Vagabond (Sans toit ni loi)

Agnes Varda’s Vagabond (1985) was a deceptively simple film. Since the film starts with the death of the main character, the end is clear, but Varda’s achievement is to entrance the viewer throughout. The main character, a woman who lives without a home, as a drifter, remains remarkably impassive throughout. She appears to remain indifferent whether other people treat her callously or with friendship; but she is admirable for her will to survive. Only in the final few minutes does the end become increasingly likely.

The question, of course, is why does Mona reject all avenues offered to her? She is young, she has the world ahead of her, so why turn away repeatedly from all long-term involvement? Rejecting offers of crass casual sex from lorry drivers are not surprising, but why walk away from a family who have gone back to live on the land, and, when she says she wants to grow potatoes, offers her a space, and to plough that land for her? Instead, she sits in the caravan provided for her and seems to do nothing but smoke cigarettes.

When she takes a lover, she smokes all his month’s supply of dope in four days, and then gets impatient because he doesn’t have any more. When a researcher into tree diseases explains to her what is happening to the trees, she wilfully misunderstands and repeats a mangled version of the tale back to a man who has given her work. A Tunisian immigrant shares his food and accommodation with her, but she complains when his six colleagues return and don’t want her around. When a stranger buys her a sandwich in a café, she puts money into the jukebox, thereby showing everyone she doesn’t need someone else’s money (although she takes it just the same). It’s difficult to comprehend just what these responses mean.

No explanation is given for her wilful rejection of any kind of job or stability. Yet, interestingly, the people she meets (largely played by amateurs) repeatedly project on to her what they would like to see. People dream of her freedom; there is very little freedom from what we see of her in this film. Other people struggle with existing relationships, dealing with drunk partners, but the film never shows Mona revelling in such freedom. In that way, the film gains stature, as we realise how disturbing she is for all of us in fixed jobs and ways of life.

Even though the film compels because of its narrative – like a picaresque novel, it has hardly any plot development. One reason for continuing to watch is simply the quality of the camera work; Varda has a gift for identifying powerful shots and scenes. In contrast, The Scarlet Pimpernel, which I happened to see the night before, probably had ten times the budget but failed to show any visual imagination. It’s not surprising that Varda started life as a photographer; many of the shots in the film are startling in their immediacy. She manages to capture both beauty and ugliness – the beauty of a couple of moments of fleeting happiness for the main character, Mona, and the sheer ugliness of much of the despoiled French countryside where the film is set. We follow where her camera moves, because we are fascinated.

Varda is aware of the power of images and their conventional interpretation. As with most French films, there are bare breasts, but they do not transmit the usual message of eroticism. One unpleasant character starts out naked in the bath, and then reveals herself to be intolerant and brutal, in dismissing a woman in her employment simply because the woman’s boyfriend has been implicated in a theft. As a viewer, your expectations are confounded as the scene evolves.

If the film has a moral, it is perhaps that of compassion.  Mona gains some of the viewer’s sympathy but as fast as it is gained, she by her actions rejects a simple admiration. Some people she encounters are brutal and horrible to her; others respect her and do not make demands of her. She is almost a kind of blank canvas against which the world displays its good and bad qualities. Perhaps the film makes us look again at those on the margin, and to rethink our dismissal of people we do not want to know; but this film is no hymn to the outsider.