimentations with the formal and expressive qualities of the medium and explores how these techniques affect the viewer and subvert their expectations. The subversive elements of Godard’s late work are being explored and the focus is grouped around his formal and expressive experimentations thus offering new enhanced experiences to audiences and cinema-goers.

Keywords

• affective intermediality
• jean-luc godard
• adieu au langage
• subversive cinema