It sounds so lovely in French. So I took that because it was the subject: I and myself and myself and I. Which is, in a way, boring, because it is a contradiction.
AGNES VARDAIt sounds so lovely in French. So I took that because it was the subject: I and myself and myself and I. Which is, in a way, boring, because it is a contradiction.
AGNES VARDAI call [ordinary people] real people, because they have in themselves an incredible treasure – stories, a way of speaking, a way of sharing, an innocence and a perversity which I find very interesting to discover little by little.
AGNES VARDAWhen I started I did not know I wanted to be a filmmaker. I started – I made a film. Then when I finished I said, Oh my god it’s so beautiful – I should be a filmmaker!
AGNES VARDAI hated myself totally white. So now I cheat. It’s my white hair, and I put color there.
AGNES VARDAI tried to find a language for the film – not just telling stories. I picked the Picasso painting because it said more than I could explain.
AGNES VARDAI don’t watch my own films. There is little time; I’d rather see another film.
AGNES VARDAShe almost doesn’t recognize her children, but she recites Valéry and Baudelaire. So what? We’re the ones who are suffering. She’s not.
AGNES VARDAIf you know nothing, it could be like an enemy in a way. I think that’s the way I felt when I was young.
AGNES VARDAHumor is such a strong weapon, such a strong answer. Women have to make jokes about themselves, laugh about themselves, because they have nothing to lose.
AGNES VARDAWhen I started my first film, there were three women directors in France. Their films were OK, but I was different. It’s like when you start to jump and you put the pole very high – you have to jump very high. I thought, I have to use cinema as a language.
AGNES VARDAI didn’t go to film school. I was never an assistant or trainee on a film. I had not seen all those cameras. So I think it gave me a lot of freedom.
AGNES VARDAMany filmmakers have made resurgent work, and I was just a little ahead of the time.
AGNES VARDAI never fought, I never learned kung fu or boxing, I never went into these sportif competitions. I wouldn’t cross the ocean.
AGNES VARDAIt’s interesting work for me to tell my life, as a possibility for other people to relate it to themselves – not so much to learn about me.
AGNES VARDAYou have to invent life.
AGNES VARDAThere is a song of Gainsbourg that Jane Birkin sang, and the words are beautiful in French. It says, “Le jeu et les moi.” It’s impossible to translate, because it has a very nice sound.
AGNES VARDA