Lonely Wanderer
Ruth Hottel states, “Varda consciously moves marginalized figures to center stage in her films and affords them a central role normally denied them in the dominant system.� This is clearly the case in her film, Vagabond. As Varda states, “a well-written film is equally well-filmed, the actors are well-chosen, as are the locations. The cutting, the movement, the points of view, the rhythm of the shooting and of the editing have been felt and thought out like the writer’s choices� (Hottel 676). In Vagabond, Varda disrupts the male gaze with every movement of the camera and most importantly, the actress she choices for the main role, Mona. Mona is a solo woman on the road with only her body. Her rawness is capture throughout the film, capturing the raw reality of life as a female wanderer in Europe. The way Varda shoots the entire film is as if we are looking at Mona through the eyes of Varda, a powerful female which greatly disrupts and challenges the male gaze. Through the lens of a female, the viewer is able to see Mona’s brutal reality of life. As one of the docu-testimonies stated, “That’s not wandering, its withering.� Yet, Mona seems very content with her life and is educated. At every moment that Mona is invited to a world of stability, she rebels as if she is afraid of disappointing someone or incapable to pursue her goals. At the goat farm, she is offered a life of stability and shelter; yet, she rebels and refuses to feel trapped or controlled by a boss or a partnership. Thus, she roams aimlessly throughout the cold winter, alone, only with interacting with others for her own personal pleasure of alcohol or drugs. She finds these vices in order to numb herself of the true loneliness she feels. Her loneliness and desire for interaction with people is revealed when she states to the college professor that she wants to be a babysitter and while at her stay at the goat farm, she repeatedly tries to connect with the farmer’s baby boy. All such events truly disrupt and destroy the male gaze in this movie. The viewers see her as something real and not as a sex object through her independent personality and her clothing, never revealing and only used as a means of survival during the tough winter months in France. The lens of the camera is through the eyes of a woman and shots are never pursued to expose or objectify Mona’s body. We see her body in one shot because she is one complete human, not parts of the female body meant to be objectified through close ups. In the end, Mona life purpose of a free life, with no restrictions leads her to her death in a ditch, forgotten from society and washed away as easy as the wine that covered her face.