Agnès Varda Overview

Initially a photographer, Agnès Varda has been making films since 1956, and is one of the few women associated with the French New Wave, though more accurately, work by Varda belongs more precisely to the complementary Rive Gauche (Left Bank Cinema)... [more]

Initially a photographer, Agnès Varda has been making films since 1956, and is one of the few women associated with the French New Wave, though more accurately, work by Varda belongs more precisely to the complementary Rive Gauche (Left Bank Cinema) movement, along with Chris Marker, Alain Resnais, Marguerite Duras, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Jean Cayrol and Henri Colpi. Her film Cléo from 5 to 7 (Cléo de 5 à 7) is regarded as one of the classics of French cinema, and her later features, Le bonheur and Vagabond (Sans toit ni loi), challenged art house audiences with her feminist issues and social commentary. Now working as a documentarian, Varda remains one of the most unique cinematic poets of our time. In her most recent works, The Gleaners and I and The Beaches of Agnes, she has embraced video as an intimate medium and uses it to interrogate her own life, her memories, her preoccupations. Varda was married to the film director Jacques Demy (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg) from 1962 until his death in 1990. [show less]