Cléo from 5 to 7 – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #73 (part of the “4 By Agnès Varda” Box Set) (a J!-ENT DVD Review)
December 25, 2009 by Dennis Amith
A wonderful film that is simply a pure Varda masterpiece! Agnès Varda’s “Cléo from 5 to 7″ captures morality, despair and enlightenment in addition to capturing the beauty of Paris in real-time. There is so many layers within the main character but also the actual film itself. Well-acted, well-written and breathtaking cinematography, this film is worth watching and the box set “4 by Agnès Varda” is definitely worth owning! Highly recommended!
Image courtesy of Agnès All Rights Reserved.
TITLE: Cléo from 5 to 7 – THE CRITERION COLLECTION #73 (part of the “4 By Agnès Varda” Box Set)
DURATION: 89 Minutes
DVD INFORMATION: Black and White/Color, 1:66:1 Aspect Ratio, Monaural in French with Optional English Subtitles
COMPANY: Janus Films/The Criterion Collection
RELEASED: 2007
Written and Directed by Agnès Varda
Producer: Georges de Beauregard, Carlo Ponti
Original Music by Michel Legrand
Cinematography by Paul Bonis, Alain Levent, Jean Rabier
Edited by Pascale Laverriere, Janine Verneau
Production Design by Jean-Francois Adam, Bernard Evein, Edith Tertza
Art Direction by Bernard Evein
Costume Design by Alyette Samazeuilh
Starring:
Corinne Marchand as Florence “Cleo” Victoire
Antoine Bourseiller as Antoine
Dominique Davray as Angele
Dorothee Blank as Dorothee
Michel Legrand as Bob, the Pianist
Jose Luis de Villalonga as the Lover
Loyen Payen as Irma, la cartomancienne
Serge Korber as Plumitif
Jean-Claude Brialy as L’infirmier
Raymond Cauchetier as Raoul, le projectionniste
Jean Champion as Le Patron du Cafe
Eddie Constantine as L’arroseur
Georges de Beauregard as Le conducteur du corbillard et de l’ambulance
Daniele Delorme as La vendeuse de fleurs
Fernande Engler as La fille au cafe
Sami Frey as Le Croque-mort
Jean-Luc Godard as L’homme aux lunettes noires
Anna Karina as anna, la jeune fille blonde
Yves Robert as Le venduer de mouchoirs
Alan Scott as Le marin
Agnès Varda eloquently captures Paris in the sixties with this real-time portrait of a singer (Corinne Marchand) set adrift in the city as she awaits test results of a biopsy. A chronicle of the minutes of one woman’s life, Cléo from 5 to 7 is a spirited mix of vivid vérité and melodrama, featuring a score by Michel Legrand (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg) and cameos by Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina.
Agnès Varda, a director known for her role in the Rive Gauche (Left Bank Cinema) movement (filmmakers associated with the French New Wave but the directors had different political perspectives – for a more detailed understanding, please click here), began working on her seventh indie film in 1961 titled “Cleo from 5 to 7″ (aka “Cléo de 5 à 7″).
A film which Varda has said is a “portrait of a woman onto a documentary about Paris but it is also a documentary about a woman and a sketch of Paris”. Personally, I call it a significant Varda masterpiece.
The film was released in 1962 and was nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and won the “Critics Award” in 1963 from the French Syndicate of Cinema Critics. Having received a LD and DVD release from “The Criterion Collection”, the film is now bundled with Agnes Varda’s DVD box set “4 by Agnes Varda” which includes three other films: Varda’s first film “La Pointe-Courte” (1954), “Le bonheur” (1965, “Happiness”) and “Sans toit ni loi” (1985, “Vagabond”).
“Cléo from 5 to 7″ revolves around a pop singer named Florence”Cléo” Victoire (played by Corinne Marchand) and her life on June 22nd from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Cléo is awaiting her biopsy results from her doctor at the end of the day and is worried that she may have cancer and at the beginning of the film, when she goes to visit a fortune teller, the fortune teller sees death in the tarot cards dealt to Cléo. Of course, for Cléo, this is all that she needs to know and is resigned that her young life is now over and that she is going to die. Throughout the film, we see how Cléo deals with her death and how she deals with the thought of mortality as the two hours of her life (between 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m – actually technically its between 5:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m..), she feels nothing but solitude and despair. That is until she meets Antoine (played by Antoine Bourseiller), a character that I best not talk about in full detail since he plays a pivotal role in the film and can easily spoil the story.
We see Cléo now going through the shock from her visit to the fortune teller of trying to accept the bad news but it proves to be hard. Her assistant Angele (played by Dominique Davray) tries to help her deal with the situation and try to give her confidence but most importantly, to let her know that she shouldn’t talk about it with other people and to keep it to herself. So, we see how Cléo behaves around people close to her, who don’t understand why she is a bit emotional. From her older boyfriend, her pianist and lyricist. She doesn’t want to die but yet everyone around her lives their lives as if nothing is wrong and she starts to see her life differently.
Cléo leaves her apartment and thus the adventure begins as she walks through Paris and seeing life for herself, the people around her and visiting her good friend Dorothee (played by Dorothee Blank) who is a woman who freely takes her clothes off for art students for money and lives life the way she wants to with no inhibitions. But it’s that time alone that she needs until she needs to meet with her doctor and get the results of her biopsy.
VIDEO & AUDIO:
“Cléo from 5 to 7″ is presented in black and white (1:66:1 aspect ratio). The film looks absolutely beautiful with blacks that are nice and deeps, whites and grays look remarkable and The Criterion Collection really doing a great job in eliminating a lot of the dust and scratches from this older film.
