The prospect of death puts everything into perspective, but Cléo from 5 to 7 crafted a totally new one altogether. As it says in the title, the titular singer wanders the French capital in real time, with an ominous tarot card reading turning Cléo’s world into black and white, shifting the mood even as she tries to ease the worry by going through her regular day-to-day. But as she does so, filmmaker Agnès Varda crafts memorable images that subtly depict Cléo’s inner world. The camera pivots, swaps angles, changes point of view, and only moves into the conventional images and score when Cléo performs, whether that be in literally practice of her craft, or in the presence of other people depending on the role she plays in their life. It’s this thoughtful use of the camera, gaze, and of time itself that makes Cléo from 5 to 7 a standout drama from the French New Wave.

There are a lot of novel techniques that still stand out even today, and each time I watch the film, there’s always something different that stands out. We can talk about the mirrors, the fourth wall breaks that pop up ever so often, the angles, and the camera itself. For today, what caught my attention is the difference in how Varda depicts men and women reacting to Cléo. Most men, and her fans, male or female, aren’t shy to tell her what they feel about her beauty, but the women who actually know Cléo, like her assistant Angèle and her old friend Dorothée, have personal internal monologues for the audience to know how they feel about her before seeing how they actually interact. The film isn’t just depicting the male gaze before the term was even invented, it’s probably one of the closest visual precursors to the concept of female gaze.