Movie Review: Vagabond (1985)

“In all women there is something in revolt which is not expressed,” Agnes Varda once said of her protagonist in Vagabond. Arguably one of Varda’s greatest films, Vagabond documents the journey of a young vagrant, Mona Bergeron (played by the remarkable Sandrine Bonnaire), through Southern France during its chilly winter. The opening scene of the movie shows Mona lying at the bottom of a cold ditch, dead, and covered in dirt. What follows is the reconstruction of this film through flashbacks and side commentaries told by those who encountered Mona in an attempt to re-trace her final days – a poetic soliloquy for an unknown woman. Despite her unfortunate fate, Varda depicts Mona as anything but a victim. Her character is dirty, rebellious, unpredictable and does not get along too well with others. She defies every normative social rule: her feral nature and vagrant smell is enough to leave everyone she meets feeling a little uneasy. Mona’s story deviates from popular storylines, she is not an object or place to be conquered, she is not someone who is to be won over by a charming hero, but rather she is the complete and bodily manifestation of freedom- that is, a person who has chosen her independence from a civilly accepted identity to lead a life on her own terms.

She travels through the countryside with nothing but a tent in her shoulder sack marked with the letter M, without any identification or documentation, with no definitive living status, and working at hand-in-cash jobs to afford food, weed and wine. Her journey, is a dangerous one, for a woman on the road is vulnerable to sexual predators. Being a vagabond, the discrepancies in the concept of loitering can be applied to Mona’s situation as well. The fact that the right to loiter is given only to men and women still do not share equal access to public spaces is a reason as to why a woman wandering in the street ultimately risks becoming sexual prey. Often women loitering around the city without a particular reason are noticed and are labeled to be of bad character or even prostitutes. People fail to understand Mona’s bold and fearless character. They begin to wonder if she is on the road as she does not have a home or a man to go home to. While she chose a nomadic life on the roads of Southern France for her own happiness, most people disapprove of her lifestyle as pleasure or fun is seen as threatening because it fundamentally questions the idea that women’s presence in public space is acceptable only when they have a purpose. Using the characters’ monologues describing Mona’s defiant independence, Varda has created something she herself describes as ''a mirror game or puzzle in which others bring their pieces…we learn more about the people who react to her than about Mona.” In this way, Varda makes a beautiful attempt to portray the French society from their attitudes towards a young drifter as opposed to characterizing the impossible Mona.

Vagabond, the curt name from the French movie title Sans toit ni loi (with neither shelter nor law), exemplifies Mona’s personality and her short-lived journey. Even though Mona has some controversial experiences, like sleeping with men for food or money, or till they have access to weed, she never thinks of herself as a victim. The only time she felt like a victim when she worked as a secretary burdened by the social conventions of society. She chose her independence and exit from the workplace characterised by male patriarchy. Mona meets a Shepherd who gives her a piece of land to cultivate potatoes on and a caravan to sleep in. When she fails to wake up in the mornings, and do any kind of work other than smoking, the Shepherd disses her lifestyle and tries to dictate her actions and livelihood. As a result, Mona asserts “I did not want a boss then, and I don’t want one on the road,” and continues with her journey, leaving behind all the courtesies afforded to her. Mona rejected society then and turned down the life offered to her by the stranger on the road, to preserve her freedom so she could lead a life where she was in control. It is the tragic reality that we are part of a system that favours men. In the workplace, men in general control the means of reproduction and women’s work is reduced to insignificance through the perpetuation of a sexual division of labour. It also elucidates on how women are continually and constantly exploited by men.

The concept of gender as a social construct and institution is eminently relevant for an analysis of the movie. Judith Lorber writes that gender is an important tool essential to the process of structuring social life which calls for clear differentiation of gender statuses. She elaborates describing how every society classifies people as male and female at every stage of their lives. It constructs similarities and differences between them and assigns them to different roles and responsibilities. As a result, all characteristics, feelings, motivations and ambitions flow from these different life experiences so that the members of these different groups become different kinds of people. The entire process and its results are legitimised by society’s values and principles. Mona rarely does what is expected of females: we see her spit, blow her nose with her fingers, curse the drivers who pass her by, and insult those who pick her up—and thus come to understand attributes of femininity as elements of a constructed image. Denying social and feminine limitations, Mona becomes unclassifiable. She is far apart from the depiction of women in classical cinema: nothing about her is pretty or pleasant and there is nothing comforting for the onlooker. Since patriarchy establishes the categorisation into which she will not fit, Mona becomes a repulsive being and is inevitably ostracised by society.

On watching this film, I was left with a feeling that equally disturbed me and intrigued me, similar to how Mona left her acquaintances feeling. I grew fond of Mona’s life, defined by absolute and erotic freedom and fell in love with her character who broke all boundaries that society protects so dearly. However, the reason that this film became something that I shall cherish with all my heart was its optimism towards the reality of freedom. As a vagabond, Mona went through the horrors of being raped, not always finding food or shelter and other dangerous challenges depicted throughout this film. While society would have it that Mona’s death was as a result of her barbarian and socially rejected lifestyle, it is humbling that Mona dies under natural causes, succumbing to the cruel winter. In its courageous attempt, Vagabond refuses the impossibility of freedom while tarnishing society’s authority to prescribe one’s way of life. It is a film that we can all identify and relate with as Varda beautifully puts it “ In a way we all have a Mona. We all have inside ourselves a woman who walks alone on the road.” I vehemently believe that Vagabond is a film that must be watched by everyone and more importantly, even studied by students such as ourselves. I find it fitting to conclude with a question that made this film more than just a pleasurable viewing for me, hoping that it will do the same for you…

~ Would you offer Mona a ride?