sol ****SPOILERS*** Re-make of the 1959 French Film Nior classic "A Bout De Soufflé" the US version "Breathless" has actor Richard Gere as the on the run "Checkered Pants Man", it's the only pair he has in the film, Jesse Lujack who's on the run from the police after accidentally killing a cop who stopped him for speeding on a Las Vegas highway. Jesse ends up hooking, no pun intended, up with this cute French chick Monica Poiccard, Valerie Kaprisky, while being on the lamb. It's Monica that he had a one night strand with the night before after meeting her in a Veges casino. Jesse, a master car thief, now plans to steal a hopped up car and drive with Monica to Mexico where, that's what he thinks, the long arm of the law can't get to him. Did the guy ever hear of extradition treaties between countries?Monica a French exchange student at UCLA has no idea that her new found boyfriend is wanted by the police for murder and goes along with him just for the sheer thrill of it. By the time that she does find out what it's or Jesse is all about she's torn between turning him, who by then she's madly in love with, into the police or joining him as a fugitive from justice on his mad dash towards the Mexcan/US border. It's a terrible decision on Monica's part but it's Jesse who ends up making it for her at the end of the film.French actress Valerie Kaprisky was toted to be the next Bridget Bardot and this was to be her breakout movie but you can see that she was way over her head in here. Not in the acting department but in being paired with her co-star Richard Gere. Gere didn't seem to have a script to work with in the film and most of his dialog seemed to be ad libbed. This had Gere doing what seemed like, in his unintelligent mumbling,a Marlon Brando imitation which was hard to figure out what he was saying throughout most of the movie.Miss. Kaprisky, as Monica, who did speak with a sexy French accent in understandable sentences seemed to have trouble interacting with Gere not quite knowing what he was talking about. But as for the sex scenes between the two they were both first class as well as X-rated! It took almost forever for Monica to find out what her boyfriend did, killed a cop, and when she did she started to have second thoughts in her checking out of the country with him. Even though she was made pregnant by Jesse in what had the be the fastest human pregnancy, about 24 hours, in all of recorded medical history! It turned out that "Breathless" not only bombed out at the box office but turned out to be the both first and last movie that Valerie Kaprisky ever starred in going back to her native France and continuing her film career there. And as it turned out no amount of money or, in co-staring in films with her, top Hollywood leading men would make her ever change her mind.

PeterMitchell-506-564364 A lot of people I know, disfavored this movie. Only recently I got another bad vote from someone about it. I was so hanging out to see this movie when I was 13. I loved it again and again and again. It's Gere's hyper kinetic energy of a performance that makes it work. He's a car thief, who at the start, departs Vegas, heading to L.A via some ill fortune that sees him accidentally kill a cop. How his gun went off, completely taking out the windscreen, before taking out the cop, I couldn't figure. Jerry Lee Lewis fan that Jessie (Gere) he also a Silver Surfer comic fan, one scene having him and a teen argue over the Silver's Surfer's character I found surreal, but totally unrealistic. Gere's going to L.A to see his one true love, Monica, Valerie Kaprisky, who thank god has her looks working for her here. He's fixated on her. Angry at his intrusion, especially on the campus, a scene I loved, she becomes confused, her future plans. turned upside by this hunk, where finally she has to choose. Breathless is shot in loud color which would of looked great on the cinema screen. The pool scene, especially was a well shot scene. And when the authorities move in, Gere narrowly missing them at a bank when visiting an acquaintance, the drama and action become more pumped up, more serious, with Kaprisky running away with Gere, where inevitably in it's classic of classic ending, Gere's fate is only as we could of imagined. There are many classic moments in Breathless, and it is funny in a few areas, thanks to our lead, but you can take this movie for what it is, popcorn entertainment, and those ill favored critics, this is one flick I favor highly, no matter how many times I watch it. Gere's exploits will leave you breathless as well as bloody exhausted. He really is too much, in a movie you just can't get enough.

