Farewell Madame Varda!

I was sad to hear the news today of the passing of Agnes Varda, widely known as the mother of French New Wave Cinema. She was one of a kind.

I've written stories about her projects in the past, as I found them so moving. First, The Beaches of Agnes, which is filmed partially in Venice, and couldn't be more lovely.

More recently, I was charmed out of my socks by the wonderful Faces/Places ... and I bet you will be too.

Varda saw the humanity in all of us everywhere, and made the viewer feel it too. I hope to touch people even just a little bit as much as she did one day, and thank this legend for her inspiration always. 90 is a great run, but the loss of this marvelous woman is still a tough one. She will be missed by the entire world. 

Vive Varda!

Faces Places - The Power Of Imagination

When it's May Gray days, you kind of just want to hunker down and watch a movie or something, right? There used to be a section on Netflix (when you got the dvds in the mail) where it said something like "People in Venice, CA are watching:" and it never let me down. It let me know that I was living in the right place, that my community shared my general views and tastes, and it turned me on to several films that I might not have otherwise known about. Like The Beaches Of Agnes.

Agnes Varda is the "Grandmother of the French New Wave", and was a resident of Venice, where our beach was featured in her beautiful film from 2008. The Beaches Of Agnes was so great, that I will watch every other thing she ever does, and last chilly night I snuggled in with a blanket to watch her newest film, Faces Places ... and I loved it just as much - maybe more.

Varda is a tiny little woman, who reminds one of an elderly Rachel Dratch (of SNL fame), but with a Friar Tuck-like  two-toned hair-do, for fun. I adore her. What a font of pure inspiration! She embarks on road trips around rural France with the photographer/muralist JR (a hip, young enthusiastic French dude who never takes off his shades, to Varda's annoyance), and they shoot everyday people doing everyday things, and then make them huge and grand and important looking by pasting them up on the side of giant buildings, bridges, water towers, barns ... and the result is pure beauty.

In one part of the film, Varda says, "The point is the power of imagination." And it is. Their ideas and conversations and art all celebrate both imagination and humanity, in such a lovely way that most likely you will both laugh and cry, like I did. When you see an elderly woman (who is the last person remaining in her village that is going to be torn down) come outside and see her photo on the outside of her house, and be so moved ... you can't help but be moved yourself. It reminds me a bit of the also excellent documentary Wasteland, where you witness the same sheer glory of real people.

I always go back to the Einstein quote that goes, "Remember your humanity and forget the rest", and this film helps you to do exactly that. If you're looking for a wonderful escape from all the ugliness and meanness and sadness all around us in the world today, here you go. An hour and a half where I thought of nothing but the grace and love that remains all around us, if you can just let yourself be open to it. Our own faces and places are still pretty great too, just look around.  It would be awesome if Varda and JR returned to Venice to capture some of our Visages Villages (the original French title - oh, it is in French with sub-titles, but you can do it!) Enjoy!

Thank you, Madame Varga!

The (Venice) Beaches Of Agnes

My eyes have been attracted to the word "Beach" ever since the days when I'd put my finger to the page and have to sound it out. Because of this, the wonderful film The Beaches Of Agnes (Les Plages d'Agnes) wound up in my Netflix queue, and I just watched it. I was so charmed and moved by it, I just wanted to get up and create something magical immediately after it was over.


Agnes Varda is often called the "Grandmother of the French New Wave" in cinematic discussions. She was the partner and muse of Jacques Demy (The Umbrellas Of Cherbourg), and a was/is a force in her own right as a film director, photographer, installation artist and magnificent character.

You need to be in a pretty reflective, high-arty mood, preferably by yourself, to really soak up the meanings and poetry of this whimsical, honest, creative, gracious memoir of a film, as narrated onscreen (in French sub-titles, so you need to be in the mood for that too. Matt.) by Mme. Varda herself.


From the opening scenes with assistants placing mirrors all over a Belgian beach for Varda to literally reflect into, on through to the belly of a Whale scene (I don't want to wreck it for you), to the achingly exquisite scene of little boys who had appeared in a Varda film decades earlier (she is 80 while telling you her story in 2008), all grown up into graying men, riding a bike-mounted screen playing their film through the streets of the same town it was shot in. Magic.

I kept thinking how much my late Cinema Arts professor back in college (Go Auggies!), John Mitchell, would have adored this film. He may have even made a house out of the film strips and sat inside it to watch the movement, as Varda does at one point, literally living within cinema.


At one point in the lovingly told look back, Varda is standing on a pier that I felt immediately in my own heart. Then she's on the beach that I also felt attached to, even in close-up. Soon enough, it said "Venice" in the dialogue. I knew it all along. When you watch it and recognize the wide swath of sand we all know and treasure, and the absolute love felt while Agnes is there with her friends, it makes the stories and feelings expressed by Varda all the more personal and identifiable.

I loved every single frame of this gift of a film, given back from a life well lived. It is an inspiration in every way; creatively - certainly, but also as a reminder to cherish those people and moments in our lives WHILE you are living them. As Varda says to close her wonderful tale, "Je suis vivant, et je me souviens"...

I am alive, and I remember.