Tuesday, September 04, 2007

La Jetée:

This 1962 short film was the inspiration for terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys. Stunning!

From Wikipedia:

"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.

In French, "jetée" means pier. When air flight was first introduced, airplanes would taxi up to a concrete walkway build onto the runway that was at the level of the entryway to the plane. As planes changed over time, airports were forced to change to moveable walkways and staircases to accommodate ever increasing diversity.

The title is also a near-homophone of "there I was" ("là j'étais")."


Watch it here before it goes away.





Thank you, Linda, for telling me about this film.

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