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Bodan Litnanski, Agnès Varda, François Wertheimer, Margaret Dumont, Virginia Grey

Both a diary and a kind of extended essay on poverty, thrift and the curious place of scavenging in French history and culture--a documentary capturing the world of French gleaners who collect and mak... read more read more...e use of what others have discarded.

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85% liked it

2,156 ratings

Critics

92% liked it

38 critics

Unrated, 1 hr. 22 min.

Directed by: Agnès Varda

Release Date: April 6, 2001

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DVD Release Date: July 23, 2002

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Flixster Reviews (147)

  • rubystevens
    July 6, 2010
    rubystevens
    a lovely documentary/road movie on the theme of recycling society's castoffs. director varda travels france examining the lifestyle, from the ancient custom of gleaning the fields after harvest to modern 'freegans' and artists using salvaged junk. fascinating characters, not le... read moreast the filmmaker herself, who sees her art as gleaning images from everyday life
  • fb1142797643
    March 17, 2011
    fb1142797643
    This lovely, whimsical documentary is director Agnes Varda's tribute to the quaint practice of "gleaning" -- sifting through others' harvested farmland for leftover fruits and vegetables. This gentle foraging is not stigmatized like digging through trash (in fact, it's often pres... read moreented as a commendable effort to cut ecological waste) and almost all of the interviewed gleaners are surprisingly clean and articulate. Many farmers even accept the gleaners, and merely set up some light rules for their trespassing.

    "The Gleaners and I" is somewhat unfocused, especially considering it's only 82 minutes, and has quirky personal insertions that could be labeled self-indulgent. Varda not only narrates but intermittently appears onscreen, observing her body's aging, phantom-pinching trucks that she passes on the highway (shades of the Kids in the Hall's "I'm crushing your head" bit) and showing trivial lens-cap footage shot by accident. But such tangents are central to the film's homespun charm. She also becomes seduced by the gleaning concept herself, and gradually accumulates some chairs, figs, heart-shaped potatoes and a broken clock. "A clock without hands is my kind of thing," she smiles. "You don't see time passing."

    Eventually, she introduces city settings and broadens her scope. We see people who search for appliances, turn trash into artwork and live off found food. One of them has a Masters degree. Some legal aspects are explored, and there's also discussion of gleaning as depicted in paintings. Varda seems to just spontaneously follow the story wherever it leads her. It's a warm introduction to a peculiar, less-known corner of French culture.
  • lesleyanorton
    June 27, 2011
    lesleyanorton
    French rambling shaggy-dog documentary about a) people who collect what others have left or dumped, and b) Agnes Varda, the filmmaker. Best watched if, as I was, you're equally happy spending time with both.

    ... read morejpg">
  • Dracula787
    May 25, 2008
    Dracula787
    A documentary from Agnes Varda about the world of hardcore recycling. Gleaners traditionally are people who go through fields after harvest and pickup the extra crops that the plows miss, here that definition is expanded to include people who rummage through trash and hunt for ab... read moreandoned appliances for things that can be salvaged. The gleaners are frequently very interesting, it?s the ?I? part I could have done without. Varda frequently butts in on what?s going on in order to make some weird hippie-ish observation, like one really stupid part where she includes footage she accidentally shot of her lens cap bobbing around and how she finds that to be just profound. Still the, world she?s documenting in 80% of the movie is fairly interesting and filled with colorful people and Varda doesn?t push a larger political point to far, a nice enough 82 minute watch despite some unneeded interruptions.
  • patrickdol
    February 27, 2008
    patrickdol
    This film is incredibly fasinating. It's amazing to find out about a culture of refuse pickers in France, it really makes you think about what you throw away. The only problem with the film is that the film maker is very self indulgent, and it really tends to grind the film to a ... read morehalt when she does this. Although, with the knowledge that Agnes Varda was a strong presence in the French Nouvelle Vague movement, I guess one can't be surprised can they?
    But when all is said and done it's a lovely little film that presents all sorts of gleaning, obvious and not.
  • HuskersNC949597
    August 19, 2009
    HuskersNC949597
    I understand the "and I" part, coupled with the theme of gleaners not letting anything go to waste, but was it REALLY necessary to watch her pretend to catch semi-trucks with her hand, or to watch her lens cap dance?
  • GringoTex
    August 14, 2009
    GringoTex
    What a wonderful thing. I don't get anything out of the subject of crop gleaning (I grew up on a ranch, so all the wonder at scraps left over from the harvest seems dumb to me), but none of that matters. It's an enchanting travelogue and character study. The way Varda inserts her... read moreself into the film would be terrible by any other filmmaker, but it's Varda, one of the greatest personalities in cinema, and so it works. The cross-eyed dude who eats what he finds as soon as he picks it up and then teaches African immigrants French at night is one of the great hero characters of cinema- he's the Jean Gabin of French documentary.
  • mrauto
    August 21, 2007
    mrauto
    A heartfelt, sweet and stylized documentary that runs a little too long for its own good but there are bits and pieces that are inspired throughout but comes off a bit mundane. Its sweet to see Agnes Varda get so deep into her work and for a woman of her age really embrace her ha... read morendheld camera.

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Critic Reviews

Peter Rainer
September 26, 2002
Peter Rainer, New York Magazine

[A] lyrically ramshackle essay about people, including Varda herself, who don't fit into society's cubbyholes. Full Review

Chris Vognar
February 21, 2002
Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News

The Gleaners and I is a film well worth finding. Full Review

Kevin Thomas
December 17, 2001
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times

Charged with the pleasure of discovery. Full Review

Liam Lacey
June 27, 2001
Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail

For the most part, Varda's home movie is a simple and sweet thing. Full Review

Edward Guthmann
June 11, 2001
Edward Guthmann, San Francisco Chronicle

Varda's subject matter is surprisingly rich, but it's her own energetic, curious nature that gives the film its snap. Full Review

Michael Wilmington
May 12, 2001
Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune

In its frames, we see [Varda's] empathy, skill, curiosity, wit, poetry and passion for life: everything she has gleaned from a lifetime of love and movies. Full Review

Jonathan Rosenbaum
May 12, 2001
Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

[The] characters are defined by dawdle and drift as much as Varda is in The Gleaners and I, catching life on the fly -- and implicitly inviting us to do the same. Full Review

Roger Ebert
May 11, 2001
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

And in what appears to be a documentary [Varda] conceals a tender meditation about her own life, and life itself. Full Review

A.O. Scott
April 4, 2001
A.O. Scott, New York Times

The film is studded with found metaphors and serendipitous insights. Full Review

Peter Brunette
April 4, 2001
Peter Brunette, Film.com

A superb example of the genre of the self-expressive documentary.

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