When one thinks of the major figures of postwar cinema, the name Agnès Varda immediately springs to mind. For more than five decades, Varda has been making short and feature films, documentaries and video installations, and even before that she was a photographer.
Grandmother of the French New Wave, her professional career included such films as Cleo from 5 to 7, Jacquot de Nantes, Vagabonde and The Gleaners and I. Irrepressible and enquiring, she is a force of nature, and even at eighty shows no signs of slowing down. Now, in what she says will be her last film, she turns her camera on herself, returning to the beaches which have played such a significant part in her life to create a film autobiography.
Placing herself amongst extracts from her films, and images and interviews recalling her past, she has fashioned a humorous and illuminating account of her creative work, her life with Jacques Demy, her feminism and her family life. She confronts the joy of creation and the pain of personal loss, death and aging. Idiosyncratic, engaging and deeply moving.
If you opened people up, you would find landscapes; if you opened me up, you would find beaches. Many old people wish to tell their life. As an old filmmaker, with the enthusiasm and energy of my youth, I tried to find a style and a form to tell my memories, my encounters, the ups and downs of my life. I shot my film as a kaleidoscope, a collage, a fantasy.
Agnès Varda
