Talk:Alphaville (film)

References to use

Please add to the list references that can be used for the film article.

• Woolfolk, Alan (2007). "Disenchantment and Rebellion in Alphaville". In Sanders, Steven M (ed.). The Philosophy of Science Fiction Film. The Philosophy of Popular Culture. pp. 191–206. ISBN 0813124727.

Mechanical speech box

I suspect the reference regarding the mechanical speech box is wrong. I believe the voice of alpha 60 is performed by someone employing esophageal speech. Does anyone have a better reference?

It pays to translate things carefully

>>""the French phrase is 'pays exterieur' which translates to 'outer countries' not implying 'galaxies' in the least.""

Well, they do talk about interstellar travel and galaxies as well as pays extérieurs. Like when, they're in the car, going out of Alphaville they say "roulant toute la nuit dans l'espace intersidéral ...". "Pays extérieurs" is translated by Outlands.

Ok, has Alphaville been Dubbed into German?

How many other languages has Alphaville been dubbed into? The version I have, has English subtitles but not a word from the characters' lips has actually been dubbed into English. I don't mind the subtitles in English, but it would help if there were other translations available, at least for those of us who don't speak French.

Since Germany, Spain and Italy etc. routinely dub their movies, I don't think Alphaville would be an exception. (I don't understand what the problem is, btw, but I'm Swedish and accustomed to subtitled movies.) 惑乱 分からん 01:49, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I've just seen the German version. But I didn't like the movie, because it is completely oblivious to technology. There is the specter of artificial intelligence, but the explanation how it is accomplished is beyond ridiculous. It shows that expressions like "electronic brain" served more to confuse people instead of helping understanding computer technology, which was relatively new in 1960. 79.227.147.183 (talk) 22:32, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

First Scene

Could somebody either remove or reword this section, since the bullet seems deviant to the rest of the article. DrWho42 01:15, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Removed - the bullet was distracting, and the part above the bullet sounded like fanboy fawning. Also, I don't think the info there was very special, not particularly unique to this movie and not enough to justify having a "first scene" section but not a second, third, etc.

Below is the original source if somebody feels it is important and wants to clean it up and re-insert Cat Parade 03:00, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

== The First Scene ==

Nearly flawless camerawork and editing leads to Lemmy Caution driving a car on a freeway and into the city that he is under orders to visit. The freeways are new, long, and curving, including tunnels and bypasses made of concrete, such that this could have been shot in any major city in the world of the 1960s, but the traffic is light or nearly nonexistent. The camerawork is so flawless that there appear to be no cuts or splices for 8 to 10 minutes of screentime, even as he finds himself at the hotel he is checking into, right up to the room he checks into, where he finds an assassin that must be dealt with.

*This isn't true. There are clear indications of cuts from one camera to another during the first 8 to 10 minutes of the film. There is no pretense of trying to hide these cuts. However, there is a continuous shot that begins with the protagonist entering the hotel lobby and ends with him arriving with a woman at his hotel room door which lasts for nearly two minutes.

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was PAGE MOVED per discussion below. -GTBacchus^(talk) 01:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

---

The title is currently Alphaville, a Strange Adventure of Lemmy Caution. However, it should be Alphaville (film), because:

• Foreign language films should be given their English release titles (see Naming conventions)
• As far as I can tell, the film was released in the English speaking world only as Alphaville, not as the longer version. (e.g. see here [http://www.amazon.com/Alphaville-Criterion-Collection-Eddie-Constantine/dp/0780021541/sr=1-1/qid=1168615343/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-4691238-1451623?ie=UTF8&s=dvd]).

