Original subtitles

I'm often asked why the film begins in color.

At least the tarot cards on the fortune-teller's table.

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

I see a departure, a journey. Here are the three Fates.

The fortune-teller believes the tarot's message.

Cléo believes what she's told. She's afraid,

feels threatened, sees the hanged man.

- Are you ill? - Yes.

So it's a sort of fiction in color...

that draws us into the rest of the film, into reality.

We switch to black-and-white. Ninety minutes of reality.

Thanks!

No, this card isn't necessarily death.

Even if she says, "It's not death but transformation,"

she's seen the hanged man, the clattering bones.

She's had a shock, a fright.

That fear and threat of death stay with her throughout the film.

That's what explains her behavior,

even if, at moments,

she can't talk about it or may not think about it.

But that fear never leaves her.

"5:00 to 7:00" is a racy expression for an afternoon roll in the hay.

But in fact I follow Cléo from 5:00 to 6:30.

Conveying time is difficult.

Time feels different if we're happy or anxious,

expecting someone or having fun.

I'd call that subjective time.

And then there's objective time.

Time we can't argue with. Clock time...

counted in hours, minutes, or even seconds.

This type of regularity,

like a metronome, marks every instant.

I wanted to combine objective time,

the clocks we see everywhere,

with subjective time,

how Cléo experiences it during the film.

Speaking of the desire to film the sensation of time,

the length of the shoot was also part of it.

And the constraints, hour after hour,

of a low-budget film.

What's more, the shoot took place at a specific moment in my life.

Here we see Rosalie at three.

I decided to film in Paris —

no travel, expenses, etc.

But the city has its frustrations.

I wanted nature to be present, trees and such.

I chose Montsouris Park. I know it well. It's near my place.

We shot several sequences there.

In 1961, the lawn was off limits.

I even marched so kids could play on the lawn.

Nowadays it's full of kids.

I hoped to film in the spring of 1961 with lilacs blooming...

chestnut trees flowering...

and petals gently falling.

But for production reasons, we shot in the summer.

So I set June 21, 1961, as the date the film takes place.

It was a Wednesday, but in the story and for the script,

I made it a Tuesday.

This is Corinne Marchand, who portrayed Cléo,

revisiting Montsouris Park.

- What's that? - The observatory.

From The Arabian Nights?

Another change:

The observatory was demolished. Only a hill remains.

Luckily I had postcards of that oriental palace.

Other postcards reveal more water in the waterfall.

But the cement branches haven't changed.

They act as railings and border the park.

I like this imitation of nature in the middle of nature.

At that time I was already singing a bit,

so I had some idea of all that.

Agnès asked me to play a singer

who's not all that famous.

She had me descend these stairs

as if onstage at the Casino de Paris.

I wanted her to swing her hips and shoulders.

I joined in the action, but just for fun.

I didn't need to show her. She was better at it than me.

It's the dream of any singer.

I'd have loved to be a lead in a revue,

descending a stairway with feathers everywhere.

I realized that dream here.

"Realize": It was a team effort.

A small crew around me with very few resources.

We had a crane for just one day.

We spent two weeks in these gardens

where a brief encounter occurs.

The encounter with the soldier

was very important in the film.

Would it interest you to know

that today is the longest day of the year?

Certainly feels like the longest.

The day seemed very long to Cléo.

The days were long for the rest of us too.

Rabier, the head cameraman, and I asked Corinne,

Antoine Bourseiller, and the entire crew

to start work at 5:30 a.m.

Because in June,

with the longest days of the year, it's light early.

And that created a low-angled light.

Rabier had an idea. We shot in black and white,

so this lush green lawn

was filmed with a green filter lens.

And in the black-and-white image,

it created a white, almost snowlike effect,

which suited this special encounter

between a soldier and a frightened girl.

I wanted it to be soft, somewhat unreal,

even if the subject is a reality she fears.

I'm afraid of everything.

Birds, storms, elevators, needles,

and now this great fear of death.

In Algeria, you'd be scared all the time.

How awful!

Have you seen each other since we shot the film?

Never?

You've traveled a lot.

You never got together even by chance?

Never. But that's what almost always happens.

A film crew lives together as a community,

like a crew on a boat through storms and calm weather.

