Customer Reviews

Short 2: Dreams

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Okay; I'll admit it. I bought this DVD solely so I'd have a copy of La Jetée that doesn't degrade every time I watch it. Unfortunately, this version of La Jetée is narrated in ENGLISH. Huh?

The cadence of the original French narration is hypnotic -- and its meaning filled with subtleties that get lost in translation. It's a FRENCH thing.

One of the major perks of DVD ownership is the wondrous world of alternate audio tracks and a wide selection of subtitles. (You haven't lived until you watch Groundhog Day subtitled in French!) Evidently, Warner's thinks the babble of Chris Marker wannabe's is interesting. I certainly don't. I'd rather listen to the soundtrack of my childhood.

We all have defining moments. We all walk along one pier or another. La Jetée is an eerie, magical film whose importance in my life cannot be described.

I'll stick with my ancient, fuzzy VHS version in the original French, thank-you-very-much.

Yes, Warner's, there IS a difference.

This DVD contains one of non-mainstream cinema's most haunting (there's that word again) classics, "La Jetee". A French short done (almost) entirely in B&W stills.
The problem is that the DVD has the 1962 narration, originally done in French with English subtitles, changed to ENGLISH narration.

This is NOT snobbery, but this really hurts the mood of the picture. It's not simply that they dared translate it, but (as one poster points out below) the English narration, aside from changing some of the meaning of the phrasing, is just not as well done as the French. The original French narration was as stark and ominous as the film itself, and the new English narration lacks this, altering the effect of the film, taking it not simply out of France but out of the era in which it was filmed.

Mistake!!! Allegedly, Chris Marker gave his thumbs up on the new narration. If true, that doesn't mean that much to me (Peter Weir cut 7 minutes out of his 1975 film "Picnic at Hanging Rock" years after the fact and, in so doing, ruined it!) Besides. Marker probably thought the English narration would make the film more accessible to American audiences.....

Well (and this WILL sound snobbish), film fans who are going to appreciate "La Jetee" are not the same folks, frankly, who will demand such changes. To do so, panders to an audience that "La Jetee" is never going to have anyway.

Find a fuzzy cassette copy with the original French narration: otherwise, you haven't really seen the film.

Warner's, in reissuing this excellent disc, has added some audio commentary, but deleted some material. I imagine most people will buy this to see La Jetee, but they will miss the excellent documentary "The making of Portrait of a Lady," which was included on side 2 of the old version.

Oh well.

Warner's has also redone the menus and removed some fairly humorous interstitials.

Oh well again. Warner's are not known for their aesthetics (see the Eyes Wide Shut censored disc, for example) as much for their attention to the bottom line.

Please note: I bought this DVD solely for La Jetee and had to return it when I found out that the version on "Short 2: Dreams" is the dreadful English language version. I have read elsewhere that Chris Marker approved this version as well as the French one, and that he allegedly liked this one better. I only hope this isn't true, since I consider La Jetee in French to be one of the great masterpieces in all of film and I have no use for the English-language version. Buyer beware!

La Jetee in French is hard to find on DVD in the U.S., but worth the search.

The first film in this anthology is the classic French short La Jetee, a chilling haunting film that you won't be able to get out of your head for days. All the more remarkable because it is composed almost entirely of stills (there is a brief moving shot about 18 1/2 minutes in that is both startling and deeply moving). A masterpiece not only of French cinema, but of cinema itself. Unfortunately, things go downhill fast after this.

Cafe Bar is a brief short of two people who fail to connect in a cafe and fantasize about each other. It plays like it was written by Jules Feiffer on an off day.

Depth Solitude is visually striking, but the story is labored and obvious.

A Guy Walks Int a Bar stars Fred Savage as a naive young man headed for Hollywood who interacts with various seedy stereotypical characters in the desert. A bit too long at 27 minutes.

Bride of Resistor-- visually inventive, but the story is a yawn.

Eye Like a Strange Balloon gets my nod for second-best of this DVD. There are some incredibly surreal images, but damned if I can figure out what it's about.

Vincent: The Junkie Chronicles is a 9 minute excerpt from an interview with a junkie about the damage he's done to himself. Sad more than shocking.

There are two brief shorts on filmmaker George Hickenlooper's attempts to film an Orson Welles screenplay, which are of interest to diehard film fans only.

And finally there is the aptly named Junk Drawer, a bunch of pointless and juvenile fragments that are not worth your time.

WARNING: one item on the main menu is actually a collection of commercials!

Verdict: La Jetee and Eye Like a Strange Balloon are the only ones worth repeated viewings, a few of the others worth a look, and Junk Drawer is best avoided.

One of the loveliest love stories ever acted, crafted and filmed, "La Jetee" is a one-of-a-kind masterpiece. Everything about it is precise, effortless, surprising, moving. How a sequence of still frames can create such a sense of coherent narrative and sequentiality is simply bewildering. There is one obvious component, though: the original French narrative. Masculine and vulnerable, coherent and nuanced, it is a major part of the film's sense and aesthetic logic. Even if the claim that Marker "prefers" the English version is true, as the filmmaker he is not necessarily its best critic. The English voiceover is not terrible, but it takes away a lot from the piece - not just because the French narration suits it better (it is a very French film) but also because it is simply executed better. Dvd is a format that's supposed to offer precisely these options to viewers, and I'm disappointed that, while every commercial flick is offered in 15 different formats and languages, such a vital aspect of "La Jetee" is ignored. It is still worth your while, but waiting for the complete thing (or catching it on screen) is preferable in my view (a view that draws on having followed "La Jetee" in different formats about two dozen times, indulges in the cineroman and script, and for a brief while lived in it.)

I was really disapointed to turn this familiar flick on and not hear the original French narration. I don't mean to be a snob but, the movie is French- it should stay that way. I pretty much can't watch this version.

When i ordered this DVD, i thought it would be in english and in french. I was not disappointed because i am French (in fact I watch all movies in their original version), but i had the feeling that the sound of the narration was not good. I'll tell you when i'll get the French version on the 18th of February!(French release)
Nevertheless, i think it is a really good thing that english native speakers can discover this english version. And even if we may prefer the French version, the English one is also an original version, prefered by the director himself, Chris Marker!
Concerning the DVD, do not forget that there is not only "la jetee". It contains other shorts which are very creative and interesting! That is why i put a good mark.

If you're looking for a dvd copy of la jetee in french (with english subtitles), check out bijouxflix. I just got mine in the mail, and the copy is grainy but otherwise intact.

Short 2 - Dreams was overall a disapointment. I bought it strictly for La Jetee (Chris Marker) which, naturally, loses a great deal of eloquence in English, as it appears on the DVD. But it remains an incontrovertably wonderful film. Other than the section by/about Gary Hickenlooper, nothing on the DVD deserves a second viewing. The Hickenlooper pieces, while of interest, are not really engrossing, although I may venture into watching The Big Brass Ring at full length. The long and short of it is this: if you know and love La Jetee enough to want an English version, this is a good buy. Otherwise, don't bother.