Happy Birthday, Agnès Varda! Born today in 1928 as Arlette Varda, this Belgian-born French installation artist, photographer and director was also an editor, screenwriter, producer and actor.
Her work was pioneering for, and central to, the development of the widely influential French New Wave film movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
Her work was pioneering for, and central to, the development of the widely influential French New Wave film movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
When she was twenty-six, Varda wrote and directed her debut feature film on a budget of $14,000. This was the 1955 French black and white drama film 'La Pointe-Courte' ('The Short Point').
The film has been cited by many critics as a forerunner of the French New Wave, with French journalist and cinema writer Georges Sadoul to call it "truly the first film of the nouvelle vague".
Among her credits, Varda is best known for writing and directing the 1962 French/Italian black and white comedy drama/musical film 'Cléo de 5 à 7' ('Cléo from 5 to 7').
Only the opening shot is filmed in color. The switch shows the muddled and confused state that Cléo is in.
The film follows selfish pop singer Florence 'Cléo Victoire' (Corinne Marchand), who has two hours to wait until the results of her biopsy come back.
After an ominous tarot card reading, she visits her friends, all of whom fail to give her the emotional support she needs.
Wandering around Paris, she finally finds comfort talking with a soldier in a park. On leave from the French-Algerian War, his troubles put hers in perspective. As they talk and walk, Cléo comes to terms with her selfishness, finding peace before the results come back.
The film includes cameos by Jean-Luc Godard, Danish-French film avant garde actress, director, writer, and singer Anna Karina, American-born French actor and singer Eddie Constantine and French actor and director Jean-Claude Brialy.
These are shown as characters in the silent film Raoul (Raymond Cauchetier) shows Cléo and Dorothée (Dorothée Blanck) while Bob (French musical composer, arranger, conductor, and jazz pianist Michel Legrand), who wrote the film's score, plays "Bob the pianist".
Also among her credits, Varda is known for writing and directing the 1985 French drama/romance film 'Vagabond'. In French, the film is called 'Sans toit ni loi' ("with neither shelter nor law").
The film opens with on a young woman named Mona Bergeron (Sandrine Bonnaire). However, she is dead; her frozen body found in a ditch in the French countryside. From this, the film flashes back to the weeks leading up to her death.
Through these flashbacks, Mona gradually declines as she travels from place to place, taking odd jobs and staying with whomever will offer her a place to sleep.
Nonetheless, Mona is fiercely independent, craving freedom over comfort, but it is this desire to be free that will eventually lead to her demise.
Nonetheless, Mona is fiercely independent, craving freedom over comfort, but it is this desire to be free that will eventually lead to her demise.
The film was the thirty-sixth highest-grossing film of the year, with a total of 1,080,143 admissions in France.
Vada is also best known for shooting, writing and directing the 2000 French documentary film 'The Gleaners and I'.
In French, the film is called 'Les glaneurs et la glaneuse' ('The gleaners and the female gleaner'), a reference to the director herself. As the title indicates, the film features various kinds of gleaning.
In French, the film is called 'Les glaneurs et la glaneuse' ('The gleaners and the female gleaner'), a reference to the director herself. As the title indicates, the film features various kinds of gleaning.
In May of that same year, the film was entered into competition at the 53rd Cannes Film Festival ("Official Selection 2000"), and later went on to win awards around the world.
In a 2014 Sight and Sound poll, film critics voted 'The Gleaners and I' the eighth best documentary film of all time. In 2016, the film appeared at No. 99 on BBC's list of the 100 greatest films of the 21st century.
Varda's other notable work includes writing, co-producing, co-directing and co-starring in her 2017 French documentary film 'Visages Villages' ('Faces Places'). The film also features Godard and Karina as themselves in archive footage.
Along with Varda, the film was co-produced, co-directed and co-starred JR, the pseudonym of a French photographer and street artist whose identity is unconfirmed. The film had also been produced by Varda's daughter, French costume designer, producer, writer and actress Rosalie Varda.
The following year, 'Faces Places' was nominated the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. However, it didn't win. This occurred at the 90th Academy Awards in early March 2018.
However, with this nomination at age eighty-nine years old, Varda becomes the oldest person nominated for any competitive Oscar.
According to Varda's personal life, she had been married to French director, lyricist, and screenwriter Jacques Demy ('Lola', 'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg', 'The Young Girls of Rochefort'). The were married from 1962–1990 and had two children together.
Varda's films focused on achieving documentary realism, addressing feminist issues, and producing other social commentary, with a distinctive experimental style.
Among several other awards and nominations, Varda received an honorary Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, a Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, an Academy Honorary Award, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
Varda passed due to complications from cancer in Paris, France on March 29, 2019. She was 90. A statement from her family reads. “She was surrounded by her family and friends.”
Varda had been active from 1951–2019.
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