Back in port they say they'll keep in touch,

and then they don't.

Here we're meeting again to question our memory.

The film was selected for the Cannes Film Festival.

I don't know if you remember.

Back then, you'd go up onstage before the screening.

And the emcee back then, the famous Léon Zitrone,

introduced me as "Agnès Varga,"

doubtless due to the Varga Girls at the Casino de Paris.

And then we descended the stairs

of the old Palais, of course.

And then it's fuzzy. I can't remember very well.

- Do you remember? - Yes, I do.

There was a bit of havoc.

I was a little overwhelmed.

I don't think I went to Cannes.

I have no memories of Cannes.

Can that be? No memories of it?

Hold on a minute.

Who's that, then?

Yes, I was in Cannes.

You both looked pretty good.

"Snazzy," as they say.

I was thrilled to be there.

I didn't know anything about the festival.

It's funny. I'm kissing some sailor!

But there was such euphoria all around.

What a wonderful day for an actress.

I was queen for a day.

Queen for several weeks...

and ubiquitous in press photos.

I took this shot of Cléo's face.

Luc Fournol had her hair and makeup done

so she looked as beautiful

as Brigitte Bardot, Liz Taylor,

Grace Kelly, and Marlene Dietrich.

You wore an opera hat

when I discovered you during the shoot of Lola,

Jacques's first film with Anouk Aimée.

Bernard Toutblanc, Jacques's first assistant, is wearing your hat.

He spotted you in a musical with Georges Guétary.

I called her and said...

"Listen, pack your bag tomorrow.

I don't have a contract yet.

I promise you close-ups in Demy's film.

Grab your top hat, tights, and boa."

Right?

"And come."

- Had Jacques seen her before? - No.

But he liked her very much.

And he made good on my promise. He gave her close-ups.

Cléo the coquette tries on hats in a shop called Francine's.

It's no longer there.

We got a lucky surprise as we filmed.

The Republican Guard rode by on horseback.

I was delighted by this serendipity. Rabier acted quickly.

I re-edited the unexpected shots with the cavalrymen

reflected in the store window and mirrors into the frame.

But I prefer the first one I saw.

Cléo likes mirrors a lot.

In the first part of the film,

Cléo is described and defined by those who see her.

Her assistant...

the hat saleswoman, her lover,

the musicians, and the mirrors.

Cléo is seen.

In the middle of the film, I wanted a clean cut,

a sharp change.

Forty-five minutes into the film, Cléo feels herself cracking.

The baby doll, the blonde starlet — everything cracks.

She rips off her negligee and wig and leaves.

I wish I could pull my head off too!

At this point, she begins to look at others:

people in the street, in cafés,

her friend, and later the soldier.

I consider this a feminist approach.

I wanted to focus on her as a woman

who defines herself through others' vision.

And at some point,

because she's the one looking, she changes.

She redefines herself.

It's a major role.

It's rare to be offered such a rich character.

It's great for an actress.

Cléo is a multi-layered persona,

going from flirtatiousness to anxiety, fear to curiosity.

She evolves and changes.

Even her graceful gestures in her negligee

expose her loneliness and her fear of being seriously ill.

It's true. But I'd like to have told him.

About what?

My illness! Have you forgotten already?

Everyone forgets but me.

What's more...

Corinne's character appears to be in good health,

despite her condition.

And that was a good thing,

the fact she didn't appear to be suffering and frail.

You were the picture of health.

Exactly like this magnificent woman

painted by Baldung Grien.

A skeleton whispers something she doesn't want to hear.

Or it pulls her hair.

That was a common theme in that painter's work,

but it was an inspiration for me,

another way of presenting the story I was telling.

So I had postcards of Baldung Grien's paintings.

I'd tack one up here or there.

It was a tiny image...

but for me an important mental reference

at the center of my project.

I really understood, via that image, what you were aiming for.

And let's not forget — as you well know —

we shot the film starting at the beginning

and continuing in chronological order.

By the end, the idea had exhausted me.

And I seem to remember being very tired

compared to the first images.

More than just tired.

At my request, you lost 15 pounds in seven weeks!

Because I really identified with the role.

I thought about it a lot. I believed in it.

I lived it very deeply.

There's the sick Cléo, and Cléo the singer.

A real singer.

