CHRIS MARKER a Stylistic Analysis of His Film and Media Work Lynne Broad
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
CHRIS MARKER A Stylistic Analysis of his Film and Media Work Lynne Broad Degree of Master of Arts by Research School of English, Media and Performing Arts University of New South Wales December 2008 Originality Statement ‘I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, or substantial proportions of material which have been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at UNSW or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at UNSW or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project’s design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged.’ …………………………………… …………………………………… i Copyright Statement ‘I hereby grant the University of New South Wales or its agents the right to archive and to make available my thesis or dissertation in whole or part in the University libraries in all forms of media, now or here after known, subject to the provisions of the Copyright Act 1968. I retain all proprietary rights, such as patent rights. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis or dissertation. I also authorise University Microfilms to use the 350 word abstract of my thesis in Dissertation Abstract International (this is applicable to doctoral theses only). I have either used no substantial portions of copyright material in my thesis or I have obtained permission to use copyright material; where permission has not been granted I have applied/will apply for a partial restriction of the digital copy of my thesis or dissertation.’ …………………………………… …………………………………… ii Authenticity Statement ‘I certify that the Library deposit digital copy is a direct equivalent of the final officially approved version of my thesis. No emendation of content has occurred and if there are any minor variations in formatting they are the result of the conversion to digital format.’ …………………………………… …………………………………… iii ABSTRACT This thesis explores the poetics of editing in the films and multimedia works of Chris Marker. From his first essay films of the 1950s to his 1998 CD-ROM Immemory, the director’s work has attracted critical attention for its beauty and originality of expression. Much existing analysis engages with this work in terms of its subject matter and themes and their relationship with its associational, rather than linear, narrative form, with relatively little focus on the stylistics of Marker’s editing. While questions of the director’s thematic concerns also arise in my study, I argue that Marker’s contribution to cinema and the visual arts cannot be fully appreciated without a systematic understanding of his stylistics—his expressive use of cinematic forms and patterns. In developing such an understanding, this thesis utilises the work of a number of film writers explicitly concerned with the expressive use of cinematic space and time. From André Bazin, I take the idea of rapprochement to mean the way the comparison between two juxtaposed events or images suggests or expresses the meaning of their juxtaposition. From Jean-André Fieschi, I draw on the idea that the dialectical interaction of the plastic, formal and narrative elements of a film gives meaning to its cinematic space and time. My approach synthesises and builds upon both ideas for its account of the stylistics of Marker’s work. Starting with a preliminary analysis of one cinematic comparison in The Case of the Grinning Cat (2004), I then consider Marker’s exploration of the imaginative potential of a single image sequence in The Last Bolshevik (1993). After this, I explore examples of the stylistic figure of rapprochement in Letter from Siberia (1958), and the stylistic figure of transformation in Sunless (1982). The thesis then studies articulations of rapprochement iv and transformation in the museum installations Zapping Zone: Proposals for an Imaginary Television (1991), Silent Movie (1995) and the CD-ROM Immemory. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In considering the importance of others to the completion of this work, I first want to thank my sister, Susan Cornwell, for initiating me into the intriguing world of documentary films. It was my involvement in this world that led to my fascination with film stylistics, particularly with regard to essay films. I also thank my husband, Robert Broad, for sharing my life, cheerfully, while I wrote this thesis. Finally, I thank my thesis supervisor, George Kouvaros, for his conscientious mentoring and advocacy of clear thought and expression, which helped me attain long- sought insights into film stylistics. vi For my mother, Rosemary Le Breton vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iv INTRODUCTION Creating a World both