The_Sisko_2970750
(Copied from my review on Amazon)A hauntingly beautiful love story told (almost) entirely in black and white stills. Are we set on a predestined path, despite our best hopes and dreams, and the love we share with another, to merely traverse from point A to point B, and then be done forever? The two magical seconds in this movie where love momentarily lives and breathes in live action happen all too quick for me -- possibly a metaphor for love, and life, in general. La Jetee is fittingly all too brief, and therein lies its power. In a brief span, you will feel elation, and sudden loss, and you may just ponder your own life and loves more than you have in long time.Milton Boyd
Musashi94
At first, it doesn't seem like a non-documentary film composed entirely of still images and voice-over narration should work. Yet La Jetee not only succeeds, it overcomes its avant-garde background to become a great science fiction film that can appeal even to people who are not necessarily fans of experimental work.Chris Marker, who is in fact best known for his documentary work, has a remarkable eye for composition. All of the images that make up the are beautifully staged and composed. The lighting in particular is wonderful, the blacks and whites have a wonderful contrast with each other. The transitions also feel natural and the zooms and pans help give a sense of movement that avoids the risk of becoming monotonous. This makes you feel as though you're watching an actual moving picture as opposed to just a series of still images. The choral music throughout is also well used and gives the images a haunting atmosphere.In addition to looking fantastic and keeping the viewer's interest, the film also has many profound themes regarding time and memory. The main premise of the film is that a shadowy organization in a post-World War III world are trying to send prisoners back in time in order to save the future. In actuality, they are training them s they can send the prisoners to the future so thy can bring back advanced technology before disposing of them. Such a premise lends itself to many rich interpretations about the structure of society and the cost of human progress.The matter of the protagonist's relationship with a woman from the past also has a transcendent quality with its explorations of memory and its relationship with time and human desire. The fact that such a short film that, admittedly omits most of the details, is a sign of great film-making. The fact that there is so much to analyze about near0universal themes presented in an entertaining experimental fashion makes La Jetee a film that film buffs should seek out.
SnoopyStyle
A man in Paris survives the nuclear holocaust of WWIII. The survivors are driven to live in the underground galleries. The man is held as a prisoner and forced in a dangerous experiment in time travel. His obsessive vision of a woman is needed. He saw her as a child on the observation platform at Orly Airport before the war and there was a shocking incident which he is uncertain about. He goes back into the past and has a relationship with the woman. He is then sent into the future where the future people agree to save his world. He returns to his world where his jailers are looking to execute him. With the future people's help, he returns to his childhood moment at the airport where the incident finally becomes clear.This is a rather poetic sci-fi short. The black & white and still images deliver something unique. With the narration, it feels like watching an immersive picture book. It's definitely not for everyone but I find it entrancing. It doesn't drag and the short running time keeps the movie close to the point.
Anthony Iessi
"La Jette" is a strange short film, that many are familiar to the fact that it inspired the Terry Gilliam film "12 Monkeys". It centers on the hypothetical aftermath of World War III. It is assumed that the world had been scorched by nuclear weaponry, as we see a young man strapped down and blindfolded by a group of ominous scientists in an underground refuge. What the man is being subjected to is a time machine that sends him back to the time, and his mission is to collect goods, and send them back to the present day in order to feed the survivors of the war. He is sent back to the near moment when his life ended, and all he remembers seeing is a strikingly beautiful young woman, standing over a pier while an unknown man falls to his death. Instead of following orders, the man stalks the female throughout the city of Paris, in order to figure out why he remembers her, and what significance she has to him before the bomb hit. What happens is quite lovely actually. You see, the man begins to talk to the young woman, and they begin a pleasant Parisian love affair. Needless to say, this makes the underground scientists none too pleased. For several times over, the scientists keep sending the man back to the beginning of the time warp in order to complete the mission, only for the man to keep pursuing the young lady every time. The two inter-dimensional lovebirds even manage to squeeze in a museum visit, where they gaze at the wonders of the animal kingdom. Hey, even in a time warp, you have to stop and smell the roses. After many attempts, the scientists play a trick and send the young man to a strange, scary future that warns him of the consequences of a malnourished society. The people where black clothing, and stare deeply into his eyes. Do you think that would scare him into doing the right thing? Of course not! He's got to get the girl. Angry about his failure, the scientists bring him back to the past, to meet the girl, only to have him assassinated by another time traveler. In the end, he suffered the exact same fate as the man he saw before the war. He was the fallen man from his own past. All this is shown in glorious frames per second… no not 24, just frames. Like a slideshow gone horribly wrong, the story progresses through images, which coincide with the fact that Marker himself is an acclaimed photographer. Does it even matter in the end? Not for me. I was deeply invested in every moment of this great short film. As a matter of fact, in the genre of Science Fiction, I don't think I've ever seen a finer film. Marker masterfully places fear in the hearts of his viewers. Whatever future we have to look forward to, it looks awfully bleak for Marker. There is nothing to look forward to, but the imminent arrival of a nuclear holocaust. As with many films in tune with "Nouvelle Vague", the politics are visibly liberal. "La Jette" is an early anti-war picture. In the wake of WWII, and the arms race happening in Europe, Marker constructed a film that allowed us to think about the social and physical implications of nuclear war. In the process, he allows an intimate look at the past, and how our main character, keeps trying to hang onto it as long as he can, for tomorrow is hopeless. The woman he seeks is in itself, a metaphor for peace and good memories. Good memories are precious, and beautiful, and visceral. When you think about good memories, you want to plant yourself back in time and relive them. We sympathize with our main character, and we feel for him when he dies in the end. I believe the moral of it all is to remember what thrived before, and try to prevent what this film tried to envision for our future, which consists of nothing.
