Thanks for sharing, PD... Italian film producer Carlo Ponti approached Jean Luc Godard to discuss a possible collaboration; Godard suggested an adaptation of Moravia's novel Il disprezzo (originally translated into English with the title "A Ghost at Noon") in which he saw Kim Novak and Frank Sinatra as the leads; they refused. Ponti suggested Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni, whom Godard refused. Finally, Ms. Bardot was chosen, because of the producer's insistence that the profits might be increased by displaying her famously sensual body.

ohh very nice ..........Thanks for sharing MJA A

Thank you for sharing...Brigitte bardot is one of my favourite actresses.

I found this 1964 New York Times film review
This movie has been designated a Critic's Pick by the film reviewers of The Times. December 19, 1964

CONTEMPT By Bosley Crowther Published: December 19, 1964

For a director who manipulates cinema as adroitly as does Jean-Luc Godard, and has as much feeling for the image and as much sense of pictorial style as he has, it would seem he could put his talents to more intelligent and illuminating use than he has been doing in his recent pictures—especially Contempt, which opened yesterday at the Lincoln Arts.

In this luxuriant color picture, which boasts Brigitte Bardot displaying her famous figure in the nude in a number of scenes, it appears he is aiming to tell us why a young French woman grows to hate her loving husband who is making a lot of money as a movie scriptwriter in Italy.

At least, that's the purport of the novel of Alberto Moravia on which the film is based—the novel known in Italy as Il Disprezzo and published in this country as A Ghost at Noon. And that's the direction in which the drama seems to tend about halfway through, when a burst of bitter bickering between the couple gives a hint of an ominous rift in their marital lute.

Up to this point, it is evident that the wife is confused and put out by her husband's unseemly condescension to an American producer for whom he's about to write a film. The husband has let this uncouth fellow make obvious passes at her. He has even pointedly left them alone together. The wife would like to know why.

It is also evident that she is disconcerted by her husband's flirtations with the girl who is the secretary of the producer. She is curious as to what is cooking here. And she is a little baffled about the project on which he is planning to embark.

It is a film to be titled Odysseus, directed by Fritz Lang—yes, the famous German-American director, who actually plays himself here. Obviously he and the producer have different ideas about how it should be done. The wife seems to be a bit puzzled as to which side her husband is on.

All of these things have been established when the couple start throwing verbal knives in their new, not yet furnished apartment in a stylish building in Rome. And the first thing you know they are arguing about whether they are still in love and whether the husband should go on with the project. This runs for a half hour or so, while they take baths, change clothes, and so forth. The husband never takes off his hat.

The arguments continue when they go on location to Capri, only now they are further complicated by discussions over the interpretation of the film. What is to be the explanation of the relations of Odysseus and his wife, Penelope? The husband, Mr. Lang, and the producer can't resolve this point.

And neither can Mr. Godard make us understand why the wife in his drama suddenly tells her husband she has contempt for him and decides to leave. Has she lost faith in him? Is she bored? Or is she just fed up with watching him wearing his hat all the time?

Evidently, Mr. Godard has attempted to make this film communicate a sense of the alienation of individuals in this complex modern world. And he has clearly directed to get a tempo that suggests irritation and ennui.

His characters are specific. Miss Bardot as the wife is restless and erratic. She moves about nervously, wears wigs, takes baths, and has a penchant for sunning herself or going swimming in the nude. The husband, played by Michel Piccoli, is conspicuously gross and crude, insensitive, and intellectually uncertain. He is provoking and rude. Jack Palance makes the producer a horribly crass and brutal type. Mr. Lang plays himself with a nice tone of serenity, cultivation, and good sense.

The imagery, too, is specific. Mr. Godard sets interesting scenes, with provocative color combinations and a suggestive pictorial flow. But out of it all comes nothing—or very little that tells you why this wife is so contemptuous of her husband. Maybe he should be contemptuous of her!

The dialogue is spoken in English, French, and Italian, jumbled up amusingly. Where they are necessary, English subtitles are used.

Oh ♥
Thankie for sharing MJA A