Why not just run away together? In this milestone of the French New Wave, petty crook Michel and his American acquaintance Patricia embody the ideal of a free, albeit complicated love that was in the air at the time, just like the cinematic awakening. Michel (Jean-Paul Belmondo) actually wanted to flee to Italy in a stolen car. But after shooting a policeman during his escape, he has to go into hiding in Paris. There he meets Patricia (Jean Seberg) again, who is selling newspapers on the Champs-Élysées. A loose affair develops between the two, marked by Patricia's noncommittal attitude—a tension that leads to numerous legendary dialogues. Meanwhile, the net of the manhunt for Michel is closing in inexorably. There is hardly any other work that divides film history so radically into a before and after as Jean-Luc Godard's debut. With a masterful coup, he threw the conventional laws of cinema out the window and completely redefined the rules of seeing and showing.

Leihgabe der Filmkopie mit freundlicher Unterstützung des Filmmuseum Düsseldorf.