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Cleo from 5 to 7 Movie Review

Cleo from 5 to 7 is a 1962 French New Wave film written and directed by Agnes Varda and starring Corinne Marchand. It is a very intriguing movie.

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“You seem to be waiting for something, rather than someone“

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Cleo, an arrogant pop star, is a nervous wreck as she awaits the results of a biopsy test. With almost two hours to kill before the results are revealed, she wanders around and bumps into a soldier. At first glance, this is a standard French New Wave movie in a sense that it emphasizes style over substance, and certainly the first half would indicate that the film really doesn’t have a strong plot.

However, the reason why this picture appealed to me more than the majority of its contemporaries lies in its surprisingly rich thematic resonance. The movie is imbued with a very effective existentialist narrative thread that goes well in line with the works of Albert Camus, an author who I am currently reading, so this film was a perfect fit for me in this moment.

The film explores just how eye-opening facing your own mortality must feel like as suddenly you start noticing other people around you and you wonder about their lives and their own problems. That is perfectly showcased in that beautiful final sequence with the soldier where the two characters share a meaningful, if fleeting connection.

I wish more moments were like that as the first half of the film contained too many unnecessary sequences of detour or one could even say filler. The musical sequences were particularly repetitious and prolonged, though the silent movie sequence definitely worked as it was very pleasant and charming.

Cleo gets to have surprisingly solid characterization. This is her movie of course, so others are only minor creations. The performance from Corinne Marchand is quite strong and she elevated the role significantly while the protagonist’s existential arc is very touching. She starts off as unlikable, but eventually becomes quite sympathetic.

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Cleo from 5 to 7 features fantastic black-and-white cinematography that is frequently even quite artistic in its striking imagery. The score is also lovely. The directing from Agnes Varda is one full of style and polish. I just wish that the editing and pacing were better and that the movie contained more of those truly effective and character-driven scenes that only arrived in the second half while the former resembled style over substance.