The Reception of Breathless at Cahiers

As strange as it may seem, when Jean-Luc Godard's A Bout de souffle (Breathless) was released in early 1960, Cahiers du Cinema did not review the film. Well, the truth there is that they did not review the film in their Les Films section. Two articles in the Sommaire section though did deal with the film. In the March 1960 issue, Jean Domarchi contributed an article entitled Peines d'amour perdues which was primarily a bout Pierre Kast's Le Bel âge and Jacques Doniol-Valcroze's L'Eau à la bouche but which does deal briefly with A Bout de souffle. Kast's and Doniol-Valcroze's films were also reviewed in that issue. The next month, in the Sommaire of the April 1960 issue, Luc Moullet wrote a 12 page article concerning Godard and the film. In May of 1960, le conseil des dix considered the film. here are the results:

4 stars -- Jacques Rivette (Cahiers du Cinema), Luc Moullet (Cahiers du Cinema), Claude Mauriac (Le Figaro), Pierre Marcabru (Arts & Combat)
3 stars -- Jean-Pierre Melville, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze (Cahiers du Cinema), Jean de Baroncelli (Le Monde)
2 stars -- Louis Marcorelles (Cahiers du Cinema and France-Observateur), Jean Douchet (Cahiers du Cinema)
1 star --- Ferydoun Hoveyda (Cahiers du Cinema)