Synopsis

Starting with the idea of making a left-wing spaghetti western in Italy, Jean-Luc Godard wrote a story about the kidnapping of an executive by strikers.

This situation moves through a series of practical and analytical passages into a finale based around the process of manufacturing weapons.



A filmic essay on class struggle which draws on images from westerns but has no plot and is both an experiment in making a revolutionary film and an interrogation of how successfully such a film can be revolutionary.

Cast: Gian Maria Volonté, Anne Wiazemsky, Cristiana Tullio-Altan, Allan Midgette, José Varela, Götz GeorgePaolo Pozzesi, Glauber Rocha, Fabio Garriba, Enzo Porcelli, Milvia Deanna Frosini, Mario Jannilli, Federico Boido, Aldo Bixio, Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Marco Ferreri, Jean-Luc Godard


Produced by: Gian Vittorio Baldi, Artur Brauner, Marco Ferreri, Jean-Pierre Gorin, Gérard Martin

Cinematography by: Mario Vulpiani
Editing by: Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Pierre Gorin, Enzo Micarelli

Of the Dziga Vertov Group films, Wind from the East became particularly notable due to Peter Wollen's influential essay about it: "Godard and Counter Cinema: Vent d'est." Wollen contends that Wind from the East exemplifies how Brechtian principles of "epic theatre" can be applied to film as "counter cinema."

John Simon described Wind from the East as 'a piece of infantile Maoist propaganda, so boring, antifilmic, sloppily made, and yes, insane, I see no point in a detailed description of it'.