Filmmakers who can manage to direct a new movie at the age of 89 are rare. But legendary French director Agnes Varda has done just that with her latest, Faces Places, set to hit theaters just a day after she turns 90.
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Agnes Varda: a legend of European film turns 90
Recently awarded an Oscar, Agnes Varda has been directing movies and documentaries since 1955. Her latest work, Faces Places, will hit German movie theaters just one day after her 90th birthday.
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Faces Places
At the age 90, French New Wave film pioneer Agnes Varda is releasing her latest documentary (in Germany on May 31), Faces Places, which portrays characters in French towns with humor and intelligence. On a trip to Provence, Varda travels with street artist JR, who creates photographs of the marginalized subjects they meet on the way. It won the L'Œil d'or award at the Cannes Film Festival, 2017.
Image: JR-Cinema/Tamaris/Social Animals/A. Varda
A lifetime of art
At the recent Cannes Film Festival, 82 women drew attention to the fact that they are still underrepresented in the film industry. As the event's oldest participant, Agnes Varda joined the women on the red carpet. Renowned for her sense of humor, Varda has remained a filmmaking pioneer whose influence on the Nouvelle Vague predates the likes of Jean-Luc Godard.
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Showered with praise
Agnès Varda has been honored with numerous prizes, including an Academy Honorary Award in 2017. She has, however, long been overshadowed by her famous "Nouvelle Vague" colleagues François Truffaut, Claude Chabrol and Jean-Luc Godard — even though her 1955 film La Pointe Courte, set in a small French fishing village, pioneered the highly influential French New Wave film movement.
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Debut with La Pointe Courte
In 1955, 27-year-old Agnes Varda received much praise at Cannes for La Pointe Courte. Her debut film that was half movie and half documentary, featured a young couple in crisis at the French Mediterranean coast. The work also depicts the harsh life of French families who are struggling to survive from fishing. Despite receiving critical acclaim at Cannes, La Pointe Courte was a box office flop.
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Cléo from 5 to 7
Following her debut film's lack of financial success, Varda collaborated with other filmmakers for a few years until reigniting her directing career with Cléo from 5 to 7 (1961). Her second film is a meditation on fear and death, the story of a young egotistical pop singer who seeks emotional support in Paris while awaiting cancer test results. It was nominated for a Palme d'Or in 1962.
Two legends of French film, Michel Piccoli and Catherine Deneuve, starred in Varda's 1966 film "The Creatures." The two spend their vacation on a small island. He's a science fiction author, whereas she has been left dumb after an accident. The film contains surrealistic elements while changing between color and black-and-white.
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Return to France
In the second half of the 1960s, Varda shot several documentaries on socially critical topics in the US. After returning to France, she directed One sings, the Other Doesn't (1977), a feminist film that told the story of a strong 15-year friendship between two different but independent women who become advocates for reproductive rights.
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Success with Vagabond
A turning point in Agnès Varda's career was the 1985 film "Vagabond" that earned her a Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. It tells the story of an aloof young Parisian woman, Mona (Sandrine Bonnaire), who breaks free of her office-job existence and drifts as a vagabond through the French wine country in what becomes a failing struggle for survival.
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Working with Jane Birkin
Following "Vagabond," the director devoted two films to singer and actress Jane Birkin. After shooting a docudrama of Birkin (Jane B. par Agnès V.), she shot Kung Fu Master in 1987, featuring a love affair between a 40-year old woman and a 14-year old boy. Starring opposite Jane Birkin were Varda's son Mathieu Demy and Birkin's daughter Charlotte Gainsbourg.
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Mourning Jacques Demy
1990 was a sad year for Varda following the death of her long-time husband and fellow French New Wave director Jacques Demy, who suffered from AIDS. Varda channeled her mourning for him resulted in the film "Jacquot de Nantes" in 1991. Based on Demy's notebooks, it depicts the youth and artistic career of the director who was best-known for his musicals like The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964).
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A look at film history
In 1995, the film world celebrated the 100th anniversary of the medium. Agnès Varda made her own contribution to the event with "One Hundred and One Nights." The highly imaginative film brought together many stars like Michel Piccoli and Jean-Paul Belmondo to produce an artistic kaleidoscope of film history.
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"The Gleaners and I"
Around the turn of the century, Agnès Varda directed yet another documentary, this time featuring people in rural France. A lawyer dressed in a dark robe leads the viewer through the film, while the title "The Gleaners and I" refers to people collecting edible remains from freshly harvested fields.
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A retrospective on her own life
Ten years ago, the director took a remarkable look at her own life with "The Beaches of Agnès." However, Varda didn't resort to old materials or clippings. Viewers rather see her at her favorite locations, including the beaches of France. The film was a reflection on her life and her passions, as well as on art and film.
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An Oscar crowns previously won Golden Lions and Bears
Agnes Varda has received numerous awards, including a special award at the Berlinale, a Golden Lion at the 1985 Venice Film Festival, and an honorary Leopard at the 2014 Locarno Film Festival. In 2017, she received an honorary Oscar. An still hasn't become tired of filmmaking. "Faces Places" will run in German theaters from May 31.
