Thursday, April 18, 2013

Cleo from 5 to 7

Agnes Varda, 90m, 1962
Cleo is a young, beautiful, upcoming singer. She awaits an biopsy result at 6.30. Moving in the environs of Paris, everything is tinged with sadness and thoughts of mortality. A beautiful city is sensitively captured through the moving camera as the film races towards its denouement. This is a gentle and humane film, a movie about friendship, dialog among strangers, reassurance and compassion. Surely a gem, it's among the last in the late Roger Ebert's Great Films. It must have held a personal message for him. He notes perceptively:
"When you fear your death is near, you become aware of other people in a new way. Yes, you think of the others, you think 'your life is going on its merry way, but think of me--I have to die'.....Cléo's awareness of her mortality vibrates like a soft bass drum beneath the surface."

The full movie is on Youtube HERE

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