Sympathy for the Devil

Showcasing The Rolling Stones (1968) as they record different versions of "Sympathy for the Devil," Jean-Luc Godard's Sympathy for the Devil tamely presents the to-be-legendary band while interspersing footage of the Black Panthers, a verdant interview, and an idealistic book shop. Political verse read from different texts is interjected throughout as graffiti artists championing the left take to the streets. Rich with ambiguous irony and multidimensional interpretive layers, Godard phantasmagorically makes several points which, as far as I can tell, seek to establish, amongst other things, a Marxist film industry in the West and a legion of intellectuals who pursue their activity by abandoning traditional paradigms, creating new compelling forms to provocatively distribute their countercultural content, i.e., The Rolling Stones's "Sympathy for the Devil," communism being demonic in Western eyes precisely because it attempts to politicize the teachings of Jesus Christ while giving birth to monsters like Stalin. Are artists using the internet to create a politico-economic infrastructure that can effectively sustain Marxism in order to promote a more peaceful egalitarian culture that doesn't pervert its altruistic ideals while specific outlets continue to foster a divisive mainstream capitalist agenda? In Sympathy for the Devil, Godard sets up culture and art in opposition so the aforementioned could lead to a material synthesis of some kind (a Dharma Punx video game?). The verdant interview depicts a woman named Eve Democracy (Anne Wiazemsky) being asked wide ranging questions in a forest to which she only answers "yes" or "no," which, according to my interpretation, states that 1960s women were politically situated within a wild uncultivated box that limited their productivity to monosyllabic replies which men preferred and ignored because they possessed no elaboration but still provided the illusion of a voice. The Black Panthers make sharp points concerning language and communication etc., notably in regards to semantics and the ways in which different groups can speak the same language and have no idea what the other is trying to say. A lot more could have been illustrated in the film if The Rolling Stones weren't consistently brought back to the forefront, although, since they're one of my favourite bands and their consistent return represents form working hand in hand with content, it's not such a bad thing. Whether or not they forged and continue to forge a countercultural realm in line with Godard's vision could be the anti-intellectual subject of a poetic montage worked into the chorus of a new podcast.