La Jetée- Chris Marker

La Jetée is a 1962 French film by Chris Marker that consists almost solely of photographs. It is set in a post-apocalyptic world in France; the narrative revolves around a man that is sent back in time to find help for the future but the man is transfixed by a memory of a girl he saw on a jetty when he was a boy, he also vaguely remembers witnessing a death that day. As you would expect from a narrative set in a post-apocalyptic world the plot is quite dark and at time unnerving. Personally I had been dubious on how well a film of photos could tell a story such as the one in La Jetée but I was surprised to find the method worked incredibly well, the use of photographs helps to emphasise that what the audience are seeing are moments from the past as that is what we associate photographs with. The photos tend to be fairly dark and grainy, this serves not only to create the dark and unnerving atmosphere but it also helps to create a believable setting without the need for a detailed set that a film filled with moving images would require.

The key tool that truly carries the films narrative though is the voice over that runs over the images, as without the audience wouldn’t grasp the narrative. The voice over is sometimes joined by other sounds such as the beating of a heart or half heard whispers that the audience can’t really make out, this works to keep the dark and sinister tone of the film even while the narrative moves to a story of the man chasing after the woman in his memories. This aspect of the narrative adds a sad undertone to the film as the man chases after a woman that is likely long dead in his own timeline, this undertone works well with the slow lingering pace of the film and the photographs. The use of these undertones throughout the film could be seen as foreshadowing the end where the audience see the man return to the memory of when he first saw the woman but is killed before he can reach her, this brings the narrative back full circle and explains the man that the character saw die when he was a boy was actually himself from the future. This final realization brings home the crushing darkness and sadness of the film as you realise that the man’s life was always going to end in despair from the very start.

The film has a very interesting and unique narrative; its success can be seen by its influence of the film 12 monkeys that was heavily based on La Jetée. After seeing this film both I and my partner have agreed that the use of photographs is the best way to tell the story of our own film, from that you can say that La Jetée is the largest inspiration for my own experimental film. Personally it has also shown me that simple and unique ways of telling narratives, like using only still images, can be just as interesting as traditional ways.