Over the last weekend I sat down to watch Jean-Luc Godard’s 1968 film Sympathy for the Devil or One + One. It was filmed almost exactly 40 years ago and, in honour of its anniversary, I though it was about time I saw it.
I didn’t expect a masterpiece. The film has been denigrated ever since its release. Lately there have been some more forgiving reviews written by people for whom the film seems to functions as a reminder of the revolutionary period of the late 1960s they remember from their youth. But even they still seem to agree that there is really no rhyme nor reason to this film.
The film show us The Rolling Stones in the studio recording Sympathy for the Devil. Between the recording sessions Godard cuts in small political vignettes. There is a Black Power group reciting political philosophy and executing white virgins. There is a strange interview with “Eve Democracy.” There is a porn shop where the proprietor reads out loud from Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and the customers pay for their porn with “heil Hitler” salutes (”Jackie!”).
All that sounds kind of interesting and even raunchy but it is all done in by Godard’s cold detachment from it all. His single camera pans around the scenes simply observing without any commitment. If the film has any meaning it is up to the audience to make it up. And I do mean make it up; Godard is not going to help you. His scenes do not relate in any conventional way; there is no continuity (except for the studio footage). Sure, the politics the characters recite are all revolutionary but that’s about all you can say.
Of course, this is all classic Godard: the politics, alienating the viewer by abandoning the typical narrative and utilizing long deep-focus shots for realism. There is a reason why Godard is considered the most intellectual of the New Wave directors. For some, including me, it also makes him the most pretentious. Give me Truffaut any day.
The reason why most people would want to pick up One + One even if they are not into Godard is, of course, to see The Rolling Stones record Sympathy for the Devil. But on that level alone One + One is the most useless rockumentary ever made. If ever as a child your parents took you to work with them, sat you down and told you to be quiet while they worked, you know the kind of boredom I am talking about here. The Stones start to play, they stop, reset, start again and on and on. All the while you are being led around the studio bored out of your mind by Godard’s long, cold camera pans. All you pray for is that dad finally gets the job done and you can go home.
A telling sign of how disinterested Godard was in the music being created is that he did not even want to include the finished song in the movie. That was the producer’s decision. Just as it was the producer’s decision to name the film Sympathy for the Devil to emphasise The Stones’ involvement. Not to mention that what sounds like the most interesting incident that took place during the recording process (the studio caught fire) was completely left out of the film.
Those facts underline the point that at its heart One + One is not a rock documentary. The Rolling Stones are in it but that is all. The film is through and through pure Godard - for better or worse, depending on your taste.
Verdict: Oh, God. Daaaad, can we go home now?