tomsview At the time "Breathless" was released in 1983, a critic claimed that Richard Gere's deliberate overacting supported the stylised fantasy elements of the movie. Really? I suspect that he was simply surprised by the self-indulgence of the performance, especially when compared with films such as "Days of Heaven", "An Officer and a Gentleman" and even "American Gigolo" – all made before "Breathless"."Breathless" was a remake of Jean Luc Godard's "A Bout De Soufflé" The success of that movie had a lot to do with timing, and forces that were working through society at the beginning of the 1960's. Godard's movie launched French Cinema's influential new wave, which also had an impact on Hollywood.The remake came 20 years later, and unlike Godard's version was no longer timely nor an antidote to the predictability of contemporary film.Richard Gere's character, Jesse Lujack, a petty hustler and car thief, accidentally kills a policeman and goes on the run with his French girlfriend Monica, played by Valérie Kaprisky. Unaware of Jesse's criminal activity, she is attracted to his wildness and the aura of danger he projects.Jesse Lujack as rendered by Gere is arrogant, self-centred, stupid and narcissistic; he has few redeeming traits. Whether it's gyrating to Jerry Lee Lewis while he drives yet another hot-wired automobile or practicing his quick draw with the remote while changing TV channels, extra bits of business are thrown into just about every scene.Although the film has strong production values, there are lapses in logic that are so silly they would probably get laughs if they had been in "The Naked Gun". Near the end, Jesse runs through the streets with his shirt unbuttoned to the navel, clearly revealing the distinctive tattoo on his breast that is the key feature of the police description that has just been broadcast. His checked pants don't help him melt into the crowd all that well either.In "White Heat", James Cagney created a memorable finale, surrounded by police on top of a burning fuel tank. In "Breathless", Richard Gere goes him one better when he disco dances – in those checked pants no less – as police close in from all sides. It is so over-the-top that it almost defies description.Valérie Kaprisky had to work hard to be noticed in this movie. That she does is because of the contrast between her low-key delivery and Gere's attention seeking hyperactivity.It appears that Richard Gere's performance in "Breathless" was a one off. From then on, if there was a trait that typified a Richard Gere performance, surely it was restraint. Look at him in films as diverse as, "Pretty Woman", "Internal Affairs", and "Shall We Dance?" Not only is he controlled but he also underplays to great effect. Maybe with "Breathless" he just needed to get something out of his system.

dhmason6155 I've seen the original, and this one is 1000% better. This movie has no shame and no boundaries. You simply won't see no-holds-barred love (and sex) scenes like these in a mainstream movie anymore. It's wall-to-wall fun and excitement and an awesome date movie. It brought me back to the 80's L.A of my wasted youth. I loved the sights, sounds, colors, the neon, the crummy neighborhoods, the classic cars (somehow, Jesse always manages to find some one-of-a-kind classic to steal whenever he needs a ride) and the junk man's pinwheel hat! Richard Gere has never been more exciting, before, and definitely not since (since he became Saint Richard). Here, he's expanding on his hustler character in Looking for Mr Goodbar. Where are the great exploitation movies? Fun, stupid movies have become a dying art, ever since the end of the Roger Corman era. Nothing made today approaches this kind of fun and insanity. No one in today's conservative Hollywood would have the guts to produce something like this. Just because this film isn't heavy or meaningful, doesn't mean it isn't totally awesome! And the Rockin' soundtrack is worth having all by itself: Jerry Lee Lewis, The Pretenders, X and 50s and 80s classics you won't hear anywhere else (I was amazed to hear Link Wray's "Jack the Ripper", a cult classic instrumental). I saw it when it came out, and then again recently, twice. The one and only criticism I have is Valerie Kaprisky. As an actress, she makes a wonderful model. She's beautiful, but has next to no acting talent. She delivers her lines in a monotone. Too bad there was no Eva Mendes or Sophia Vergara at the time. Still a great movie.