If I'm wrong about any of this, let me know. Cop 633 15:24, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Since there was no response, I will move the page. Cop 633 14:18, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree, this should be moved; even if it had been released under this name, WP:NAME implies it should be listed under what it is always called. The only question is whether it should be moved to Alphaville. Alphaville, São Paulo (a real estate development) is already disambiguated, and the band may well be named after one of the other two. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:08, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Alphaville (film) is the logical move destination, surely? Cop 633 22:37, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

The film may be more popular than any of the other uses but it doesn't blow them out of the water. I'm not against plain Alphaville but Alphaville (film) is probably the better choice. I'm fer it. Doctor Sunshine 00:28, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

The page should be moved, and I believe the film is the primary use of the name, so the title should be simply Alphaville. --Akhilleus (talk) 03:53, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

• Support the move to Alphaville (film). I think Alphaville ought to remain disambiguation. -MURGH ^disc. 15:24, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

SF noir

Were there many SF noir films before this ? Or can this be seen as a direct ancestor of Blade Runner et al ? -- Beardo 04:12, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

As far as I know this was the first. Cop 633 14:31, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Please consider that this was not a serious movie but a parody of the noir style. The dissidents who are shot on the diving board after their final rant, fall into the water and the bodies are recovered by teams of synchronized swimmers? Lemmy Caution is arrested and turned over to Professors Heckle and Jeckle? The final scene in which Natasha struggles, successfully, to remember how to say, "I love you"? Really. There's a lot of other tongue-in-cheek nonsense here and the article on Film Noir ought to put this in the parody category. 173.174.85.204 (talk) 01:59, 21 July 2017 (UTC) Eric

WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level. BetacommandBot 02:13, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

This bot makes no sense. Someone tell it a poetry riddle before it enslaves us all. ←Ben^B4 09:57, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Another planet?

The article claims it's set on another planet, it's been a while since I saw it but I don't recall that being explicit in the film, and I assumed this was just a city on Earth in the future, was there something I missed? Number36 03:36, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

The old Criterion DVD of Alphaville had subtitles that indicated Alphaville was a planet, but I have not seen that set of subtitles duplicated anywhere else. Maybe someone can chime in on the translations?2605:6000:EC83:EC00:A850:31F5:DA9A:AA6 (talk) 18:34, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

I just assumed that, what with the whole deal about words being regularly changed and omitted and Lemmy talking about having to get used to the dialect, actually all of the terms that implied that Alphaville was a planet were just the result of Alpha 60 changing the meaning of the words. 50.47.83.249 (talk) 02:03, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

Institute of General Semantics

Reference is made in the film to an "Institute of General Semantics", possibly a reference to a real institute of the same name? Anyone know? --Andyf (talk) 23:02, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Ford Mustang?

The article states that Lemmy Caution enters Alphaville in his Ford Mustang. It's been a while since I've seen the film, so I stand to be corrected, but I am pretty sure the vehicle was not a mustang. I think it was a Ford Falcon, though not as certain about that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.141.177.29 (talk) 17:54, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

according to the imcdb it's a mustang: [1]. --93.216.70.12 (talk) 16:07, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Critical reaction

No section on this. How was it received at the time and how do critics view it now? Did it influence any subsequent movies? --71.174.170.66 (talk) 16:18, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

General cleanup

Hertz1888, I know this is pretty trivial, but you reverted my deletion of 'cheap' when describing the camera. You mentioned a linked article but don't say which one. Can you be more specific? I'm not denying that Instamatics were cheap in 1960s France, but this is in the Plot section and there doesn't seem to be any indication in the movie that it is cheap in the world of Alphaville. For all we know Instamatics are the height of technology in the Outlands. The tech is decidely mixed in the movie, with futuristic looking buildings and computers, but low-tech stuff like tarnished keys on hooks, etc. The plot section suffers in general from a lot of interpretation being mixed in and lots of details on production, both of which belong in a different section. Ashmoo (talk) 11:55, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

I agree with this... why is there mention of the camera brand in the plot section at all? Same goes for pointing out that the "Galaxie" is played by a Mustang... that is not plot.2605:6000:EC83:EC00:A850:31F5:DA9A:AA6 (talk) 18:37, 11 July 2015 (UTC)

Influenced section

Is the German band Alphaville also named after this movie? --62.16.186.44 (talk) 13:12, 30 January 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Alphaville (film). Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120415162652/http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gadgets/the-future-is-now-sci-fi-films-in-real-locations-49304078/ to http://crave.cnet.co.uk/gadgets/the-future-is-now-sci-fi-films-in-real-locations-49304078/

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

• If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
• If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 19:51, 2 July 2017 (UTC)