20240220

クリス・マルケル 『ラ・ジュテ』（1962）を、Youtubeでフランス語版、日本語版を続けて視聴。スチール写真から再構成してナレーションをかぶせた映画かとおもっていたけど、いったんフィルムで通して撮影したのをスチール処理したものらしい。

通常どおり撮影したフィルムをストップモーション処理したスチル写真のモンタージュで構成され、シンプルかつ効果的なナレーションで語られる。

この映画における演出というのはどのように分析されるんだろうか。

　主演のダヴォス・アニク（Davos Hanich, 1922-1987） はいかにもフランス人というような顎の張りをしている。本業は画家・彫刻家だそうだ。パリのエコール・デ・ボザールでフェルナン・レジェに学び、助手にもなったらしい。この映画のときには、40歳というからアーティストとしてもそれなりな時期だったのでは。パリ19区ラ・ヴィレット門近くのマルセル・ムルディ広場（Square Marcel-Mouloudji）の噴水彫刻が彼の作品。ほかにロヌ・アルプ（Rhône-Alpes）地方オト・サヴォワ（Haute-Savoie）県のまちアラシュ・ラ・フラス（Arâches-la-Frasse）のフレヌスキー場（Station de sports d´hiver de Flaine）の駐車場での金属ワイヤーを用いた彫刻が代表作としてあげられるようだ。

　クリス・マルケルとは、第二次世界大戦の頃、スイスに亡命中に出会ったとのこと。レジスタンスの生き残りだった。

Some of my favorite shots from the film La Jetée. This film really showed me how black and white Images can show a lot of intention in a film, and can at times be more powerful than color. Personally, black and white evokes more feeling for me than color. This is my first time watching a film in still images, and it was an interesting experience because you are truly experiencing each image by themselves and not getting distracted. 

When I first began watching La Jetee, I felt gaps, breaks in my understanding of what was happening in the film. I found it initially difficult to become absorbed in cinema that felt choppy and seemed to halt with every new image. However, as I began to follow the storyline, I found that my mind could fill in the gaps where the images stopped and began again. I was reminded of a brain teaser that human brains can read any words as long as the first and last letter are in order—the letters in between can be completely out of order and the brain will still make sense if it. As I came to the close of this science fiction story, I considered two questions: would I classify this as a film? And did the still images allow me to focus more on the storyline? 

In Raymond Bellour’s The Film Stilled, he quotes cinema as “the system which reproduces movement as a function of any-instant-whatever; that is, a function of equidistant instants selected so as to create an impression of continuity.” Agreeing with this definition, I consider La Jetee to also be cinema, not only photography. While the film was only told in still images, I felt movement in them. At the end of La Jetee the pace of the images grows faster, there is strong continuity between the images. The moments before and after the protagonist's death feel seamless. All these signs point to cinema. 

The movie I watched this week, La Jetee was a movie built with black and white images and some sound. There was an impressive story going on, however the movie would be incomplete with the method. I believe the dream-like atmosphere combined with the apocalyptic world works with photographs. They both gave me impatience and curiosity along with the tension. I learned that the photographs could make someone feel more tense than the videos. As a narrator described the experiment room with dark and blurry shots, I felt tense. As the narrator described love and a girl with light and closer shots, I felt the dreamy state. However, I believe that sound effects and the small movement were as important as the photography because they actually gave the massages and gave the movie it's story. In Boogie Woogie Daddy, there are more movements than La Jetee. The short movie, they are showing us movements during the trespassing between the scenes. I suppose that might be to emphasize the ‘’spinning’’ word they have been constantly talking about. However, with the shootings, the photos, the sounds and the images; as I watched both of these movies I imagined... YouTube! Especially in Boogie Woogie Daddy, I realized some motives were photographed and used. As the narrator was talking, some illustrations and other type of images were used to emphasize the emotion and the story. Even if it was a story, watching Boogie Woogie Daddy was ringing YouTube bells in my ears. When I design a video, I would animate the important parts like the logo to promote my YouTube channel. Animation is a great way to emphasize and make things memorable. Now I compared movies to YouTube, I understand the animated and moving parts better. They were made to be more memorable. About the pictures and the narrator sound, the videos on YouTube (especially the informative videos, video essays etc..). They use stock photos that are connected to the topic of the video. In the movies, they used images to resemble emotions, gestures and atmosphere. That is the reason why I found the movies similar to YouTube videos.