This movie is rich! One of the richest out of the thousands I've seen. I had to pause it after every scene just to catch my breath and to digest the images and emotions that came from the screen. It is less like watching a movie and more like going to a painting exhibit of newly discovered Renoirs and Monets. The beauty and the music simply got my heart thumping, and then, all I can say is that the plot seems to emerge out of the art direction. Genius!
It is impossible for me to free my mind now from the images, which are startlingly fresh, in the way that "Letyat zhuravli" (The Cranes are Flying) was in 1957, or the opening shot of "Cleo de 5 a 7" was in 1962. The composition of every shot is immaculately precise in the manner of Jacques Tati's "Monsieur Hulot" movies, or Godard's "Une femme mariee" (1964) or the magazine industry, but Agnes Varda's movie is greater than all of these, because whereas those are static, motionless, almost feeling-less projects, hers has somehow managed to come across fluidly, effortlessly, vividly as anything before or after until the works of Kieslowski. It felt like I was watching a scene out of some family's life in heaven, and then, one of the children looks at the camera and offers some fruit, as if Varda is winking at us and saying, "Enjoy, come in. Be a part of our wonderful time." Can life really be so wonderful as it is in this movie? The movie goes on to probe that very question. And I am better for it.
It is impossible for me to free my mind now from the images, which are startlingly fresh, in the way that "Letyat zhuravli" (The Cranes are Flying) was in 1957, or the opening shot of "Cleo de 5 a 7" was in 1962. The composition of every shot is immaculately precise in the manner of Jacques Tati's "Monsieur Hulot" movies, or Godard's "Une femme mariee" (1964) or the magazine industry, but Agnes Varda's movie is greater than all of these, because whereas those are static, motionless, almost feeling-less projects, hers has somehow managed to come across fluidly, effortlessly, vividly as anything before or after until the works of Kieslowski. It felt like I was watching a scene out of some family's life in heaven, and then, one of the children looks at the camera and offers some fruit, as if Varda is winking at us and saying, "Enjoy, come in. Be a part of our wonderful time." Can life really be so wonderful as it is in this movie? The movie goes on to probe that very question. And I am better for it.