"La guerre sera fini quand le Roi vainquerait." (The war will be over when the King will have won it.)
Of all the war's absurdities derided and exposed in Godard's movie, this is perhaps the most striking: the king, who declared the war, gets to declare when the war is over, won or, as the case may serve him, lost (though, in reality, the king rarely admits to losing, he may instead simply say that the battle is much longer and more costly than previously thought and there still are sacrifices to be made before the promised "trèsors" will be reaped.) On the other hand, of course, one should not discount what G's movie has to say about the commoners, who've been persuaded (and indeed avail themselves) of the promises made to them in the beginning that all is fair in war ("can we kill the innocents?" a reluctant future enlistee asks. "Yes," the king's man replies. "Can we burn the towns?" "Yes" "Can we burn the women?" "Yes" "Can we eat in a restaurant without paying?" "Yes"). Beautiful.
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