The great filmmaker Chris Marker passed away two weeks ago at the age of 91.
Five years ago, I saw his short LA JETEE for the very first time, it left an indelible mark in my soul. So much that last month when I was wandering alone at the Haneda Airport observatory deck, I couldn't help but remember this film of his.
In 2008, having moved to Tokyo for the very first time, I decided watch my DVD of his masterpiece, SANS SOLEIL (which came together with LA JETEE). The film is referred to as a "film essay", it felt like a travelogue and a documentary, yet accompanied by a voiceover that was both oblique, cryptic and poetic. It was like a novel filled with snippets of stories and philosophical musings that, strangely, reminded me of Italo Calvino's novel, INVISIBLE CITIES.
I was never aware that this such sort of cinema had existed, I was so inspired by it, so suddenly overwhelmed by the possibilities that opened before me, I instantly wanted to make a film myself similar to SANS SOLEIL, using traveling footages of my 2007 trip in India, combined with a scrapped internet ad that I did with a rather well-known blogger/ columnist (and current aspiring model) Nicole Tan aka Nicolekiss.
My own experiment became a 10-minute short film called FLEETING IMAGES. I guess the film was important to me in a sense that it helped me confirm my own style as a director, that I was probably more comfortable with an introspective, meditative style of storytelling. My subsequent works would reinforce this, I think.
Two days after Chris Marker's passing, Cathy Munroe Hotes of Nishikata Film Review actually did a review of FLEETING IMAGES.
It had been 4 years since I made this film. I decided that perhaps it would be fitting to start a new Youtube account for all of my own short films, and that I should just share with the public, this insignificant and tiny little homage of mine to Chris Marker.
So, here you go. This is the film.
Five years ago, I saw his short LA JETEE for the very first time, it left an indelible mark in my soul. So much that last month when I was wandering alone at the Haneda Airport observatory deck, I couldn't help but remember this film of his.
In 2008, having moved to Tokyo for the very first time, I decided watch my DVD of his masterpiece, SANS SOLEIL (which came together with LA JETEE). The film is referred to as a "film essay", it felt like a travelogue and a documentary, yet accompanied by a voiceover that was both oblique, cryptic and poetic. It was like a novel filled with snippets of stories and philosophical musings that, strangely, reminded me of Italo Calvino's novel, INVISIBLE CITIES.
I was never aware that this such sort of cinema had existed, I was so inspired by it, so suddenly overwhelmed by the possibilities that opened before me, I instantly wanted to make a film myself similar to SANS SOLEIL, using traveling footages of my 2007 trip in India, combined with a scrapped internet ad that I did with a rather well-known blogger/ columnist (and current aspiring model) Nicole Tan aka Nicolekiss.
My own experiment became a 10-minute short film called FLEETING IMAGES. I guess the film was important to me in a sense that it helped me confirm my own style as a director, that I was probably more comfortable with an introspective, meditative style of storytelling. My subsequent works would reinforce this, I think.
Two days after Chris Marker's passing, Cathy Munroe Hotes of Nishikata Film Review actually did a review of FLEETING IMAGES.
It had been 4 years since I made this film. I decided that perhaps it would be fitting to start a new Youtube account for all of my own short films, and that I should just share with the public, this insignificant and tiny little homage of mine to Chris Marker.
So, here you go. This is the film.
