In Alphaville Godard establishes a techno-Fascistic city in which poetry and love and conscience are contraband. His stunning dream/nightmare world is created by Raoul Coutard with mysterious, dread-filled and hauntingly beautiful images; but Alphaville, the "capital of pain," is Paris, underlit. Black shadows are pools of ambiguity, glass surfaces reflect fear. The plot is a brilliant mixture of comic strip, film noir and science fiction. Special agent Lemmy Caution (Eddie Constantine) is sent on an intergalactic mission to Alphaville to dispose of the diabolical scientist Leonard von Braun, whose mechanical brainchild Alpha 60 tortures the populace with logic. Here is a playful homage to noir and also a sad one, particularly in the wretched figure of Akim Tamiroff as a soul-dead ex-agent. This surprisingly moving film finds the poker faced, monosyllabic, hard-as-nails Lemmy Caution trying to communicate the meaning of the word "love" to a robotized Anna Karina.