Agnès Varda

Director

May 30, 1928 (90 years)

† March 29, 2019

Ixelles, Brussels, Belgium

Biography

Agnès Varda (May 30, 1928 – March 29, 2019) was a Belgian-born French film director and professor at the European Graduate School. Her films, photographs, and art installations focus on documentary realism, feminist issues, and social commentary — with a distinct experimental style.

Filmography

7.7

Cléo from 5 to 7

Agnès Varda eloquently captures Paris in the sixties with this real-time portrait of a singer set adrift in the city as she awaits test results of a biopsy. A chronicle of the minutes of one woman’s life, Cléo from 5 to 7 is a spirited mix of vivid vérité and melodrama, featuring a score by Michel Legrand and cameos by Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina.

7.4

Happiness

Though married to the good-natured, beautiful Thérèse, young husband and father François finds himself falling unquestioningly into an affair with an attractive postal worker. One of Agnès Varda's most provocative films, 'Le bonheur' examines, with a deceptively cheery palette and the spirited strains of Mozart, the ideas of fidelity and happiness in a modern, self-centered world.

7.4

Vagabond

Mona Bergeron 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. Mona is fiercely independent, craving freedom over comfort, but it is this desire to be free that will eventually lead to her demise.

6.5

Agnès Varda: From Here to There

Agnès Varda takes us on a journey of discovery as she travels the globe—from Stockholm to St. Petersburg, Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, Mexico City to Los Angeles—meeting with friends, artists, and fellow filmmakers.

7.6

The Gleaners and I

Varda focuses her eye on gleaners: those who scour already-reaped fields for the odd potato or turnip. Her investigation leads from forgotten corners of the French countryside to off-hours at the green markets of Paris, following those who insist on finding a use for that which society has cast off, whether out of necessity or activism.

7.7

The Beaches of Agnès

Filmmaking icon Agnès Varda, the award-winning director regarded by many as the grandmother of the French new wave, turns the camera on herself with this unique autobiographical documentary. Composed of film excerpts and elaborate dramatic re-creations, Varda's self-portrait recounts the highs and lows of her professional career, the many friendships that affected her life and her longtime marriage to cinematic giant Jacques Demy.

7.6

Faces Places

Director Agnès Varda and photographer/muralist JR journey through rural France and form an unlikely friendship.

5.8

Lions Love

Three actors in Hollywood live and love together. A director comes from New York to make a movie about actors and Hollywood.

6.1

One Hundred and One Nights

Monsieur Cinema, a hundred years old, lives alone in a large villa. His memories fade away, so he engages a young woman to tell him stories about all the movies ever made.

6.5

Kung-Fu Master!

A lonely 40-year old woman finds herself shattering taboos by falling in love with the 14-year old Julien – but is it romance, or a desperate attempt to turn back time in the face of middle age?

6.7

Jane B. by Agnès V.

The interests, obsessions, and fantasies of two singular artists converge in this inspired collaboration between Agnès Varda and her longtime friend the actor Jane Birkin. Made over the course of a year and motivated by Birkin’s fortieth birthday—a milestone she admits to some anxiety over—Jane B. by Agnès V. contrasts the private, reflective Birkin with Birkin the icon.

7.1

One Sings, the Other Doesn't

The intertwined lives of two women in 1970s France, set against the progress of the women's movement in which Agnes Varda was involved. Pomme and Suzanne meet when Pomme helps Suzanne obtain an abortion after a third pregnancy which she cannot afford. They lose contact but meet again ten years later. Pomme has become an unconventional singer, Suzanne a serious community worker - despite the contrast they remain friends and share in the various dramas of each others' lives, in the process affirming their different female identities.

6.4

The Creatures

A writer decides to use the strange inhabitants of a small island as a basis for characters in his new book.

7.5

Jacquot

Jacquot Demy, the son of a garage owner and a hairdresser, is fascinated by cinema and decides to pursue his dream of becoming a filmmaker by any means necessary.

4.0

Henri Langlois vu par...

Thirteen filmmakers share personal reflections on Henri Langlois—the visionary founder of the Cinémathèque Française—recounting his influence on their lives, his role in preserving film history, and his enduring impact on world cinema.

6.4

Nausicaa

A girl, whose father is from Greece, studies ancient art in France. The film was made for television but never broadcast for political reasons related to its portrayal of Greeks. A work print was screened in Belgium in 1971, and the film is now available in reconstructed form.

7.1

Far from Vietnam

In seven different parts, Godard, Ivens, Klein, Lelouch, Marker, Resnais, and Varda show their sympathy for the North-Vietnamese army during the Vietnam War.

N/A

20 Little Films

Since 1995, the Viennale has invited renowned directors to create short, one-minute films as personal contributions to the festival. Ranging from home movies to political essays, musical sketches to abstract studies, these “little films” form a unique anthology of cinematic moments. 20 Little Films collects a selection of these works, premiering together for the Viennale’s 50th anniversary at the Locarno Film Festival.

7.4

Hello Cubans

A photo montage of Cubans filmed by Agnès Varda during her visit to Cuba in 1963, four years after Fidel Castro came to power. This black & white documentary explores their socialist culture and society while making use of 1500 pictures (out of 4000!) the filmmaker took while on the island.

6.5

Fiancés on the Bridge

A subtitle warns, "beware of dark sunglasses." Anna and her lover, whose looks in bowler and bow tie are reminiscent of a young Buster Keaton, kiss chastely on a bridge overlooking the Seine. He dons sunglasses and waves as she runs down a stairway to the river's edge, then watches in horror as she's knocked flat and loaded into the back of a hearse. In vain, he gives chase. Disconsolate, he buys a large funeral wreath and a handkerchief from sympathetic vendors. He removes the glasses to wipe his eyes and realizes they are the cause of all his woe. He replays the farewell without the glasses.