The Gleaners and I (2000)

Artwork for the English Release of the Film

Watch this film now.  Even if you are not a fan of documentaries, it is enjoyable and remarkably short for how much it packs.

As my wife bluntly put it, it is the rare French movie that makes sense from the onset.

Agnes Varda is by far one of my favorite filmmakers.  The rare master, like Martin Scorsese, that can effortlessly switch from feature film, to short film, to documentary, to drama, to horror, to comedy without seeming to be an ill attempted career move.

Dubbed the godmother of the French New Wave by the French filmmakers themselves, Agnes Varda has a very laisez-faire manner of approaching film, and never is this more apparent than in this film, which serves both as a documentary about gleaners and garbage pickers, while at the same time being self-reflective on the art of filmmaking.

Apart from a major hiccup having to do nothing with Agnes Varda proper, the film was excellent.  The only thing that bothered me endlessly was the poor quality of the translation which cuts a huge layer of the meaning from the film.

Starting with the title, the French title is Les Glaneurs et la Glaneuse.  Sadly the American translation should have been something along the lines of The Gleaners and I, the Gleaner.  In the English translation she is almost entirely erased as being inclusive amongst the gleaners, and that, I think, is a major crime, but being aware of it, the rest of the film, should be ever more enjoyable.