nouvelle vague

Linklater's "Nouvelle Vague," streaming on Netflix from November 14, charts how young French director Jean-Luc Godard defied all filmmaking convention to create his 1960 classic "Breathless."

“He’s the real genius,” someone says about him in “Nouvelle Vague.”

Though Godard later came to be synonymous with turgid, obtuse cinema, “Nouvelle Vague” is the opposite: a sprightly, effervescent ode to moviemaking as semi-controlled mischief.

It’s not clear whether Mr. Linklater agrees that his subject is a genius; “Nouvelle Vague” hits somewhere between fond mockery and respect for iconoclasm, and Mr. Linklater’s “Boyhood” is more of an homage to Truffaut’s warm style than “Nouvelle Vague” is to Godard’s chilly one.

Straightaway, “Nouvelle Vague” thrusts you into a razor-smart club and demands you keep up.