Not the music?

- Michel Legrand thought you sang well. - We got along great.

Your voice wasn't dubbed. That's rare.

That song was a nice moment.

It was a climax in the film.

Ashen, pale, and alone

Without you

When Corinne sang her own playback, we were all moved.

Bernard is to the right here.

He was Demy's first assistant director and then became mine.

Here on the left we see Marin Karmitz, my other AD.

We decided to get together.

The meeting was set up in the offices

where Marin produces numerous fine films.

He's a distributor and releases video.

He's a pillar of French cinema.

Marin has become MK2.

We haven't seen each other since Cléo, right?

That's right.

During the credits, I'm surprised at what the medium says

when my two ADs' names appear.

I see evil forces...

Was that by chance? Or by mistake?

By mistake! You know you were forces of good for me.

My supports. My wonderful ADs.

I explained that I met Bernard through Demy.

And I met you, Marin, through Antoine and Sami Frey.

Was it more difficult

working on a film in real time, covering real terrain?

I remember spending days and days scouting

between Rue de Rivoli and Montsouris Park,

timing the duration of travel,

which had to be extremely precise,

and wondering if it could be done in real time.

It was hard. Working in real time was a challenge.

All the watches

and clocks in the street had to match the story.

And we had to adapt the editing

so it reflected the watches we filmed.

Viewers will notice we were very careful.

It's 5:05 when she sees the fortune-teller.

It's 5:08 when she enters the café.

It's just the mirror that suggests there's some mistake.

When TABAC reads correctly, the clock reads 5:08.

Both the taxi radio and the street clock give the hour.

It's 5:22.

Cléo has a collection of old clocks, so we didn't have to reset those.

It would have been impossible.

She only had a timer for her exercise.

As she walks to the Café du Dôme, it's 5:52.

And it's 6:00 as she crosses Place Edgar Quinet

to see her friend Dorothée.

In the taxi to Montsouris Park, it's 6:15.

It's rare to shoot a film...

in chronological order, from beginning to end.

It was relatively easier that way.

The hard part was shooting in the heart of Paris.

Like where the camera glides to the front of the taxi.

We had to place the car frame on an enormous platform.

The frame was mounted on a camera-car,

with a separate driver and engine.

This huge contraption had to navigate through the streets.

When I wanted a second take on the Pont Neuf,

the huge platform had to go around,

cross some other bridges, and come back again.

We lost a lot of time.

I enjoyed filming in real locales, like cafés I'd scouted,

but it presented problems.

Two extras appear on the right.

The rest are customers in the café called "Comings and Goings."

There were plenty of comings and goings...

with natural and spontaneous real-life action.

Likewise at the Café du Dôme.

Some friends helped out as extras. The rest were real customers.

In contrast, Bernard Evein designed the set for Cléo's flat

in a bright, empty space.

A spectacular set for Cléo and her kittens.

I was thrilled at finding that space,

because I'd scoured that magnificent area —

Rue de la Fontaine au Roi.

You liked it right away.

We agreed with Jean Rabier, the head cameraman,

that we'd use the natural sunlight from the windows.

We used very few lights. Sometimes none.

- You know I was a cameraman? - I didn't.

I studied to be a cameraman at IDHEC,

so I learned the old way.

I was assistant to Christian Matras,

and to Ghislain Cloquet,

who trained Sacha Vierny, Pierre Lhomme, etc.

So we were used to very different lighting.

In the old days, bed sheets were sky blue.

Cameramen didn't want white. You remember that?

They'd wear blue shirts.

Actors were forbidden to wear white.

White was considered too plain. So we hated white.

Michel Kelber went ballistic on me once

because in a scene in one of Léonide Moguy's films,

the typists had white paper in their machines instead of blue.

It was crazy.

But thanks to you I learned

how to use reflected light

from white paper, white sheets, and white walls.

I had to unlearn everything from film school.

I learned another way of doing it

that left its mark on me for life.

Did you like Cléo?

I thought she was very beautiful.

I remember especially her hairdo and her polka-dot dress.

Here Marin doesn't seem too taken with the dress.

In the beginning of the film,

Cléo leaves the fortune-teller at 58 Rue de Rivoli.

Squatters occupied that building for a long time,

until they were forced to leave.

