History...

Remember La Jetée?
Well I remember it…the week we watched it wasn’t a thrilling one in avant-garde film, however this film managed to be my favorite. As we reflected upon in it class, I found it interesting that a lot of us forgot the movie was comprised of pictures rather than continuous footage. I watched bits of it again and found the “waking up” series to be my favorite. It was extremely relatable; it seemed slow paced an lagging; words generally not used in a positive manner, but I feel they presented the action of waking up very well. Watching the film again reminded me of picture books. I used to love seeing each image after the page was narrated. The film also had that nonchalant pace that a picture book reader takes upon.
Honestly, I didn’t gain much insight as I watched the film the first time. After, looking up what it was about [The survivors of a destroyed, post-apocalyptic Paris in the aftermath of World War III live underground in the Palais de Chaillot galleries; Wikipedia] I wanted to watch again with this new perspective; but once again, I was left in a state of ambiguity. I like sci-fi films with this type of plot line, but I feel La Jetée didn’t live up to my “twilight zone” expectations. However, I’m glad the film was black and white, even though it was supposed to be depicting the future. I also appreciate the continuous and narrative nature of the film, even though its images were disconnected.

[[[Koyaanisqatsi]]]
Life was, is, and will forever be out of balance. Why else would we be here if not to try and find a balance if not the ultimate balance [42]. We all interpreted this film in different ways independent of one another yet resulting in the same general ideas. There is always something wrong, but how are we expected to interpret what “ails” the world. Is it the existence of what is manmade, or man himself. This film is excellent because it leaves so much room for interpretation. It allows us to each create our own understanding of the world today, and furthermore determine what we believe the history of the relationship between man and earth consists of. Some of us were positive, and others negative, but the interesting thing was we were all right in our justifications. This film was full of contradictions because of the various juxtapositions featured throughout it. It challenged the representation of the superficial versus natural, which I thought was more dominantly represented as manmade vs. nature. All in all the most significant debate, to me, was the debate on whether it was too long a film. I believe it wasn’t; sometimes it’s more important to be in the moment and appreciate what has been presented to you especially if it’s a reflection of what you would otherwise unable to visualize or grasp. Furthermore, the film was time lapsed, compressing hundreds of hours worth of film into short reels; thus the overall film was a combination of multiple reels representing the larger more complex “history of the world”. This film spoke to me; it was inspiring visually and its message was short and bittersweet.