Chaos or Control:
The Politics of a very very Mad World
- JEAN-LUC GODARD'S ALPHAVILLE -
Alphaville, although filmed in Paris, is a fairly anonymous city in terms of the architecture, yet there is character found in the government that sets it apart from other cities in the world at the time. Taking a nationalist political perspective, the leader has created a city in which all people are brainwashed to believe that their way of life is far superior to all other cities. From the viewpoint of the audience, however this fascist government is an oppressive dictatorship which makes the notion of such a city existing maddening. For the citizens of Alphaville, most are complacent towards the government out of fear of death by firing squad. The convicted persons are punished for their free thoughts, for having irrational emotions and using words which have been edited out of the dictionary. A world in which the government has the ability to kill people for expressing themselves is sadly not unfamiliar to the audience, and so the terror that such a regime can create is forefront in the elements that cause Alphaville to be an insane film.
