Jean-Pierre Gorin (born 17 April 1943) is a French

filmmaker Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, castin ...

and

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professo ...

, best known for his work with ''

Nouvelle Vague French New Wave (french: La Nouvelle Vague) is a French art film movement that emerged in the late 1950s. The movement was characterized by its rejection of traditional filmmaking conventions in favor of experimentation and a spirit of iconocla ...

'' luminary

Jean-Luc Godard Jean-Luc Godard ( , ; ; 3 December 193013 September 2022) was a French-Swiss film director, screenwriter, and film critic. He rose to prominence as a pioneer of the French New Wave film movement of the 1960s, alongside such filmmakers as Fran ...

, during what is often referred to as Godard's "radical" period. Jean-Pierre Gorin was a student of

Louis Althusser Louis Pierre Althusser (, ; ; 16 October 1918 – 22 October 1990) was a French Marxist philosopher. He was born in Algeria and studied at the École normale supérieure in Paris, where he eventually became Professor of Philosophy. Althusser ...

Michel Foucault Paul-Michel Foucault (, ; ; 15 October 192625 June 1984) was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationship between power and knowledge, and ho ...

and

Jacques Lacan Jacques Marie Émile Lacan (, , ; 13 April 1901 – 9 September 1981) was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist. Described as "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud", Lacan gave yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, and ...

. He was a radical leftist well before meeting Godard in 1966. Godard relied on some of his discussions with Gorin while writing the script of 1967's '' La Chinoise''. Gorin played a role in making '' Le Gai Savoir'', which was released in 1969. In 1968, Gorin and Godard founded the collective

Dziga Vertov Group The Dziga Vertov Group (french: Groupe Dziga Vertov) was formed around 1969 by politically active filmmakers including Jean-Luc Godard and Jean-Pierre Gorin. Their films are defined primarily for Brechtian forms, Marxist ideology, and a lack of p ...

and together produced a series of overtly political films including ''

Vent d'est ''Vent d'est'' (; ) is a Franco-Swiss historical drama film directed by Robert Enrico, on a script co-written with Frédéric H. Fajardie, released in 1993. Plot At the end of the Second World War, a regiment of the First Russian National Army, ...

'' (1970), ''

Tout va bien ''Tout va bien'' is a 1972 French-Italian political drama film directed by Jean-Luc Godard and collaborator Jean-Pierre Gorin and starring Jane Fonda and Yves Montand. The film's title means "everything is going well". It was released in the U ...

''(1972), and ''

Letter to Jane ''Letter to Jane'' is a 1972 French postscript film to '' Tout Va Bien'' directed by Jean-Luc Godard and Jean-Pierre Gorin and made under the auspices of the Dziga Vertov Group. Narrated in a back-and-forth style by both Godard and Gorin, the film ...

''(1972). Gorin left France in the mid-1970s to accept a teaching position at the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is ...

at the urging of the film-critic and painter

Manny Farber Emanuel Farber (February 20, 1917 – August 18, 2008) was an American painter, film critic and writer. Often described as "iconoclastic",Grimes, William (August 19, 2008) ''New York Times''Kiderra, Inga (August 21, 2008Obituary: Artist and Crit ...

. Gorin remained on the Visual Arts faculty thereafter, teaching film history and

film criticism Film criticism is the analysis and evaluation of films and the film medium. In general, film criticism can be divided into two categories: journalistic criticism that appears regularly in newspapers, magazines and other popular mass-media outle ...

. He continued to make films—most notably a "Southern California tetralogy" of essay films: ''

Poto and Cabengo Poto and Cabengo (names given, respectively, by Grace and Virginia Kennedy to themselves) are American identical twins who used an invented language until the age of about eight. ''Poto and Cabengo'' is also the name of a documentary film about t ...

''(1978), ''

Routine Pleasures Routine may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * "Routine" (''SWT''), the first of four stories in the second issue of the ''Star Wars Tales'' series *Choreographed routine, orchestrated dance involving several performers * Comedy routine, ...

''(1986), ''

My Crasy Life My or MY may refer to: Arts and entertainment * My (radio station), a Malaysian radio station * Little My, a fictional character in the Moomins universe * ''My'' (album), by Edyta Górniak * ''My'' (EP), by Cho Mi-yeon Business * Mark ...

'' (1991), and ''

Letter to Peter Letter, letters, or literature may refer to: Characters typeface * Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet. * Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alpha ...

'' (1992). Gorin describes his concept of ''Poto and Cabengo'' in 1988:

The film is about an unstructured discourse—the language of the twins—surrounded by structured discourses—the discourse of the family, the discourse of the media, the discourse of therapy, the discourse of documentary filmmaking.... he twins' languageerupts as a subversive act which has not been authorized by any social or ideological establishment. In a sense its special threat is that its "unauthorized" nature relativizes the arbitrary nature of those institutionalized discourses. The singsong of the twins reveals the shaky grounds of institutional power. It relativizes discursive authority from the family to the scientific community in their competitive and ineffectual attempts to "define" the twins who spontaneously flit about the screen exceeding any definition.Tillman, Lynne
"Interview with Jean-Pierre Gorin"
''
BOMB Magazine ''Bomb'' (stylized in all caps as ''BOMB'') is an American arts magazine edited by artists and writers, published quarterly in print and daily online. It is composed primarily of interviews between creative people working in a variety of disciplin ...
'', Spring 1988''. Retrieved 17 May 2013.

Selected filmography

# 1972 ''

Tout Va Bien ''Tout va bien'' is a 1972 French-Italian political drama film directed by Jean-Luc Godard and collaborator Jean-Pierre Gorin and starring Jane Fonda and Yves Montand. The film's title means "everything is going well". It was released in the U ...

'' # 1972 '' Letter to Jane: An Investigation About a Still'' # 1976 '' Here and Elsewhere'' # 1980 ''

'' # 1986 ''Routine Pleasures'' # 1992 ''My Crasy Life'' # 1992 ''Letter to Peter''

References

External links

Jean-Pierre Gorin, UCSD site, bio
* Burgan, John "Jean-Pierre Gorin", Encyclopedia of the Documentary Film, ed. Ian Aitken, Routledge, New York, 2006, pp. 312–3
Senses of Cinema - Great Directors: Erik Ulman, ''Jean-Pierre Gorin''
* Raymond Durgnat'
''Letter to Jean-Pierre'', rouge.com

*
Criterion's post "Three Popular Films by Jean-Pierre Gorin"
18 January 2012
''BOMB Magazine'' interview with Jean-Pierre Gorin by Lynne Tillman (Spring 1988)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gorin, Jean-Pierre 1943 births French experimental filmmakers French film directors Living people University of California, San Diego faculty