I'm a huge fan of all things French New Wave. I went into this widely touted movie expecting to see a masterful, well-executed documentary about scavengers a segment of society whose struggles aren't often chronicled.
Instead, I got a rambling, unfocused picture that focused way too much on the director herself. Every time the movie started to get good and really engage my interest, Varda would break away from the subject she was documenting either to film herself or prattle away while filming a bunch of trucks on the freeway. What's more, she even saw fit to put in footage where she left the camera running as she carried it, calling the scene "The Dance of the Lens Cap," or some such thing. And while you can make statements that Varda, like her subjects, is using footage other directors just throw away, there's a reason directors don't use that footage. It's almost as if some studio executive has decided to play a prank on snooty French film snobs, handing a camera to a goofball old woman who once upon a time made decent movies. I appear to be one of the few who didn't fall for it.
Instead, I got a rambling, unfocused picture that focused way too much on the director herself. Every time the movie started to get good and really engage my interest, Varda would break away from the subject she was documenting either to film herself or prattle away while filming a bunch of trucks on the freeway. What's more, she even saw fit to put in footage where she left the camera running as she carried it, calling the scene "The Dance of the Lens Cap," or some such thing. And while you can make statements that Varda, like her subjects, is using footage other directors just throw away, there's a reason directors don't use that footage. It's almost as if some studio executive has decided to play a prank on snooty French film snobs, handing a camera to a goofball old woman who once upon a time made decent movies. I appear to be one of the few who didn't fall for it.