La Jetée: Difference between revisions
added info on MIT edition, fixed cats |
|||
| Line 44: | Line 44: | ||
==Other versions== |
==Other versions== |
||
* [[Terry Gilliam]]'s [[1995]] ''[[Twelve Monkeys]]'', a mainstream adaptation of ''La Jetée'', helped introduce this '60s cult film to a broader audience, though Gilliam's version altered the plot significantly. |
* [[Terry Gilliam]]'s [[1995]] ''[[Twelve Monkeys]]'', a mainstream adaptation of ''La Jetée'', helped introduce this '60s cult film to a broader audience, though Gilliam's version altered the plot significantly. |
||
* In [[1996]], the [[MIT Press]] released a book version of ''La Jetée''.<ref>{{cite book | last = Marker | first = Chris | title = La Jetée | publisher = Zone Books | location = New York | year = 1992 | isbn = 9780942299670 }}</ref> It reproduced the film's original images along with the script in both [[English language|English]]and [[French language|French]] and is now out of print.<ref>[http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=4947 ''La Jetée'' at the MIT Press]</ref> |
* In [[1996]], the [[MIT Press]] released a book version of ''La Jetée''.<ref>{{cite book | last = Marker | first = Chris | title = La Jetée | publisher = Zone Books | location = New York | year = 1992 | isbn = 9780942299670 }}</ref> It reproduced the film's original images along with the script in both [[English language|English]] and [[French language|French]] and is now out of print.<ref>[http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=4947 ''La Jetée'' at the MIT Press]</ref> |
||
==DVD releases== |
==DVD releases== |
||
Revision as of 04:17, 5 August 2007
| La Jetée | |
|---|---|
| File:La jetee criterion box.jpg Criterion Collection dvd backed with Sans Soleil | |
| Directed by | Chris Marker |
| Written by | Chris Marker |
| Produced by | Anatole Dauman |
| Starring | Jean Negroni Etienne Becker Davis Hanich Jacques Ledoux Helene Chatelain |
| Cinematography | Chris Marker |
| Edited by | Jean Ravel |
| Music by | Trevor Duncan |
Release date | 1962 |
Running time | 28 min. |
| Country | France |
| Languages | French German |
La Jetée ("The Jetty") is a 1962 28-minute black and white science fiction film by Chris Marker.
It tells the story of a post-nuclear war experiment in time travel by using a series of filmed, i.e., optically printed, photographs playing out as a photomontage of varying pace with no dialogue and a narration consisting of a voice-over. It contains only one brief shot originating on a motion-picture camera. The stills were taken with a Pentax 24x36 and the motion-picture segment was shot with a 35mm Arriflex.[1] The film score was composed by Trevor Duncan.
Due to its brevity, it often accompanies other films; Jean-Luc Godard's Alphaville (1965) was the film with which it was first released.
In French, "jetée", which ostensibly refers to the airport terminal where the film begins and ends, is derived the feminine past participle of the verb jeter, which means "to throw". Hence, the title has another meaning, as the main character is described as being "thrown" through time. The title is also a near-homophone of "there I was" ("là j'étais").
Plot
In the movie, the survivors of a destroyed Paris in the aftermath of World War III live underground in the Palais de Chaillot galleries. They research time travel, hoping to send someone back to before the devastating war to recover food, medicine, or energy for the present, "to summon the past and future to the aid of the present". The traveler is a male prisoner, his vague but obsessive childhood memory of witnessing a woman (Hélène Chatelain) during a violent incident on the main terminal ("The Jetty") at Orly Airport is used as the key to his journey back in time. He is thrown back to the past again and again. He repeatedly meets and speaks to the woman who was present at the terminal. After his successful passages to the past, the experimenters attempt to send him into the deep future. In a brief meeting with the technologically advanced people of the future, he is given a power unit sufficient to regenerate his own destroyed society. On his return, he is cast aside by his imprisoners to die. Before he can be executed, he is contacted by the people of the future, who offer to help him escape to their time, but he asks to be returned to his childhood. He is returned and finds the violent incident he partially witnessed as a child was his own death as an adult.
Roots and references
- A scene in La Jetée (about tree rings) is an explicit reference to Alfred Hitchcock's 1958 film Vertigo (which is the adaptation of D'entre Les Morts, a 1954 French novel, by Boileau-Narcejac).
- Mamoru Oshii's Akai Megane (a.k.a. 'The Red Spectacles') is a 1987 live-action film that was inspired by La Jetée. It features a scene on the Tokyo jetty which is a tribute to La Jetée, one of the Japanese director's favourite films.
- David Bowie's Jump They Say music video contains a reference to La Jetée.
- The 2003 short film, La Puppe, is both an homage and a spoof of La Jetée.[1]
- Three Chicago-based instrumental rock groups (which all share members) have recorded songs inspired by it: Isotope 217 - "La Jetée" (1997); Tortoise - "Jetty" (1998); Chicago Underground Trio - "La Jetée" (1999).
- A famous tiny bar in Tokyo is named La Jetée and is decorated with posters of the movie.
Other versions
- Terry Gilliam's 1995 Twelve Monkeys, a mainstream adaptation of La Jetée, helped introduce this '60s cult film to a broader audience, though Gilliam's version altered the plot significantly.
- In 1996, the MIT Press released a book version of La Jetée.[2] It reproduced the film's original images along with the script in both English and French and is now out of print.[3]
DVD releases
- A digitally-restored version of La Jetée is available on video, with English subtitles, in the "La Jetée/Sans Soleil" DVD digipack released by Arte Video. This is a Region 2 PAL DVD, and will only play on American/Canadian players that are region-free.
- Recent international DVD releases, condoned by the director, replace the original French narration and English subtitles, with a new English narration (which alters the meanings of certain phrases).
- Criterion Collection released a "La Jetée/Sans Soleil" combination DVD on June 26 2007.
References
- ^ http://www.net4image.com/pedagogie/cineastes/marker.htm
- ^ Marker, Chris (1992). La Jetée. New York: Zone Books. ISBN 9780942299670.
- ^ La Jetée at the MIT Press