The Academy Museum of Motion Pictures presents Enter the Vardaverse: Afternoons in Paris Series

As the grandmother of the French New Wave, filmmaker Agnès Varda’s (1928–2019) influence on cinema history cannot be overstated. Working vigorously and spiritedly until her death at age 90 in 2019, Varda directed some two dozen features and almost as many short films, adapting her style to fit her ever-evolving curiosities and interests over her seven-decade career. For Part 3 of Enter the VardaVerse, we track Varda’s filmmaking through the streets of Paris, where she lived on rue Daguerre for much of her life, and hold a mirror to her contemporaries.

September 3, 2023 – 2pm

Cléo from 5 to 7 │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.

Directed/Written by: Agnès Varda. With: Corinne Marchand, Antoine Bourseiller, Dominique Davray. 1962. 90 min. France/Italy. B&W, Color. French. DCP. 

Preceded by

Les dites cariatides │Varda’s elegant investigation of female and male sculptures dignified within the architecture of Paris is manifested against a poetically composed soundtrack, voiceover, and array of carefully examined images. Historical context around the sculptures is shared through dimensional storytelling by Varda, and her continuous effort to perceive subjects with genuine curiosity enables viewers to perceive the stationary sculptural subjects through the scope of humane appreciation. 

Directed by: Agnès Varda. Written by: Charles Baudelaire and Agnès Varda. 1984. 13 min. France. Color. French. Digital.

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September 9, 2023 – 2pm

Band of Outsiders by Jean-Luc Godard │ Two restless young enlist the object of both of their fancies to help them commit a robbery—in her own home. This audacious and wildly entertaining French New Wave gem is at once sentimental and insouciant, effervescently romantic and melancholy, and it features some of Godard’s most memorable set pieces, including the headlong race through the Louvre and the unshakably cool Madison dance sequence. 

Directed/Written by: Jean-Luc Godard. With: Anna Karina, Sami Frey, Claude Brasseur, Danièle Girard. 1964. 95 min. France. B&W. French. DCP.  

Preceded by

The Fiancés of Macdonald Bridge (Les fiancés du pont Macdonald) │Directed by Agnès Varda for her film Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962), this silent short stars her French New Wave colleagues Jean-Luc Godard, Anna Karina, Sami Frey, and Eddie Constantine and is set on the titular bridge over the Canal Saint-Denis. 

Directed/Written by Agnès Varda. With: Jean-Luc Godard, Anna Karina, Sami Frey, Eddie Constantine. 1962. 5 min. France. B&W. French. Digital. 

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September 10, 2023 – 2pm

Le Samouraï by Jean-Pierre Melville│“There is no greater solitude than that of the samurai, unless it is that of the tiger in the jungle… perhaps…” Jean-Pierre Melville’s masterpiece Le Samouraï begins with a quote from Bushido, the code of the samurai. Alain Delon portrays Jef Costello, a lone hit man armored in his signature trench coat and fedora, living in seemingly lifeless, gloomy surroundings. When a hit on a nightclub owner goes wrong, Costello’s quiet, desolate world is interrupted by ominous variables. 

Directed/Written by: Jean-Pierre Melville. With: Alain Delon, François Périer, Nathalie Delon. 1967. 101 min. France/Italy. Color. French. 35mm. Print courtesy of The Institut Français.

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September 16, 2023 – 2pm

Four Nights of a Dreamer by Robert Bresson│Jacques is an artist whose world changes when he meets Marthe, a woman intent on taking her own life. After he stops her from doing a swan dive into the Seine River, the two start regularly meeting, and Jacques learns that Marthe almost killed herself over a broken heart. As Jacques and Marthe wander through Paris over a series of nights, he begins to fall in love with her — only to find that her former lover is not entirely out of the picture.

Directed/Written by: Robert Bresson. With: Isabelle Weingarten, Guillaume des Forêts, Jean-Maurice Monnoyer. 1971. 87 min. France/Italy. Color. French. DCP. 

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September 23, 2023 – 2pm

Diva by Jean-Jacques Beineix│A sensational thriller adapted from Daniel Odier’s novel of the same name, made of cult-like, obscure cinematic components, and driven by director Jean-Jacques Beineix’s distinctive creative style. It centers on Jules, a young postman who gets around the streets of Paris on his moped and is obsessed with opera. Jules’s trouble begins when he illicitly records the performance of an American soprano and accidentally stumbles on a tape which incriminates the corrupted chief of police.

Directed by: Jean-Jacques Beineix. Written by: Jean-Jacques Beineix, Jean Van Hamme. WITH: Frédéric Andréi, Wilhelmenia Fernandez, Roland Bertin. 1981. 117 min. France. Color. French, Italian, English, Latin. Rated R. 35mm. 

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September 24, 2023 – 2pm

Céline and Julie Go Boating by Jacques Rivette│When Céline goes traipsing across a Parisian park, unwittingly dropping first a scarf, then other objects, Julie cannot help but follow her, picking up each item. So begins a fanciful relationship between the two, which soon sees Celine sharing Julie’s apartment and each of them playfully switching identities in their daily lives. As they increasingly indulge their fantasies, they find themselves trying to rescue a young girl from a supposedly haunted house.

Directed by: Jacques Rivette. Written by: Juliet Berto, Dominique Labourier, Bulle Ogier, Marie-France Pisier, Jacques Rivette. WITH: Juliet Berto, Dominique Labourier, Bulle Ogier. 1974. 193 min. France. Color. French. DCP. 

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