Vagabond (1985 film)

Vagabond
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Agnès Varda
Written by	Agnès Varda
Produced by	Oury Milshtein
Starring	Sandrine Bonnaire Macha Méril Yolande Moreau
Cinematography	Patrick Blossier
Edited by	Patricia Mazuy Agnès Varda
Music by	Joanna Bruzdowicz Fred Chichin
Distributed by	MK2 Diffusion
Release dates	September 1985 (1985-09) (Venice) 4 December 1985 (1985-12-04)
Running time	105 minutes
Country	France
Language	French
Box office	$8.1 million

Vagabond (French: Sans toit ni loi, "without roof nor law") is a 1985 French drama film directed by Agnès Varda, featuring Sandrine Bonnaire. It describes the story of a young woman, a vagabond, who wanders through French wine country one winter. The film was the 36th highest-grossing film of the year with a total of 1,080,143 admissions in France.

Plot

The film begins with the contorted body of the woman, covered in frost. From this image, an unseen and unheard interviewer (the voice of Varda herself) puts the camera on the last men to see her and the ones who found her. The action then flashes back to the woman, Mona (Sandrine Bonnaire) walking along the roadside, hiding from the police and trying to get a ride. Along her journey she meets and takes up with other vagabonds such as herself as well as a Tunisian vineyard worker, a family of goat farmers, a professor researching trees, and a maid who envies what she perceives to be a beautiful and passionate lifestyle. Mona explains to one of her temporary companions that at one time she had an office job in Paris and did very well for herself, but she became unsettled with the way she was living – choosing instead to wander the country free from any responsibility, picking up what she could to survive as she goes. Throughout the film, Mona's condition seems to become progressively worse until she finally falls where we first saw her, frozen and entrenched in her misery in a ditch.

Cast

• Sandrine Bonnaire as Mona Bergeron
• Macha Meril as Mme Landier
• Yolande Moreau as Yolande
• Stéphane Freiss as Jean-Pierre
• Setti Ramdane as Tunisian
• Francis Balchère as Police
• Jean-Louis Perletti as Police
• Urbain Causse as Farmer
• Christophe Alcazar as Farmer
• Joël Fosse as Paulo
• Patrick Schmit as Truck Driver
• Daniel Bos as Demolition Worker
• Katy Champaud as Girl at the Pump
• Raymond Roulle as Old Man with Matches
• Henri Fridlani as The Gravedigger
• Patrick Sokol as Young Man with Sandwich
• Pierre Imbert as Mechanic

Critical reception

The movie was acclaimed by the critics. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 100% of 13 critics gave the film a positive review, for an average rating of 8.7/10.

Style

The film combines straightforward narrative scenes, in which we see Mona living her life, with pseudo-documentary sequences in which people who knew Mona turn to the camera and comment on what they remember about her. Significant events are sometimes left unshown, so that the viewer must piece the information together to gain a full picture.

The title

The original French title, Sans toit ni loi ("With neither shelter nor law"), is a play on a common French idiom, "Sans foi ni loi" – "With neither faith nor law."

Awards and nominations

Award	Category	Name	Outcome
César Awards 1986	Best Actress	Sandrine Bonnaire	Won
	Best Film	Agnès Varda	Nominated
	Best Director	Agnès Varda	Nominated
	Best Supporting Actress	Macha Méril	Nominated
French Syndicate of Cinema Critics	Best Film	Agnès Varda	Won
Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards	Best Actress	Sandrine Bonnaire	Won
	Best Foreign Film	Agnès Varda	Won
Sant Jordi Awards	Best Foreign Actress	Sandrine Bonnaire	Won
Venice Film Festival	Golden Lion	Agnès Varda	Won
	FIPRESCI Prize	Agnès Varda	Won
	OCIC Award	Agnès Varda	Won

External links

• Vagabond at IMDb
• Vagabond at AllMovie
• Vagabond at Rotten Tomatoes
• Vagabond an essay by Sandy Flitterman-Lewis at the Criterion Collection