Cléo's scampering pets are a charming distraction from the story in the same way Cléo is treated (and portrays herself) -- an amusing plaything, graceful, soft to touch. Her potential illness is what worries her on the surface, but as she turns for support for the black period ahead, she discovers the meaninglessness of her present relationships. She has a maid who doubles as a resentful mother and lectures her that men don't want to know of troubles or illness. Her songwriting team doesn't respect her. (Did you catch her song titles? "Wayward Girl." "Inconstant Girl." "The Girl Who Lied.") Her inattentive lover visits to handle her for a moment just like she petted her little cat. She's a creature whose material gains are based on fleeting qualities -- youth, beauty -- and whose happiness is marred by fear of not pleasing others, of not keeping their attention. As soon as she tears off that ridiculous wig, she's a changed person.
I read a little about New Wave Cinema for a background to this film, and in "A World History of Film," Robert Skylar writes: "New Wave films in general are open to criticism for disdainful treatment of women characters." He goes on to cite a couple of examples from films of the time, but needless to say, Varda's films aren't among them.
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I’ve watched several New Wave films over the last year or so. Our film is an interesting comparison. It shares several of the common features like shooting on location, using jump cuts, and giving a montage of faces off the French street. But most of the other filmmakers in the movement shared an aesthetic ideal that can be compared to American jazz where the musicians frequently took well known songs from the likes of, say, Cole Porter, and reworked them to their own ends and created a distinctive, self-aware, new music out of these sources. The New Wave did something similar to Hollywood movies. Where Porter and Hollywood were straightforward well-crafted entertainments, jazz and the New Wave were about the music and the movies in a reflexive way that put style in the center. So for example, if Godard’s “A Bout de Souffle” had been made in 1950 or 1970 instead of 1960, it would have been completely different and had a different sensibility. But if “Cleo” had been made a decade earlier or latter, it could have been very much the same film with just some minor stylistic changes. So Vargas’s film is about her subject in a way that much of the New Wave is not. I’m not surprised that she is the one who went on to documentary films.
I was also struck by the scenes where all the men stare at Cleo as she walks down the street. As viewers, we are in Cleo’s place and are getting stared at. This is quite a contrast from, say, Godard’s “Un Femme est une Femme” made the same year where we viewers get to do some staring at Anna Karina. By the way, that is Karina and Godard in the silent short film.
I wish I'd seen more films from the genre to draw better comparisons. The two to stand out most in my mind are "Alphaville" and "Last Year in Marienbad" -- both of which (particularly the latter!) are in their own league for me in terms of exposition and unconventional filmmaking. Both are gorgeous to watch, but somewhat difficult to follow. But they're both also highly stylized, like our current pick.
Anyway, of what I've been reading, what you said about New Wave putting style at the center -- that's what I wanted to write but couldn't put into words.
(I've also seen a few Chabrol films -- I recognized the jump cuts from "Les Biches," which came out later.)
Oh, and I need to post a new thread about Godard and that short. I abandoned ship last night when my power started flickering on and off.
I had to keep rewinding during the kitten scenes because Mabel was barking insanely at the TV.
The wig removal was key, cl. I had the distinct feeling that the new Cleo would not be hanging from an exercise bar in a peignoir anytime soon (as thoroughly delightful as that scene was!).
Fantastic analysis of Cleo as kitten. That is exactly right, cl.
The only other film of Varda's I've seen is "Kung Fu Master," which is about a woman in her 40s (played by the beautiful Jane Birkin, mother of the ridiculously talented Charlotte Gainsbourg) who falls in love with a teenage boy. It's been years since I've seen it, but I remember really liking it. Despite its subject matter, it's a much more conventional film than Cleo.
The people who treat her like a plaything—her lover and the songwriters—are the ones who visit her at home where the kittens are. So I wonder if it is possible to link some major symbols to the various places Cleo goes: fortune teller, coffee shop and hat shop with her assistant, home, a cafe on her own, the art studio and movie theater with Dorothee, and the park, bus, and hospital grounds with Antoine. Anything promising? Were there flowers in the park? There were flowers in the hospital grounds.
Oh, and Kc, I agree that the exercise scene was wonderfully silly.
The cats were a great illustration of her "before" life. But will things continue to be different for her after 6:30? What about the superstitions? The songwriting team? The lovers? The cats? Can she really change?
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