As evidenced in The Beaches of Agnes, Varda is too venerable to be hip -- and too wholly alive to be venerated.
Free account saves your watchlist and ratings.
The Beaches of Agnès
Overview
Filmmaking icon Agnès Varda, the award-winning director regarded by many as the grandmother of the French new wave, turns the camera on herself with this unique autobiographical documentary. Composed of film excerpts and elaborate dramatic re-creations, Varda's self-portrait recounts the highs and lows of her professional career, the many friendships that affected her life and her longtime marriage to cinematic giant Jacques Demy.
Director and cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
The Beaches of Agnes is a work of delightful contradictions from a filmmaker who has always played by her own rules.
Filmmakers don't usually do documentaries about themselves, but Agnes Varda's The Beaches of Agnes is good enough to start a trend.
A puckish, moving and wonderfully eccentric tour through her life.
Varda recalls her childhood, her adulthood, her politics, and how both her films and her two children were born. She doesn't just show us, she takes us inside of it all, inside of her. It's a reverie.
More films
You Can See Everything (2026)
Documentary · R
Thirty-four days before she's sent to prison, notorious Silicon Valley founder Elizabeth Holmes invites a skeptical film crew to document her every move. What begins as an intimate portrait of an enigmatic felon becomes a mind-bending three-year journey into the abyss.
- Runtime
- 2h 54m
- Director
- Nathan Fielder, Lance Oppenheim
- Cast
- Elizabeth Holmes, Billy Evans, Amanda Seyfried
My Mom Jayne (2025)
Documentary · TV-MA
Through deeply personal interviews with her siblings and an examination of the photographs, letters, and belongings left behind, Mariska assembles a new portrait of her mother Jayne Mansfield, an extraordinary and complex woman.
- Runtime
- 1h 46m
- Director
- Mariska Hargitay
- Cast
- Jayne Mansfield, Jayne Marie Mansfield, Mickey Hargitay Jr.
Room 237 (2012)
Documentary · Not Rated
A subjective documentary that explores various theories about hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's classic film The Shining. Five very different points of view are illuminated through voice over, film clips, animation and dramatic reenactments.
- Runtime
- 1h 43m
- Director
- Rodney Ascher
- Cast
- Bill Blakemore, Geoffrey Cocks, Juli Kearns
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (2022)
Documentary · Unrated
The life of internationally renowned artist and activist Nan Goldin is told through her slideshows, intimate interviews, ground-breaking photography, and rare footage of her personal fight to hold the Sackler family accountable for the overdose crisis.
- Runtime
- 2h 2m
- Cast
- Nan Goldin, Marina Berio, Noemi Bonazzi
Snow (1963)
Documentary · N/A
Comprising train and track footage quickly shot just before a heavy winter's snowfall was melting, the multi-award-winning classic that emerged from the cutting-room compresses British Rail's dedication to blizzard-battling into a thrilling eight-minute montage cut to music. Tough-as-boots workers struggling to keep the line clear are ...
- Runtime
- 8m
- Director
- Geoffrey Jones
Rail (1967)
Documentary · N/A
"Rail" captures British Railways at a major turning-point in its history. In certain respects, this was a period of considerable upheaval and loss. There was a facing-up to the increasing need for a big modernisation drive. Full and speedy electrification, or the wider promotion of diesel-power on remaining lines, became a matter of to...
- Runtime
- 14m
- Director
- Geoffrey Jones



Comments
Talk about the film with other members