time loops
I watched La jetée recently and was captivated. Oddly enough, the experience closed a time loop that I’d been caught in since some time in the late nineties.
We used to visit a comic store down an old arcade in the suburbs, myself and mike, and maybe some others on occasion. I had little interest in comics, more of a fascination in Mike as some kind of brooding teenager par excellance.
Phil, who ran the store, would talk for ages to us. He was, apparently, a University science drop out. It seems peculiar that he would want to spend so much time with people of our age, not peculiar in that sense. Just odd.
He insisted that we watch this magnificent film, told in photos, about time travel, upon which the Terry Gilliam film Twelve Monkeys was based. This is La jetée.
La jetée depicts a man sent to the past in order to save the future. The realness of his world is never firmly established, he could be mad. In any case his obsession with the past, and of a woman in it, eventually has him killed.
So, I’ve been returning to this moment, in which I am advised to see this film, in which my interest is aroused over and over for probably a decade, and I’ve come close to watching the film many, many times, and have returned to this moment over and over, but have been stopped by some sort of deep-seated reluctance and dread, like Freud, who for years could not bring himself to visit Rome, a city that held such fascination to him.
Anyway, the loop has been closed, along with its more recent sub-loop, in which my brother also advises me to watch this eery and sad piece.
As for the myriad others, I live in them still.
Category: chatter | Tags: film, freud, nostalgia 4 comments »
September 11th, 2008 at 21:22
Hey Ben,
Nice blog. I just finished the Road. If you liked grapes of wrath then The Road is worth the few hours it will take to read it.
The jetee sounds good. I just got 12 monkeys but I haven’t watched it yet.
Which one do you think I should watch first?
cheers
d
September 12th, 2008 at 13:06
I’ll have to pick up a copy of The Road. I love dreaming of the apocalypse. It’s one of my favourite neuroses.
It doesn’t matter terribly much whether you see La Jetee or 12 Monkeys first. 12 Monkeys is not a remake of La Jetee, nor is it simply ‘inspired by…’, but somewhere in the middle.
If I had to choose, I’d go with La Jetee. Watching how Gilliam has interpreted the story will add an extra dimension of viewing pleasure.
September 28th, 2008 at 16:36
What did you two think of The Road? I thought it was good but ultimately over-rated: no more than a very competent retelling of a cliched idea (love and survival post-apocalypse).
September 28th, 2008 at 21:32
Haven’t read it yet, although your appraisal of it ‘competent retelling’ makes me very, very reluctant….