In the movie Breathless, Godard does a lot to break down the walls of traditional mise en scene. Throughout the movie Godard eliminates the discretion of a focal point and more often than not throws the dominant image in the middle of the frame, even taking up the entire frame as in the shots seen below. Godard also disregards camera angles, using primarily an eye level shot. This I believe shows a sense of neutrality on the part of the director which allows the audience to make what they will of the characters.
An example of this neutral ideology is the ending scene where the main male character (I do not currently recall his name) was shot and ended up running down a street from an eye level camera angle, seemingly never looking down upon him as a villain or gloriously up at him (which some could see him as a more modern day Romeo) which completely allowed the audience to make the decision to which of the two dimensions of the character they chose to see fit. This element eliminates the director’s influence on an audience for a particular message and allows the audience a more poetic perspective to tick off the possibility of what the message could possibly be.
Interesting comments here. Not sure what you mean by "focal point." And while Godard definitely employs a fairly eclectic and nonstandard approach to his choice of angle in many places, it does seem that his approach remains, as you suggest, somewhat ambivalent in interpreting his characters. That is, the film seems to resist judging them as we might expect. Could take this a bit further and consider what else this approach implies. Also, when you write these, I do expect you to use the characters' or actors' names, which I make available via handout and are readily available elsewhere.
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