Documenteur
By Kit Macdonald
These two screenings of Agnès Varda's 1981 film Documenteur are part of the Agnès Varda Essencial season, a wide-ranging celebration of the French film director, screenwriter and photographer taking place between Filmoteca and CCCB and running until September 6. Also known as Documenteur: An Emotion Picture, the film's title is a portmanteau of "documentary" and "menteur" (liar), reflecting its intriguing blend of documentary realism and fictional elements.
Set in Los Angeles, the film follows a French single mother (played by Sabine Mamou) getting her life back together in a foreign land following a breakup. Varda's own son, Mathieu Demy, plays the woman's young son who accompanies her as she navigates the challenges of being a single mother and living away from her home country. She eventually finds an interesting new line of work that brings Documenteur together with its companion piece, the documentary Murs Murs, in which Varda filmed mural art around LA and interviewed the artists behind the pieces.