The new digital transfer was supervised and approved by director Agnes Varda and according to Criterion, the digital transfer was created from a 35mm interpositive made from the original camera negative. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris and scratches were removed using their MTI Digital Restoration System.
As for the audio, the film is presented in monaural. According to Criterion, the soundtrack was mastered at 24-bit from the optical soundtrack, and audio restoration tools were used to reduce clicks, pops, hiss and crackle. The Dolby Digital 1.0 signal is directed to the center channel and for this film, I preferred to set my home theater receiver to stereo on all channels to have a more immersive soundtrack. Audio is in French with optional English subtitles.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
“Cléo from 5 to 7″ comes with the following special features:
- Remembrances - (35:59) A wonderful documentary from 2005 featuring Agnès Varda and reuniting cast and crew from “Cléo from 5 to 7″ over 40 years later and revisiting the areas of where the film was shot, also images from the making of the film and more. From why the first few minutes features color and black and white images, to the casting of the characters and interviews with the cast 40-years-later and what they remember about filming certain scenes and working with Varda.
- Hans Baldung Grien - German painter Hans Baldung Grien was an influence to Agnès Varda that his postcards and paintings were featured in the film. Using your remote, the viewers can cycle through various artworks.
- Madonna and Agnes – (2:24) A short clip taken from the 1993 French television special “Madonna, c’est Madonna” hosted by Christophe Deschavannes. Agnès Varda and Madonna discussing Madonna wanting to remake “Cléo from 5 to 7″.
- Cléo‘s Real Path Through Paris – (9:17) A short film from 2005 by Pierre-William Glenn as he straps a camera on him while riding a motorcycle and retracing the steps Cleo took through Paris from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m.
- Les Fiances Du Pont MacDonald – (4:54) The short silent film featured in “Cléo from 5 to 7″ starring Jean-Luc Godard, Anna Karina, Sami Frey, Eddie Constantine and many more. Also, including another video (2:57) featuring director Agnès Varda discussing the making of the short silent film and why she included it on “Cléo from 5 to 7″.
- L’Opera Mouffe – (16:05) A short film by Agnès Varda from 1958. Filmed indoor and outdoor from the rue Mouffetard and featuring composer Georges Delerue, inspired by Kurt Weill’s music from “The Threepenny Opera”. Visually creative!
- Trailer – (2:04) The original theatrical trailer of “Cléo from 5 to 7″.
Fantastic! That is my feeling of “Cléo from 5 to 7″ after watching it. Agnès Varda does a remarkable job of writing and directing a film that chronicles a woman’s life and to see her go through these wide range of emotions and the feeling of existentialism and looking at her life around the people around her.
In the beginning, we see how Cléo truly is. A popstar who shows how vain of a woman she can be. When she looks at the mirror and tells herself that “As long as I’m beautiful, I’m even more alive than the others”, one can immediately look at Cléo and see the lifestyle she has lived. Frivolous and possibly a lifestyle of a queen, buying whatever she wants and reacting to when she hears her music and letting people know that is her on the radio. But it’s when we see those layers of Cléo stripped down. She is now in despair and has left that life that she has lived temporarily to be alone and to get the biopsy results. Giving her a chance to see life differently when faced with her own mortality.
The film has style, it has grace, we see Cléo going through many areas of Paris, driving through Paris as we are like a passenger as we watch the scenery from the front window and of course, the film is also known for its inclusion of the short silent film “Les fiances du pont Macdonald” which feature a newly married Jean-Luc Godard, actress Anna Karina, Georges de Beauregard, Jean-Claude Brialy, Daniele Delorme, Alan Scott, Eddie Constantine and many other popular celebrities and directors from the French New Wave.
The editing is creative and artistic, in fact the inclusion of art in the film is a beautiful touch to a film that has so many enjoyable things going for it. But most importantly is how Varda was keen on detail. Wherever there is a clock (may it be in various restaurants, cafe’s to clocks out in the middle of the stress of Paris, we see the time). Varda and crew were determined to capture the clock at the time Cléo is near it and that the time coincides with what is happening with the film.
Speaking of Paris, what I loved about the film is how we see Cléo in various areas around Paris, the artwork of Hans Baldung Grien (which prior to the film, I always found his artwork hauntingly creepy) and to make a comparison of what I enjoyed about Eric Rohmer’s “My Night at Maud” from 1969 about using the camera and driving through Paris and the viewer is like the passenger, Varda uses this technique many years prior to the film and I just love seeing that incorporated if the scenery is worth capturing and in this case, cinematography in this instance and also of Cléo walking around Paris was well-done!
“Cléo from 5 to 7″ captures Paris in the early 1960′s. A lot of the locations we see in the film are no longer and personally, I don’t know if a film can be shot today with as much access or detail or in such a way as Agnès Varda was able to capture Corinne Marchand walking around in public with not much worry about rabid fans trying to get into the film. You see eyes looking straight at the camera (in fact, these people are probably wondering why they were being filmed) but it captures the time of people in Paris so innocently, and its a shame that some of the locations shot are no longer around. The cinematography is breathtaking and again, the editing is well-done! The film is literally a visual time capsule of Paris from yesteryear.
The DVD release is no slouch as there are so many special features included such as the reuniting of the characters of the film nearly 44-years later and also the inclusion of Agnès Varda’s short film “L’opera Mouffe” from 1958 and revisiting Paris via the path Cléo took over 40-years later.
Such a beautiful and amazing film in so many levels, “Cléo from 5 to 7″ is absolutely fantastic and definitely recommend the viewing of this film and the purchase of “4 by Agnès Varda” DVD boxset. It’s definitely a Criterion Collection set worth owning!
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