You can recognize the ironwork on the door.

This is where we filmed.

And that polka-dot dress —

I think it was organdy, with a double lining.

It was a sheath dress with an interior lining.

I remember it gave her a lovely, airy effect.

And that was your design.

- You designed that? - Yes, I love polka dots.

It gave her walk...

a breezy quality.

Then there was the little black dress with darts.

Cléo wears one of my necklaces.

I'd brought my entire collection.

The wings were mine too...

as well as the rocking chair.

I remember lending my car to the doctor.

You remember that?

That was your car?

Yes, a Singer convertible I was pretty proud of.

- And the ring? - Cléo's ring.

You found it in a boutique...

on Boulevard Raspail.

- We didn't buy it — - Too little money.

We rented it.

Now that I see it, I remember.

What a pretty ring!

A pearl and a frog.

You and me.

And at the end of the shoot,

to show Agnès our appreciation,

we bought it.

You paid the difference between the rental fee...

and the full price.

I really like this ring.

I was very touched by the gesture and the gift.

The film was divided into chapters,

with the time and duration of each sequence.

She's so kind, so pretty.

Let's talk about Dorothée Blank.

Remind me when we first met.

It was when we did L'Opéra Mouffe.

So 1957.

Don't ask me about dates.

I shot on Rue Mouffetard...

with you and José Varela and another guy named Tasso.

You had two lovers.

- Might as well, huh? - Yes, might as well.

We see you in bed with Varela. Remember that?

Someone said it was shocking. It seemed innocent to me.

You caressed his feet.

I continued with other lovers in my life.

My favorite moment is when you filmed

there in your courtyard.

On a bed. - A mattress on an iron bed.

You asked me to just wriggle my back a bit.

You'd had experience as a model.

What about acting in the film? - It didn't require any transition.

I acted in the film as I did in life.

When I entered the studio...

the atmosphere was marvelous.

It was a world of artists...

very gentle, very calm, very —

And quiet, above all.

I must confess that while preparing for the DVD release,

I reedited two takes.

Cléo enters Couturier's studio. We see him at the back.

He turned 100 recently.

The part I removed is in yellow and in slow motion.

I think it flows better without that 1.5 seconds.

As Cléo...

you saw Dorothée's simplicity as she posed.

As for you, Dorothée...

I'd asked the sculptors

to look through you, not at you.

We see an idea through their eyes. What did you feel?

I felt freedom.

In other professions,

people ask you to behave this way or that way.

When you model, you're nothing.

You're just yourself. No one asks how you're feeling.

You breathe...

and turn thoughts over in your head.

The painter isn't interested in that.

That's what I mean by freedom.

And that delighted you.

Cléo was a little uptight and anxious.

Cléo was more uptight.

She'd probably never have posed nude.

And neither would I.

I just learned. Get in.

Then there was Dorothée's adventure at the wheel.

I had no idea you didn't know how to drive.

I'd never driven. I took lessons.

I had to take the road test twice. I failed it the first time.

I failed the second time too, but the instructor asked...

"When does shooting start?"

"That depends on you, sir." "On me?"

I said, "The shoot begins this afternoon.

If I have my license, I work. If not, I don't."

So he gave it to me.

Speaking of that car she did her best to drive,

it took a color photo to remind me it was red.

I can't remember who loaned it to us.

I remember scouting a fun address for Dorothée.

In the 14th arrondissement, there are stairs called Rue des Artistes.

Dorothée descends them again to bid us farewell.

I like to linger on street names, boutiques,

metro stations, and buses.

As we came to Place d'Italie, I seized the chance,

as I often do in my films,

to talk about trees and how they fare.

You know these trees?

They're Paulownias.

There are some in Paris, and lots in China and Japan.

It's a rare tree from Poland.

I was wrong. Paulownias come from China.

But the big trees from 1961 are no longer there.

I asked two chief arborists for the city to talk about why.

The Paulownias on Place d'Italie

were already advanced in age, about 50 years old.

The area was fairly polluted due to traffic.

And don't forget that the metro is underground.

So the atmosphere was rather inhospitable,

and they began to waste away.

After a study was done, it was decided

to remove the remaining trees and redo the whole square.

The 1999 storm played a part too.

Quite a few trees were uprooted.

