Witty documentary about the Chateaux of the Loire.
Agnes Varda's first documentary short, on the chateaux of the Loire in France, was commissioned by the French Tourist Bureau; she used the commissionimaginatively to cut her teeth on documentary filmmaking.Only a third of the movie actually focuses on the chateaux.She gets interested in amateur
painters in the area, in gardeners and groundskeepers, on funny names of
small towns on the Loire, and on fashion models looking terrific against the
backdrop of the beautiful historic palaces.Varda was a successful
photographer when she took up filmmaking in 1954, and her visual aesthetic is exquisite in this film.Lots of wordplay in the voiceover commentary, and
playing/punning with words and images, will hopefully be translated and
available someday to English-speakers.
score 8/10
gorbman 23 March 2004
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0062107/34767
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