Vagabond Essay

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“Sans toit ni loi” (Vagabond) written/directed by Agnès Varda Agnès Varda a French writer/director is considered an innovator and an important piece in the development of the French New Wave, and she is the only woman associated with this movement. Amongst her most successful films are: Cleo from 5 to 7 (1962); Le Bonheur (1965); and the 1985 film “Sans toit ni loi” (Vagabond) which is considered her best since it brought her international attention and many awards. Her successful film, Vagabond (1985) is a movie about Mona Bergeron a young homeless person who is found frozen in a wine vine courtyard ditch. The film pieces together the story of Mona’s final days alive in a narrative documentary-style. The beginning of the film is narrated by director/writer Agnès Varda whose voice tells us about Mona, that “No one claimed her body, so it went form a ditch to a potter’s filed.” As the movie continuous, we start putting together a portrait of Mona with flashbacks from others characters and how they remember Mona. Through the villagers narrations we learn a little about the mysterious young woman. Agnes Varda ends her introductory narration saying, “I know little about her myself, but it seems to me she came from the sea.” Agnes Varda’s film does not deliver the story in a linear sequence; instead the scenes are strings of arrangements that change abruptly giving the viewer little information about Mona’s past. In her filmmaking style, Varda alludes the spectators by giving us only a few specific details of Mona’s decision to live the way she did. In this way, the viewers have to generate their own opinion about Mona’s life style from their personal point of view. The only two or three things revealed in the film about Mona character is that she was a free spirited young woman who chose to live her life as a vagrant, and rejected social norms and the
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