LES GLANEURS ET LA GLANEUSE
THE GLEANERS AND I |
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Director:
Agnès Varda
Screenplay: Agnès Varda
Featuring: Bodan Litnanski, Agnès Varda, François
Wertheimer.
Awards: Best Documentary, Chicago Int’l Film Festival (2000),
and the European Film Awards (Berlin, 2000).
Running time: 82'
Year of production: 2000
Rating: Not rated
Gauge: 35mm, DVD (color)
Language: French
Distributor: Zeitgeist Films
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“[Varda
is] an indefatigably curious, skeptical and sympathetic observer.
[The film] is both a diary and a kind of extended essay on poverty,
thrift and the curious place of scavenging in French history and culture.”
A.O. Scott, The New York Times. |
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Gleaning,
the gathering of the grain or vegetables remaining in the fields after
reaping, was a communal activity practiced by the poor in former times
and immortalized in 19th century paintings by Millet and Breton. In
a different, more solitary form the practice continues in France to
this day, enshrined as a legal right. In rural areas the poor, the
provident, the ecologically motivated, glean vegetables and pick passed-over
fruit; in the cities they rummage and scavenge. In this eclectic and
personal documentary, Varda becomes a gleaner herself, gathering moments
in the form of images with her tiny digital camcorder, and providing
a running commentary on what she sees. She visits various regions
of France--the north, the Pyrénées, Provence and Paris--and
interviews gleaners, pickers and scavengers. The picaresque form permits
Varda to pause along the way to chat with lawyers, artists, cafe patrons,
and even a psychoanalyst, about poverty and waste. Amusing and eccentric,
without ever losing its sense of perspective, the film provides a
very human portrait of people living on the fringes in France. Varda’s
personality--inquisitive, reflective, pragmatic--shines out from the
heart of the film, as she turns her camera to a stray dog, a misshapen
potato, or her own aging hands.
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| PHOTO Courtesy
of Zeitgeist Films |
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