I feel very at home in the Paris of the early and mid sixties. Certainly more than today’s Paris. My younger years, thanks to Truffaut, Malle, Godard, Resnais and others, are oddly associated with French social movements (and architecture!) that happened ten years before I was born. What can I say? Marker shoots a month in the life of the city — his camera examines the city and its people like the Pathfinder examined Mars. Fitting snugly on the shelf with “Diary of a Summer” and “I Am Curious (Yellow)/(Blue)” and Marker’s own later, brilliant “Sans Soliel” (and, to a certain extent, “Koyaanisqatsi” and Linklater’s “Waking Life”) this is great, free floating, random stuff that exudes a spirit. This isn’t Marker’s best, but compared to other documentarians it is a remarkable cut above.
Welcome
Jordan Hoffman is a New York-based writer and film critic working for The Guardian, Vanity Fair, Thrillist, Times of Israel, NY Daily News and elsewhere.
He is the host of ENGAGE: The Official Star Trek Podcast, a member of the New York Film Critics Circle and challenges you to a game of backgammon.