Matthew Surridge

My tenth film of the day was Cléo de 5 à 7, written and directed by Agnès Varda, released in 1962. Cléo is a singer in Paris who fears she has a bad illness, and the movie follows her one day between 5 and 7 PM as she waits for the results of medical tests. Which doesn't really describe the movie; it's carried, and carried well, by stunning technique.

#Varda #Cleode5a7 #film

Dec 21, 2022 at 11:39pmWeb
Show threadMatthew SurridgeDec 21, 2022
The black-and-white cinematography's breathtaking (so are the sets and costumes), the editing's sharp and disorienting in a good way, the patterning of dialogue and incident is captivating — even without a linear plot development, you constantly feel that things are happening, constantly want to know what happens next.
Show threadMatthew SurridgeDec 21, 2022

Character is illustrated and developed in unconventional but powerful ways, and by the end you can see an arc over the course of time. The movie's a great example of what the French New Wave did well.

Next, another 60s film set in Paris (edit: nope! In France, but in the south) following a woman, this time a shortish feature by a French-speaking but non-French writer and director; which I'll then follow with a longer movie by the same artist.