Memories of the Future: Chris Marker’s Travels and Trials
Chris Marker (1921–2012) is a revolutionary French artist whose creations incorporate various media from photographs, to text, to the imaginary space of the Internet. As a film director, he has produced countless masterpieces, and in this robust program we invite audiences to experience the vast world of his work.
Venue: Yamagata Citizens’ Hall (Small Hall)
Last year, Chris Marker passed away at 91 years of age. The news of his passing took the world by surprise, and filmmakers, academics, and critics alike were quick to memorialize his monumental achievements and contributions to cinema. Never confining himself to a single field, Chris Marker was a traveller, photographer, activist, author, and multimedia artist. He turned his camera toward cinematic greats like Tarkovsky, Medvedkin, and Japan’s own Kurosawa Akira, though he hated to be photographed and interviewed himself. Marker was an unusual existence, a composite of various elements. Upon seeing his Sunday in Peking (1956), film theorist André Bazin (1918–1958) remarked that it was “an original work, belonging at the same time to literature, cinema, and photography . . . Neither a poem, nor reportage, nor a film, but a dazzling synthesis of all the above.” Chris Marker’s body of work spans almost an entire century, and is itself a history of cinema. Starting with film and expanding into the new medium of YouTube right before his death, he produced manifold works of art. Marker’s curiosity always surpassed the current limits of technology, and only grew as new mediums continued to emerge.
At this year’s YIDFF, we will memorialize Chris Marker with a retrospective of around 45 of his works that span from the beginning to the end of his career. Many of these films have never been screened in Japan.
- Far from Vietnam 1967 / 115 min
Le joli mai 1962 / 165 min
Statues Also Die 1953 / 30 min
Sunday in Peking 1956 / 22 min
Letter from Siberia 1958 / 62 min
The Astronauts 1959 / 14 min
La jetée 1962 / 28 min
If I Had Four Camels 1966 / 49 min
E-clip-se 1999 / 8 min
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Description of a Struggle 1960 / 60 min
The Kumiko Mystery 1965 / 54 min
Be Seeing You 1967 / 45 min
The Sixth Side of the Pentagon 1968 / 28 min
The Embassy 1973 / 21 min
Report on Paris: Words Have a Meaning 1970 / 19 min
Report on Prague: The Second Trial of Artur London 1971 / 30 min
Report on Brazil: Torture 1969 / 23 min
Report on Brazil: Carlos Marighela 1970 / 40 min
Report on Chile: What Allende Said 1973 / 16 min
A.K. Narration: Hasumi Shigehiko / 1985 / 70 min
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The Train Rolls On 1971 / 32 min
The Battle of Ten Million 1970 / 58 min
A Grin Without a Cat 1977 / 240 min
Sans soleil 1982 / 100 min
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A.K. Japanese subtitled version / 70 min
One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevich 1999 / 55 min
The Last Bolshevik 1993 / 118 min
2084 1984 / 10 min
Three Video Haiku 1994 / 3 min
Level Five 1996 / 105 min
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Prime Time in the Camps 1993 / 27 min
Blue Helmet 1995 / 25 min
A Mayor in Kosovo 2000 / 27 min
Three Cheers for the Whale 1972 / 16 min
Remembrance of Things to Come 2001 / 42 min
The Case of the Grinning Cat 2004 / 59 min
La théorie des ensembles 1990 / 13 min
Matta 1985 / 14 min
From Chris to Christo 1985 / 24 min
Junkopia 1981 / 6min
Slon Tango 1990 / 4 min
Cat Listening to Music 1990 / 2 min
Tokyo Days 1986 / 24 min
Berliner Ballad 1990 / 29 min
Ceaușescu Detour 1990 / 8 min
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New Regard about Olympia 52 Julien Faraut / 2012 / 80 min
- Special Events
- Lecture: “The Cat-Headed Man” by Etienne Sandrin (Curator, Pompidou Centre)
- Reading: “Le Dépays” by Etienne Sandrin and Fukuzaki Yuko