Jacquot

Director Agnes Varda's evocative tribute to her late director husband Jacques Demy, JACQUOT (Demy's mother's childhood nickname for him), is meant to be both a celebration and gentle examination of Demy's creative evolution from boyhood to manhood. Unfortunately, most of the essence of the grown man, as remote as someone dreamt up by von Sternberg, gets left between the lines (although the viewer gets interview snippets, done in a quick and perfunctory manner).

Because of Varda's episodic arrangement of her material, JACQUOT--at 119 minutes, a lengthy compilation--lacks a fluid nature. Varda works too hard to integrate clips from Demy's films into her own dram...