"Agnès Varda is my cinema hero. Vagabond presented a new way of thinking about film form for me. Varda took a very bold approach to the way that she told this story, mixing forms and styles to create a fuller picture of a human being who is invisible to the world, a stranger to everyone, even to herself—begging the ultimate question of how well we ever really know someone."

"I always say Agnès Varda was to the French New Wave as Eve is to the Ruff Ryders: a ride-or-die bitch, respected by a pack of tough gentlemen. The first film of hers I saw was Cléo from 5 to 7. My mom had just had a routine but unpleasant dental surgery and was all whacked out on pills, and I read all the subtitles to her in different voices. I was so impressed by how Varda manages to be both deeply emotional and utterly in control of the technical elements of filmmaking. That had seemed to me to be an impossible line to straddle, and she does it so beautifully. Watch The Beaches of Agnès next, a portrait of a rich life in film."

"I always say Agnès Varda was to the French New Wave as Eve is to the Ruff Ryders: a ride-or-die bitch, respected by a pack of tough gentlemen. The first film of hers I saw was Cléo from 5 to 7. My mom had just had a routine but unpleasant dental surgery and was all whacked out on pills, and I read all the subtitles to her in different voices. I was so impressed by how Varda manages to be both deeply emotional and utterly in control of the technical elements of filmmaking. That had seemed to me to be an impossible line to straddle, and she does it so beautifully. Watch The Beaches of Agnès next, a portrait of a rich life in film."

"I always say Agnès Varda was to the French New Wave as Eve is to the Ruff Ryders: a ride-or-die bitch, respected by a pack of tough gentlemen. The first film of hers I saw was Cléo from 5 to 7. My mom had just had a routine but unpleasant dental surgery and was all whacked out on pills, and I read all the subtitles to her in different voices. I was so impressed by how Varda manages to be both deeply emotional and utterly in control of the technical elements of filmmaking. That had seemed to me to be an impossible line to straddle, and she does it so beautifully. Watch The Beaches of Agnès next, a portrait of a rich life in film."

"I always say Agnès Varda was to the French New Wave as Eve is to the Ruff Ryders: a ride-or-die bitch, respected by a pack of tough gentlemen. The first film of hers I saw was Cléo from 5 to 7. My mom had just had a routine but unpleasant dental surgery and was all whacked out on pills, and I read all the subtitles to her in different voices. I was so impressed by how Varda manages to be both deeply emotional and utterly in control of the technical elements of filmmaking. That had seemed to me to be an impossible line to straddle, and she does it so beautifully. Watch The Beaches of Agnès next, a portrait of a rich life in film."

"See above . . . the French really know how to do sex and bodies and affairs and palettes. Never had I seen a film on this subject treated and shot with such levity and ease. I also feel it’s necessary to note how major Agnès Varda is as an individual, having made a lane all her own alongside so many a male contemporary."

"Agnès Varda is one of the filmmakers I’ve always admired for her great ability to stick to her own voice. I find that irony is something that needs to be cultivated, and the few filmmakers who manage to do that are, for me, great masters. Even when she’s telling stories that are far from her own life, all of her films become like beads in a necklace that shines very brightly and decorates her. And the thing that I find surprising is that when she does tell stories that are so connected to her own gaze and her own life, they still succeed in being universal."

"The poster for Vagabond is an image of a woman with strange, defiant eyes and hair like that of an unkempt animal. In 1985, I was living in New York and going to the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre. I had a pretty wild roommate named Lizzie who was really into punk rock. She would party all night and sleep all day. This poster was over her bed. You get the picture. She took me to see Vagabond. I still haven’t recovered. This film introduced me to the director Agnès Varda. Varda has a film language all her own, and anyone who wants to direct will learn story and camera technique by watching Vagabond. You’ll have a field day wondering how she constructed the seamless tracking shots. I had the opportunity to interview Varda, and she gave me the following insight with a glint in her eye: “I try to make something look simple.” Vagabond is a seemingly simple story that gets more complex as you watch it. It begins almost like Sunset Blvd. In the French countryside, the dead body of a young woman is discovered. She’s frozen as if she’s been there for days, and we don’t know anything about her. There is voice-over by Varda herself, not the victim. Who is this woman? How did she get here? Varda will explain for us. The movie plays with time, a theme in Varda’s work that she also explores in Cléo from 5 to 7. With tracking shots moving right to left, Varda goes back in time to reconstruct the events that led to this young woman freezing to death in a ditch. Sandrine Bonnaire’s performance is very raw, almost self-destructive, but very effective. There’s a “There but for the grace of God go I” feeling as you watch her. Every act of rebellion, every bottle of booze, every man she has sex with, brings her closer and closer to her demise. Even when someone is genuinely kind to her, you are wondering when the next act of betrayal will come. The world is a tough place, and sometimes the only grace is the dignity of death. Frozen and still."

"I've always loved Angès Varda and been obsessed with Cleo from 5 to 7. I kept thinking of that specific movie when I was singing "Chance" because I was like, "I wonder, cinematically, does this song belong in my version of Cleo from 5 to 7?" [The film is] about a singer — she's obsessed with herself but she's also so sad, alone, and isolated. She only has the woman who works with her and is taking care of her. And then she goes to see a fortune teller and the fortune teller tells her she has cancer. She's having a rough temperamental day after the fortune teller. The day goes [on] and you don't really have empathy for the character at first, but then over time you get to know her. I really like that. [Agnès] features this character in this way because it shows you that even when you imagine that someone's life is super easy and they're obsessed with themselves, that's not really the full story"