Every time I watch an Agnes Varda film for the first time, I am always left with the feeling: why am I not watching more Agnes Varda? Or just all the time? As an autobiographical documentary, The Beaches Of Agnes (2008; Les plages d’Agnès) also works as a primer for the French filmmaker’s career, with clips and mentions of certain films that she’s made, still many that I haven’t seen yet and was eagerly noting to check out next. What becomes clear is that even when Varda’s films are fictional narratives or documentaries, featuring actors or about other people, they work as autobiographies, or capture Varda’s own life at that point in time. Varda comes across as very giving, being curious and inquisitive about people and the world around her, and this trait also has a reflective result; this is clear in the opening sequence where Varda has assistants assemble mirrors on one of the beaches she remembers from childhood. Approaching her own 80th birthday, Varda recreates scenes from her childhood and her creative life; there is a loose, free-form approach from the video cameras documenting everything to her own narration and presence on-screen. A major theme is time and loss as Varda looks at photos she’staken of actors who have passed away, people in her creative community who have gone, none more so affecting that her relationship with director Jaques Demy, their life together and the children they raised, their seperate creative undertakings and the grief she still has for his passing. Often sequences from her films speak for parts of her life left unsaid such as the separation with Demy and the film Documenteur, and then their reunion, and her efforts to preserve his memories with the film she directed about his childhood (Jacquot) as he was dying of AIDS. There are digressions, cameos from artists and actors and directors, and even filmmaker Chris Marker as an animated cat interviewing Varda. As a director and as an artist, Varda continues to be an inspiration; even as she approaches eighty, she remained continually engaged and creative, welcoming and playful, political and active. Varda admits early on that she was never a movie buff when she started directing films, but its clear that filmmaking like many other artistic expressions (photography, installations) was an important way of connecting to other people as well as understanding herself. Streamed on Mubi in Australia. Recommended.
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