Familiar and Strange 1 CHAPTER 1 Path to the Stylistics of an Imaginary Space-time 16 CHAPTER 2 Mapping the Imaginary Land in Space and Time 37 CHAPTER 3 Sunless as Sea change 64 CHAPTER 4 Locating the Past in the Present 93 FILMOGRAPHY 112 BIBLIOGRAPHY 114 viii INTRODUCTION Creating a World both Familiar and Strange This thesis is about the poetics of editing in the film and media work of a remarkable French filmmaker and visual artist known as Chris Marker. Born Christian-François Bouche-Villeneuve in Neuilly-sur-Seine in 1921, Marker has used several pseudonyms throughout his long career—including the most widely known, Chris Marker. For Ross Gibson, ‘marker’ is the French infinitive form of an English verb ‘poised to become active’ which also connotes survey and cultural reference.1 The director is much-admired in the English-speaking world for just two films made twenty years apart—the black-and-white science-fiction film La Jetée (1962) and the poetic essay film Sans Soleil (Sunless, 1982). However, his extensive oeuvre spans several media: from print and radio in the 1940s through documentary film essays of ever-increasing complexity to museum installations and the CD-ROM Immemory (1998).2 The appeal of Marker’s work lies not only in the beauty of its images, its engaging alliance of poetry and humour, the importance of its topics, but also the sheer intelligence with which he creates his worlds ‘both absolutely 1 Ross Gibson, ‘What do I know? Chris Marker and the Essayist Mode of Cinema,’ Filmviews, 134, Summer 1988, 28. Paper presented to forum on The Line between Documentary and Fiction, Australian Film Television and Radio School, 1987. 2 The titles of Marker’s work are given initially in the original French and subsequently in the English translation. The exceptions are those films released in English with their French titles and commonly referred to by same, such as La Jetée. 1 familiar and completely strange.’3 In speaking of this intelligence (both logical and imaginative) I mean not only the intelligence driving his selection of words and images but also the intelligence behind the unexpected and intriguing ways he joins both sounds and images with those following. In other words, the fascination of a Marker work lies in the ingenuity of his editing, whose secrets this thesis attempts to unravel. Baghdad to Paris: Metaphor, or Comparison in Space and Time? The ingenuity of Marker’s editing is clearly illustrated by his treatment of one sequence in his recent documentary Chats Perchés (The Case of the Grinning Cat, 2004). A preliminary analysis of this sequence is given here as the first step in developing an understanding of the poetics of Marker’s editing. The film follows the reactions of Parisians to French and international politics after the Al-Qaeda attack on New York’s twin towers. One strand of the film documents the filmmaker’s search for graffiti images of a grinning yellow cat. This graffiti first appeared on Parisian rooftops late in 2001 when many nations were united in sympathy with the Americans. The voice-over declares that there’s no one to blame for the fact that this unity didn’t last—‘certainly not the cats.’ The search for graffiti of the cheerful cats moves from the rooftops to the streets. The film frames the cats as helpful beings whose tasks include comforting those who are lost. When the cat image is washed off the wall outside the church at St-Germain-des-Près, the narrator likens this to the Taliban’s destruction of the giant Buddhas at Bamian in Afghanistan. The search for cat images moves to the Metro. One scene shows people using a moving footway beneath a large advertisement featuring a young cat. Elsewhere, children play, buskers perform the 3 Chris Marker, Giraudoux by Himself (Giraudoux par lui-même), Paris, 1952, 43. Marker’s claim that Giraudoux believes the cinematic image creates a miraculous world ‘in which everything is both absolutely familiar and 2 largo from a Bach concerto to appreciative commuters and we meet a real cat named Bolero. These early Metro sequences show Parisian life at its most peaceful, in contrast to the scenes of strikes, election campaigns and political demonstrations taking place in the streets. But when the United States begins its invasion of Iraq, Marker’s treatment of the next Metro sequence brings the political developments above ground down into the peaceful heart of the city. This sequence is introduced about halfway through the film, through President Bush’s television announcement of the start of the Iraq war. This is followed by a shot looking up at people descending a stairway into a dark interior. The sound of trains nearby indicates that we are in the Metro—although the nature of the image suggests a bomb shelter.