“Our God is hidden. He comes to us like a thief without announcing his presence.”In her most memorable screen role, Anna Karina gives a remarkable and nuanced performance, offering a heart-wrenching depiction of crushed resistance which must have resonated with her audience. Through her association with the directors of the French New Wave (in particular, her then-husband Jean-Luc Godard), Karina became closely identified with the liberated modern woman of the 1960s, and so her casting in the lead role of this film was an inspired and appropriate choice. Karina's Suzanne Simonin represented a free- thinking younger generation that had grown tired of being oppressed and dictated to by an intolerant establishment. Suzanne's act of rebellion would be played out for real across France in the spring of 1968, bringing empowerment to the younger generation and an early end to the De Gaulle presidency. Both on screen and off, La Religieuse demonstrated that there is no greater stimulus for revolution than repression.

“Our God is hidden. He comes to us like a thief without announcing his presence.”In her most memorable screen role, Anna Karina gives a remarkable and nuanced performance, offering a heart-wrenching depiction of crushed resistance which must have resonated with her audience. Through her association with the directors of the French New Wave (in particular, her then-husband Jean-Luc Godard), Karina became closely identified with the liberated modern woman of the 1960s, and so her casting in the lead role of this film was an inspired and appropriate choice. Karina's Suzanne Simonin represented a free- thinking younger generation that had grown tired of being oppressed and dictated to by an intolerant establishment. Suzanne's act of rebellion would be played out for real across France in the spring of 1968, bringing empowerment to the younger generation and an early end to the De Gaulle presidency. Both on screen and off, La Religieuse demonstrated that there is no greater stimulus for revolution than repression.