![]() ![]() Edward Guthmann of the San Francisco Chronicle argued that "Varda's subject matter is surprisingly rich, but it's her own energetic, curious nature that gives the film its snap." In the Chicago Tribune, Michael Wilmington wrote: "In its frames, we see empathy, skill, curiosity, wit, poetry and passion for life: everything she has gleaned from a lifetime of love and movies." Peter Rainer dubbed the film "lyrically ramshackle". It was acclaimed by critics, achieving a score of 83/100 on Metacritic and a 92% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Later that year, it had its North American premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. The Gleaners and I debuted out of competition at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival ("Official Selection 2000"). It was distributed by Zeitgeist Films in New York, a company that has distributed films from such directors as Christopher Nolan and the Brothers Quay. Varda produced the film under Cine-Tamaris, a company she founded in 1954 and that had produced most of her previous films. She also traveled alone to get many of her "gleaned" shots and would go to markets between 2 and 4 p.m. In the press kit, Varda wrote that she and her team would travel and shoot for roughly two weeks at a time and immediately proceed to edit while scouting for additional locations. The film was filmed between September 1999 and April 2000 in Beauce, Jura, Provence, the Pyrenees, and the suburbs of Paris. In one scene, she "catches" numerous trucks on the freeway, first encircling each truck by putting her hand in front of the camera lens and then closing her hand as she drives past "just to play." In addition to footage relating to "gleaning", Gleaners also includes more self-referential footage, such as a scene in which Varda films herself combing her newly discovered gray hair, or the several closeups of her aging hands. Varda chose to put this footage in the finished film with a jazz music background, calling it "The Dance of the Lens Cap". For example, in one scene, Varda forgot to turn off her camera, so, as the camera hung at her side, it filmed the shifting ground and the dangling lens cap. Varda referred to her filmmaking process as "cinécriture" ("cinema-writing"), saying that the process of encountering subjects, choosing shots and music, editing, and writing narration is "all chance working with me, all this is the film writing that I often talk about." As such, she said the objects she found, such as the heart-shaped potato, were " of luck", as were some of the shots. It film is notable for its use of a hand-held camera and for its unusual camera angles and techniques. Gleaners was Varda's first film to use a digital camera. They make the statement they explain the subject better than anybody." Technique I said to my assistant, 'Call everybody you know.'" Referring to these subjects, Varda stated that "The more I met them, the more I could see I had nothing to make as a statement. In order to find the subjects, Varda claimed her method was to ask all the people she knew to talk to everyone-"the peasants, the owners, the farmers, the fruit growers-about our film. Two of the most notable symbols from the film are the numerous heart-shaped potatoes Varda finds in a field and a clock without hands she finds on the street. There are interviews with, among others, a Michelin 2-star chef who gleans and a wealthy restaurant owner whose ancestors were gleaners the owners of a few vineyards, among whom are psychoanalyst Jean Laplanche and the great-grandson of physiologist and chronophotographer Étienne-Jules Marey artists that incorporate recycled materials into their work, including Louis Pons, who explains that junk is a "cluster of possibilities" lawyers who discuss the French laws regarding gleaning versus abandoned property and an urban gleaner named Alain, who has a master's degree and teaches French to immigrants. She also included some of the people on the peripheries of the gleaning culture. For the film, Varda traveled throughout rural and urban France to document various types of gleaners who, whether due to necessity or for artistic or ethical reasons, gather crops left in the field after the harvest or food and objects that have been thrown out. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |