In May 2000, director Agnès Varda presented Les Glaneurs et la Glaneuse (The Gleaners and I) at the Cannes Film Festival. Her documentary, screened out of competition, explored gleaning, or the act of collecting leftover wheat stalks after harvest and, by extension, salvaging food from markets for those most in need.

The filmmaker, then in her 70s, used this as a springboard for a reflection on industrial society. At the time, Le Monde summarized the film as follows: "Traveling across France from North to South, it sets out, guided by whim, to meet those figures who roam from the edges to the centers of our cities, driven by poverty, environmental awareness or a passion for recycling." Varda also appeared on camera herself, taking the opportunity to revisit her career and her vision of cinema, which she presented, fittingly, as the art of gleaning images and situations.

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