It was a danger for people in the square.

So they were cut down.

It always hurts to cut down a tree,

but one is planted in its place almost immediately.

And it grows more beautiful with each passing year.

For the moment, they're young and small,

but they're vigorous, and they grow quickly.

And you can see they're beginning to flower now.

Sometimes kids hang out at night and vandalize these trees.

They carve things like "I love you, sweetie" on the trunk.

That's romantic!

Sure, but a tree is a living thing,

and it doesn't like to be hurt.

I don't love trees. I adore them. I've worked with them for 34 years.

I was raised in the country.

I started climbing trees at five or six.

For this job, you have to love nature. That includes trees.

It's a labor of love. - That's right.

Two months later, the Paulownias on Place d'Italie,

after blossoming, were green again.

We passed that way for the final scene at the hospital.

- When's your train? - About 8:00.

We have so little time.

It's silly looking for the doctor.

It's not that urgent. I can call him later.

Time for Cléo and Antoine was too short or too long.

We have plenty of time.

And the space between them was either huge or very tight.

I brought Antoine and Corinne to the hospital grounds

to talk about the final sequence.

I marvel at your relationship,

at something extremely subtle between you,

a gentleness toward each other.

What I call being together.

It's not about being in love.

It's something you can experience

in certain exceptional circumstances.

We really were in a sort of bubble.

I think I expressed it in my eyes.

Antoine, you had tears in your eyes.

That's possible.

Did the viewer feel it? - Yes!

I can only express my gratitude. I admired you two then...

and I admire you 40 years later for expressing what I wanted.

Why?

I'm sorry I'm leaving. I'd like to be with you.

You are.

I think my fear is gone.

I think I'm happy.

I have to mention a problem with that last shot.

We set up the dolly tracks, and the actors walked along them.

They don't look at each other much. Just a few emotional glances.

There's something ephemeral and subtle taking place.

It's quite a long shot. They keep walking.

What happens at the end?

A dark, blurry shape appears behind them —

the dolly tracks.

I'm devastated and angry at myself. "The camera was poorly placed!

We weren't careful enough.

We focused on their faces, not enough on the shot."

It took two months to convince Beauregard

to authorize a reshoot.

Antoine and Corinne arrive in their costumes...

a small crew, dolly tracks, camera, film stock...

The atmosphere is right. We get ambulances, place the tracks.

They walk slowly.

Corinne says the same thing:

"I think my fear is gone. I think I'm happy."

They look at each other.

No tracks in the shot, but it's not working.

I tell them, "Maybe I didn't direct you well.

I didn't say the right thing.

Or maybe I should have kept quiet. Let's do it again."

Take two. Take three.

For me it's a dud. They're just not there.

In the final edit...

I used the scene from the first shoot,

with the blurry dolly tracks at the end.

No one ever criticized it. Maybe no one noticed.

Maybe it's a mistake to even tell you this.

But that taught me something. A real lesson.

It's very difficult to reconstruct and re-create

the magic of a moment...

when everyone was in sync.

The impulse, the director's desire, the actors' emotions.

You can't just try

to recapture something so ephemeral and miraculous.

It was quite a lesson.

This hospital bench reminds me of something.

Georges Sadoul, a well-known film critic in 1962,

told me a story I thought was extraordinary.

The film gave him an unexpected shock,

and he wrote me about it.

"Dear Agnès Varda, you made me cry for several days

with your film Cléo from 5 to 7, which touched me deeply.

It's a beautiful film, your best.

I must admit to a strange coincidence.

In June 1938...

I spent a whole day in the gardens of the Salpêtrière Hospital

waiting for news of a death:

that of my wife, Jacqueline Cartier-Bresson,

who died at Cléo's age in the film.

For me, those gardens are the image of death itself,

the height of tragedy."

And when I spoke with him...

he said he'd not only waited for the news of her death,

but he'd waited for a doctor to speak to them.

That really struck me.

Without realizing it, I'd created

an intense and devastating scene from someone else's life.

I still don't know what inspired Baldung Grien

to paint beautiful women taunted by skeletons.

But it reached me 500 years later

and served as my motivation.

I'll now finish up with my memories of this film

by closing the little notebook in which I jotted down my plans

and put photos as the film was shot.

I'm closing it now.