Time: 90 Minutes
Age Rating: PG – Sexual references
Cast:
Corinne Marchand as Florence “Cléo” Victoire
Antoine Bourseiller as Antoine
Dominique Davray as Angèle
Dorothée Blank as Dorothée
Michel Legrand as Bob
Director: Agnès Varda

I had been meaning to watch a movie from Agnès Varda for a while. I heard that she was a very notable and acclaimed filmmaker and I hadn’t gotten around to watching any of her work until now. I got the opportunity to watch one of her most famous movies in the cinema, Cléo from 5 to 7. I came out of it feeling a little disappointing, not bad by any means, but I found that I wasn’t nearly as invested or engaged as I wanted to be.

For what it’s worth, Cléo from 5 to 7 does have an interesting enough premise and setup, as it follows protagonist Cléo wandering from place to place as she waits for results of a biopsy test. It’s very much a vibe movie as she follows the streets and we see her grow and change. I like how it attempts to play out in real time (even if it technically goes from 5 to 6:30 rather than to 7 as the title implies). Unfortunately, I just didn’t feel nearly as connected with it as I wanted to. Most of it is due to the fact that I couldn’t connect with Cleo that much and I was left longing for something I didn’t get, it mainly lost me in the second half. Despite it only being 90 minutes long, at a certain point it felt a little dull and drawn out to me, though perhaps I wasn’t in the right headspace to watch it. That said, it does have some great scenes and sequences, and the ending worked for me.

The performances are strong all round, especially from Corinne Marchand. She really made Cléo feel credible and real, even if I couldn’t connect with her.

As I said, this is the first movie I watched for Agnes Varda and I can already tell she’s an amazing filmmaker. It’s very well made, her direction is inventive and she makes some great stylistic choices. The black and white cinematography is beautiful with lots of mesmerising shots. There’s some very good visual storytelling on display and she makes use of innovative camerawork and editing, including long takes, split screens and POV shots which help get us into the protagonist’s head. I also like how real everything felt, especially with the environments and attention to detail.

While I wasn’t entirely engaged with it, Cléo from 5 to 7 is decent and well crafted, and has a great lead performance from Corinne Marchand. While I was underwhelmed by the movie, I am open to the possibility that I went into it with the wrong headspace, and perhaps it’ll work better for me on a later viewing.