1961-1970 Bertrand Blier Documentary France

Bertrand Blier – Hitler, connais pas AKA Hitler, Never Heard of Him [+extras] (1963)

adminDecember 3, 2019

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Young people talk about the past, present and the future, dreams and trends, in front of Blier’s camera.

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In 1963, 22-year-old Bertrand Blier invited 11 of his peers to come to a film studio and talk about their lives. The record of what was said, Hitler? Connais pas!, is a discussion of values that remains relevant and fascinating today. The footage was shot just five years prior to May 1968, and the atmosphere of that time is clearly discernible: these young people may not yet be revolutionaries, but there is clearly a ferment in the air. One young woman describes how she dances the twist every evening; a young man relates his mother’s marital infidelities; another young woman describes her own sexual escapades. A bourgeois life holds no appeal for her whatsoever: that would be “a small life,” like that of her parents — and that is certainly not the way to happiness. Another young man has a very traditional attitude: a carbon copy of his father, typical of the 1950s. All he wants is a nice family, a good job, and a nice car in the driveway. Blier focused his camera on an interesting historical gray area. The aesthetics are typically 1960s: each of the twenty-somethings is filmed in isolation, sitting on a chair, under bright lights, from different angles, and in black-and-white.