An original film duo likely to remain unique in film history: Director Agnes Varda and street artist JR have created a wonderful, poetic and humorous film with Faces Places. They were responsible for the shooting together and both of them performed their own roles as the main protagonists. After premiering in Cannes last year, Faces Places was nominated for an Oscar. The film is now set to hit German movie theaters on May 31 – just one day after Varda's 90th birthday.
Varda and JR have portrayed France in a sensitive way
The two artists belong to different generations; Varda was born in 1928 and JR more than 50 years later, in 1983. The concept that the two of them created together is as simple as it is efficient. In their vehicle that is painted to look like a camera, they travel across rural parts of France. After taking pictures of the people they encounter, JR tapes up blown-up copies of the portraits onto house walls or directly passes them on to the people he photographed. The director engages the people in converation while filming. The result is a portrait of the state of the nation in 2017, and it's a mixture of pessimism and joie de vivre.
A film still from a Varda film shows two artists traveling across France in their truck painted like a cameraImage: JR-Cinema/Tamaris/Social Animals/A. Varda
As a filmmaker, Agnes Varda has always moved between documentaries and movies. And she has always refused to produce films for commercial purposes, remaining true to her own artistic style. That's why many observers were quite surprised when the Academy chose her for a lifetime achievement award last year. How could Varda and the little golden Hollywood statue that stands for glitz and glamour possibly fit together?
Agnes Varda was born in Brussels to a Greek father and a French mother on May 30, 1928. She was raised in the south of France, near its beaches. At first, she wasn't interested in film, but rather in literature, photography and the arts. When she finally turned to film, she didn't have much experience in the genre. She had only watched movies for ten years before she directed her first film, La Pointe Courte, in 1955. She was still more interested in writers, artists and photographers. "Photography has never ceased to teach me how to make films," she said later. In this regard, her latest work fits well into her oeuvre.
Agnes Varda, seen here in 1986, was the only significant female representative of France's 'Nouvelle Vague'Image: AFP/Getty Images
But later on, Agnes Varda became one of France's most significant filmmakers. For a long time, however, she was overshadowed by her male colleagues: Jean-Luc Godard, Francois Truffaut, Claude Chabrol, Jacques Rivette and Eric Rohmer. They were seen as France's big film revolutionaries in that they founded the famous "Nouvelle Vague," the movement that revolutionized French film in the early 1960s. In this regard, Varda wasn't given much attention, probably because she did not have much to do with Truffaut and Godard who had originally been film critics.
A director who loves experimenting with film
It seems however that film history should have paid greater attention to Agnes Varda at an early stage of her career. After all, her film debut in 1955 already contained quite a few ingredients that her male colleagues only came to apply much later (for example, in famous films like Breathless or The 400 Blows); these techniques impressed critics and audiences with their unconventional dramaturgy, experiments with the camera, cuts and montage, as well as a combination of movie and documentary elements. "All these new elements with which the 'Nouvelle Vague' challenges the 'Tradition of Quality' are already present in Varda's debut film, in terms of production technology, theoretic attitudes and esthetics," critics Miriam Fuchs and Norbert Grob said later.
Varda has appeared on many red carpets, including CannesImage: picture-alliance/Visual Press Agency/P. Farjon
In later years, the name Agnes Varda came to be mentioned frequently whenever France's big film revolutionaries were listed. And, of course, it was mentioned every single time that Varda was the only female representative of the "Nouvelle Vague." Perhaps that was due to the fact that, for a long time, Varda had been overlooked because she was a woman. After all, writing film reviews had long been dominated by men. That's all changing now. And maybe that's one of the reasons why Varda has received so much critical acclaim over the last several years.
An Oscar for the only woman of the "Nouvelle Vague"
With her Oscar, Varda has definitely won the upperhand over the male heroes of the "Nouvelle Vague." Neither Chabrol, nor Alain Resnais, Rohmer and Rivette were ever honored with an Oscar. The only one to do so was Truffaut who received an Oscar in 1974 for his Day for Night. Jean-Luc Godard was to win an honorary Oscar in 2010, but he cared so little about it that he didn't even travel to Los Angeles to receive the much sought-after trophy. His legendary response back then was: "Such a long trip just for a little piece of metal?"
In her work The Beaches of Agnes, the director takes a very relaxed look back at her lifeImage: AFP/Getty Images
Varda was more keen to receive the highest honor in the film world. In an interview with the German Press Agency, she referred to herself as "a little queen at the outskirts of film." As honorary Oscars usually went to people who were neither Hollywood stars, nor producers of blockbusters, she said, she was deeply moved about the fact that she had now been chosen for one.
Varda's honorary Oscar a sign of change
When the director, together with her husband, director Jacques Demy, lived for a few years in the US in the 1960s, she directed some films while however stubbornly refusing to accept commercial offers from big Hollywood studios. Varda always insisted on her artistic independence. And Hollywood wasn't willing to grant her that.
In recent years, however, the Academy behind the Oscars has undergone some remarkable changes. After having being accused of not being open enough towards women and Black filmmakers, the institution introduced some changes. Agnes Varda has profited from that change. Another proof is the Oscar nomination for her latest film, Faces Places, a movie that will hit German movie theaters just one day after her 90th birthday.