Writer's Block

The scouts

A Varda homage in Chicago sounds like the safest possible move—and yet there's something genuinely unsettling about how these directors let the city's indifference seep into every frame, refusing the consolation of the original's fatalism.

The formal rigor here is extraordinary: Bohs and Brinton understand that to genuinely engage with Varda's essay-film DNA is to rebuild it shot by shot, letting Chicago's architecture and light do the narrative work rather than substitute for it.

The decision to let real time and real geography breathe without voiceover narration—trusting the viewer to find meaning in the woman's movement through the city—is what transforms homage into something earned and entirely their own.