Les creatures (1966)

Not rated, but the movie touches upon the evil that is inherent in people.  As such, there is a scene --while lacking anything completely explicit --that shows a girl about to be molested.  There is violence, murder, implied sexuality.  It's got a lot going on considering that a lot of the movie has a lighthearted tone to it.  While much is left to the imagination, it doesn't mean that this movie is meant for everyone.

DIRECTOR:  Agnes Varda

I've always maintained that Varda, in her later years, fought to maintain the relevance of the old days.  I tended to hold Varda's work during the French New Wave as borderline unimpeachable.  Much of her later work felt like an impression done of a French avante-garde filmmaker.  But considering that Les creatures was made in 1966, I may have to revisit that thesis with fresh eyes.

I tend to watch the introductions on Criterion discs by the director.  I learned a lot about film from simply watching too many Criterions.  I was diving head first.  Would I probably be smarter if I learned about the directors before watching all of these films?  Probably.  But also, I probably wouldn't have gotten into my love of esoteric film if I hadn't simply taken a chance on a lot of them. But when the director has an introduction for a film, especially when it's a lesser known film, I will watch it.  I want to know the context of the film and how it was received.  Yeah, sometimes it influences how I watch a movie and my opinion on the film.  With the case of Les creatures, I learned that not a lot of people loved this one.  Normally, this lights my brain up.  I love to be the guy who loves the movie that everyone else disregarded or outright disliked.  It makes me feel like the right level of snob.

But I'm going to agree with history on this one. It's not the worst movie in the world.  Heck, there have been Varda films that have been more frustrating than this film.  The bigger issue is when Varda seems to lack craft and subtlety.  I won't deny that I tend to be standoffish when a film comes across as aggressively avant-garde.  Heck, a lot of avant-garde directors would pride themselves on my guttural response to their art.  After all, art is meant to elicit a response. I think that my reaction to Varda's more avant-garde stuff comes from a two fold frustration: a lack of nuance and a sloppiness.  The lack of nuance isn't the worst thing in the world.  I'm a guy who likes to pick apart a movie.  Even with something like Les creatures, there's actually a lot to pick apart.  But there are images that are such sledgehammers that it almost comes across as obnoxious.

And here's a personal thing.  I know, this is a me thing and a few other people's thing.  Agnes Varda almost feels ashamed to be dipping her toe into the science fiction camp.  It's not shame, per se.   It's thinking that science fiction is something to not take very seriously.  Les creatures is a weird movie.  It's difficult to understand where reality starts and fantasy ends.  The fact that there's a throughline where Edgar is writing a novel, which is a throwaway concept to almost explain away why the movie gets so weird.  Varda is almost doing a hat on a hat on a hat (and me, adding all of those "on a hats", is a hat on a hat).  She has a plot about a man who, through his own pride, maimed his true love.  He wanders around the town and weird things happen to him.  His wife, who should feel neglected throughout the story, waits for him at home, unable to speak.  But the foundation of the movie is this idea behind free will and the cruelty between those we love.

But why do all the beats?  One of the things about art is to kill one's darlings.  There are elements of the film that are underutilized and undercooked.  Honestly, considering that Catherine Deneuve is on the poster as the second billed person in this movie, she's barely in the film.  She has so little to do.  She's in one location for the majority of the film.  Michel Piccoli checks in with her every so often.  Her scenes last a minute at most.  Yet, she's supposed to be the focus of the film.  Honestly, considering that this is a movie where she gets pregnant midway through the film, we don't really experience any of the pregnancy.  Now, this could be a movie about neglect.  I don't hate that as an idea.  The notion that Edgar spends all of his time in the world of his novel could sell the notion that an artist can only have one true love.  But Mylene hardly seems bothered to be locked up on this tower.

If this is a movie that uses a machine as a device to talk about temptation and evil, just embrace that.  There's no real reason to kind of giggle at the notion of the artist.  Personally, I would remove the author element altogether.  Sure, this could be a story about the artist interpreting the role of morality, but it doesn't have to be silly.  Why does Edgar have to be a hack artist?  Why couldn't he actually craft a story about a man controlling people's destinies?  Instead, he has stories about people acting bananas over a random object.  If Edgar is an author who is neglecting his wife, why not make the art something seductive?  Make it something that he can't stop thinking about.  Instead, it feels like Varda takes shortcuts in her story.  There's no crafting.  Instead, Edgar's avatar keeps stumbling around story elements that he just accepts.  Let's say that the linen salesmen are part of the dream.  These are two guys who accosted Edgar.  Why would Edgar invest in these two guys and help them rob a house?  All of these moments reflect a kind of crappy author.

And Varda kind of does this a lot.  There's shorthand when there should be investment.  I don't mind things getting weird.  Sure, it's a bigger sell, but that's why it needs to be taken seriously.  I mean, it all feels like she's doing an impression of an avant-garde artist.  The insane thing is that she can't be doing that. She's living in the era where all of this stuff is being discovered.  But she has that discordant soundtrack.  It's weird.  If this was a contemporary movie, I would be commenting that it was trying to make fun of an era that wasn't really like that.  But ultimately, Varda is the stereotype before the stereotype existed.  It's just, so much.  I want to talk about the role of morality and free will.  The subtext is there and it's ready to be unpacked.  But the movie is so frustrating that I don't really have the drive to really attack the subject.  Like, because all of the window dressing is rougher than I care for, I have no desire to really discuss the themes that Varda has.  

Part of that logic comes from a place of distrust from me.  I could talk about the fact that people sometimes are not themselves.  When one acts against character --which is not a wholly impossible concept --it could discuss the notion that we aren't really our selves.  Perhaps Varda has a point that we're all puppets to unconscious responses.  But because Varda goes for the easy read on this subject and has her characters act as outlandish as possible, it's hard to cite these behaviors as something that might be universal. For example, the criminal burning up the money is a fun scene to film, but seems so over-the-top that it makes no sense that these two guys would end up with a murder charge.  I do see some of her smaller moments playing out. Honestly, the most upsetting scene is the scene with the old man ready to molest the girl.  It sends Edgar into a rage and it matches with the notion that the old man is losing his sense of judgment, returning him to his criminal youth.  But in light of the other scenes, it makes it hard to look at the human condition because there's no universal message there.

I love Varda.  As much as I dump on Varda's individual movies, she's an incredible filmmaker.  But when watching all of her movies (and I'm writing from an idiot's perspective), she tends to get in her own way, trying for the most avant-garde presentation of something that can be challenging without it.  My old theory was that she was fighting with her own past.  But I also have the feeling that she's trying to make a name for herself in the light of her contemporaries.  When she's making an earnest and vulnerable movie, she crushes.  When she tries to make artsy-fartsy stuff, she starts to forget the important small moments.