Such a loving, unique film, reflecting both artists beautifully. We get some of the traditional elements that might make up a biography, like Birkin looking through childhood photos, describing her early life, and with her brother revisiting her childhood home, now demolished, each recalling little details and games they played. We also get Varda putting her into a number of skits, riffing on things Birkin has said or playfully exploring her in various scenarios. Some of these things seem quite random but through it all a real sense for who both Birkin and Varda are emerge, which was really quite lovely. One thing I can say is that Birkin would have made a fierce Calamity Jane, or Joan of Arc. Also, her bulldog is adorable.
Quotes from Jane B.
On looking directly into the camera: "It's embarrassing. It's too personal. It's like staring at someone."
"What I'd really like is to make a whole film about how I really am, with my jeans, old sweaters, messy hair, pajamas, barefoot in my garden. For once I'd like to forget about wigs and pretty costumes. I'd like to be filmed as if I were transparent, anonymous, as if I were just anyone."
"I'm know I'm very spoiled. But that doesn't mean I'm never lonely. You can be spoiled and lonely. Covered in flowers and lonely."
"I guess I only like lost people."
On Marilyn Monroe: "She was like a naïve muse, inspiring our dreams of being beautiful."
"This sort of statuesque perfection leaves me unmoved. I like a man's or a woman's body with or perhaps precisely because of its flaws."
"I like melancholy, so I write in the past tense... I remember how I loved him..."
Quotes from Agnes V.
"Why would I make this film? Because you're beautiful. Like a chance encounter on an editing table between a perky tomboy and an Eve in modeling clay."
On Birkin wanting to work with Marlon Brando: "Too expensive. How about a French actor, almost as good but cheaper?"
"I prefer daydreams to psychology. I like to jump around, toy with chance, with fleeting emotions and events."
On Jane B. Wanting to be liked but also to be anonymous: "You dream of being a famous nobody."
"It's like a jigsaw puzzle, fitting one piece here, one there. A picture gradually appears, even with a hole in the middle. But there can be a lull even at the finest parties."
