Breathless

One of the most important films of the French New Wave, the full-length debut of Jean-Luc Godard, paradoxically fragmented and cohesive at the same time. "Breathless" marked the beginning of Godard's long creative partnership with cinematographer Raoul Coutard, without whom the New Wave would have been completely different. Godard didn't have money for a camera dolly at that time, so Coutard shot the film while rolling around on a chair with wheels.

Tarkovsky highly praised this film and included it in his lectures on directing as an example of innovative and successful editing: "The actor's movement in close-ups is edited in dozens of geographical locations, but as if in one movement. From the point of view of classical editing, this is completely impossible. The conversation in the car is edited in such a way that the people inside talk logically and nothing is missing, yet the background of the streets they drive on jumps with tremendous force, as if whole minutes, hours, or pieces of time are torn from there. Everything goes against the classical laws of editing."

 Silver Bear for Best Director.