Estimated between 120,000 and 180,000 euros, it consists of 59 pages in blue ink and 24 typed pages, many of which are annotated and corrected by the hand of the father of the New Wave.
The autograph manuscript of Contempta cult film by Jean-Luc Godard, once owned by Brigitte Bardot, will go on sale in Paris on October 20, announced the auction house Christie’s, a month after the death of the master of the New Wave.
Estimated between 120,000 and 180,000 euros, it consists of 59 pages in blue ink and 24 typed pages, many of which are annotated and corrected by Godard.
It also contains a note from the writer Alberto Moravia, whose screenplay is adapted, or even notes and words from the film’s performers: Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance and the director Fritz Lang, who appears in his own role.
“This is the complete manuscript of the first version of the film, without the nude scenes imposed on the director by the American production of the film”, specifies Christie’s, and in particular the legendary opening scene, between Michel Piccoli and Brigitte Bardot.
“Only known manuscript version”
It is the “only known handwritten version of the screenplay” of this film released in 1963, which belonged to Brigitte Bardot before she sold it to her photographer friend Ghislain Dussart, known as Jicky.
A monument in the history of world cinema, Jean-Luc Godard died on September 13 at the age of 91. The Franco-Swiss filmmaker resorted to assisted suicide and died “peacefully” at his home in the small town of Rolle in Switzerland.