Alphaville - an A to Zee of important motion pictures


"Her name was Beatrice
She said she was a Seductress, Third Class
I was struck by her sad, yet hard, face
Something’s not in orbit in the capital of this Galaxy"



Thus begins the hard-bitten Chandleresque narrative of its chief protagonist at the outset of Alphaville, Jean Luc Godard's sci-fi/pop art/futuristic 1965 film.

The dreamy, dirty, black and white night-world of stark brutalist architecture is a suitable background for the confrontation between logic and humanity

"You have come from the Lands Without

What were your feelings...

...when you passed through galactic space?

Johnson: The silence of infinite space appalled me

Alpha 5: What is the privilege of the dead?

Johnson: To die no more

Alpha 5: Do you know what illuminates the night?

Johnson: Poetry"

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