
To me watching the films of Jean-Luc Godard is like watching a white Rauschenberg painting or listing to John Cage’s “4:33”: it isn’t something I do for entertainment. They’re historically significant because he broke all the rules in the book, but I just don’t enjoy watching them. Since I only add titles from films I’ve seen myself there weren’t many Godard films present in the Movie title stills collection.
On december 3rd, Atelier Carvalho Bernau released a free typeface to celebrate Godard’s 80th birthday. The typeface was inspired by the title sequences of Godard’s ‘Made in U.S.A’ (1966) and ‘2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle’ (1967). When I started googling I found surprisingly few stills or videos from Godard’s films, that’s why I decided to add the most interesting ones to the Movie title stills collection.
I’ve located almost all films from the earlier part of Godard’s career and took all stills containing typography: titles from the opening title sequences, intertitles and end (“Fin”) titles. Like silent films Godard used lots of intertitles, which make his films much more typographic than other films from the ’60s and 70’s.
It’s quite interesting to see the designs evolve. In this digital age it’s refreshing to see type that isn’t made on a computer: the imperfect and handmade look of the letterforms, the bad kerning, the large gaps between letters and words, the justified blocks of text, the awkwardly dotted capital I’s. Even when he used an existing typeface – like Antique Olive in ‘Week end’ (1967) – the letterforms look as if they were cut out with an Exacto knife.
Sauve qui peut (la vie) (1980) is the last film featuring custom typefaces. In his later films Godard used existing typefaces like Futura, Univers, Helvetica and Garamond.
Click on the images below to view all typographic stills (and some videos) from the individual films: opening titles, intertitles and end (“Fin”) titles.

À bout de souffle
Breathless
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Jean-Paul Belmondo, Jean Seberg, Jean-Pierre Melville
- Country:
- France

Une femme est une femme
A Woman Is a Woman
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Jean-Claude Brialy, Anna Karina, Jean-Paul Belmondo
- Country:
- France

Vivre sa vie
My Life to Live
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Anna Karina, Sady Rebbot, André Labarthe, Guylaine Schlumberger, Gérard Hoffman
- Country:
- France

Les carabiniers
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Marino Masé, Patrice Moullet, Geneviève Galéa, Catherine Ribeiro, Barbet Schroeder
- Country:
- France, Italy

Le mépris
Contempt
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Brigitte Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance, Giorgia Moll, Fritz Lang
- Country:
- France, Italy
- Title design:
- Jean-Luc Godard

Bande à part
Band of outsiders
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Anna Karina, Danièle Girard, Louisa Colpeyn, Sami Frey, Claude Brasseur
- Country:
- France
- Title design:
- Jean-Luc Godard

Une femme mariée (1964)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Bernard Noël, Macha Méril, Philippe Leroy
- Country:
- France

Alphaville, une étrange aventure de Lemmy Caution (1965)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Anna Karina, Akim Tamiroff
- Country:
- France

Pierrot le fou (1965)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Jean-Paul Belmondo, Anna Karina
- Country:
- France

Masculin féminin: 15 faits précis (1966)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Jean-Pierre Léaud, Chantal Goya, Marlène Jobert
- Country:
- France

Made in U.S.A (1966)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Anna Karina, Jean-Pierre Léaud, László Szabó, Ernest Menzer, Marianne Faithfull
- Country:
- France

2 ou 3 choses que je sais d’elle / 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Joseph Gehrard, Marina Vlady, Anny Duperey
- Country:
- France

La chinoise (1967)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Anne Wiazemsky, Jean-Pierre Léaud, Juliet Berto, Michel Semeniako, Lex De Bruijn
- Country:
- France
- Country:
- France

Week end (1967)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Mireille Darc, Jean Yanne, Jean-Pierre Kalfon
- Country:
- France

Tout va bien / Everything’s all right (1972)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Yves Montand, Jane Fonda
- Country:
- France

Sauve qui peut (la vie) (1980)
- Directed by:
- Jean-Luc Godard
- Starring:
- Isabelle Huppert, Jacques Dutronc, Nathalie Baye
- Country:
- France