Editing Chris Marker (section)

==Return to personal work (1974–1986)==

In 1974 Marker returned to his personal work and made a film outside of ISKRA. ''La Solitude du chanteur de fond'' is a one-hour documentary about Marker's friend [[Yves Montand]]'s benefit concert for Chilean refugees. The concert was Montand's first public performance in four years, and the documentary includes film clips from his long career as a singer and actor.<ref name="Wakeman" />

Marker had been working on a film about [[Chile]] with ISKRA since 1973. Marker had collaborated with Belgian sociologist [[Armand Mattelart]] and ISKRA members Valérie Mayoux and Jacqueline Meppiel to shoot and collect the visual materials, which Marker then edited together and provided the commentary for. The resulting film was the two and a half-hour documentary ''La Spirale'', released in 1975. The film chronicles events in Chile, beginning with the [[Chilean presidential election, 1970|1970 election]] of socialist President [[Salvador Allende]] until his [[Death of Salvador Allende|murder]] and [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|the resulting coup]] in 1973.<ref name="Wakeman" />

Marker then began work on one of his most ambitious films, ''[[A Grin Without a Cat]]'', released in 1977. The film's title refers to the [[Cheshire Cat]] from ''[[Alice in Wonderland]]''. The metaphor compares the promise of the global socialist movement before [[May 1968 in France|May 1968]] (the grin) with its actual presence in the world after May 1968 (the cat). The film's original French title is ''Le fond de l'air est rouge'', which means "the air is essentially red", or "revolution is in the air", implying that the socialist movement was everywhere around the world.<ref name="Sterritt">{{Cite journal|last=Sterritt|first=David|author-link=David Sterritt|year=2009|url=http://www.cineaste.com/articles/ema-grin-without-a-catem|title=A Grin Without a Cat|journal=[[Cineaste (magazine)|Cineaste]]|publisher=Cineaste Publishers|volume=34|issue=4|access-date=31 July 2011|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110928220805/http://www.cineaste.com/articles/ema-grin-without-a-catem|archive-date=28 September 2011}}</ref>

The film was intended to be an all-encompassing portrait of political movements since May 1968, a summation of the work which he had taken part in for ten years. The film is divided into two parts: the first half focuses on the hopes and idealism before May 1968, and the second half on the disillusion and disappointments since those events. Marker begins the film with the [[The Battleship Potemkin#The Odessa Steps sequence|Odessa Steps sequence]] from [[Sergei Eisenstein]]'s film ''[[The Battleship Potemkin]]'', which Marker points out is a fictitious creation of Eisenstein which has still influenced the image of the historical event. Marker used very little commentary in this film, but the film's montage structure and preoccupation with memory make it a Marker film. Upon release, the film was criticized for not addressing many current issues of the New Left such as the woman's movement, sexual liberation and worker self-management.<ref name="Wakeman" /> The film was re-released in the US in 2002.<ref name="Sterritt" />

In the late 1970s, Marker traveled extensively throughout the world, including an extended period in Japan. From this inspiration, he first published the [[photo-essay]] ''Le Dépays'' in 1982, and then used the experience for his next film ''[[Sans Soleil]]'', released in 1982.<ref name="Wakeman" />

''[[Sans Soleil]]'' stretches the limits of what could be called a documentary. It is an essay, a [[Film editing|montage]], mixing pieces of documentary with fiction and philosophical comments, creating an atmosphere of [[dream]] and science fiction. The main themes are Japan, Africa, [[memory]] and travel. A sequence in the middle of the film takes place in San Francisco, and heavily references [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s ''[[Vertigo (film)|Vertigo]]''. Marker has said that ''Vertigo'' is the only film "capable of portraying impossible memory, insane memory."<ref name="Wakeman" /> The film's commentary are credited to the fictitious cameraman Sandor Krasna, and read in the form of letters by an unnamed woman. Though centered around Japan, the film was also shot in such other countries as [[Guinea Bissau]], Ireland and [[Iceland]].<ref name="Wakeman" /> ''Sans Soleil'' was shown at the [[1983 Berlin Film Festival]] where it won the OCIC Award. It was also awarded the Sutherland Trophy at the 1983 [[British Film Institute]] Awards.

In 1984, Marker was invited by producer [[Serge Silberman]] to document the making of [[Akira Kurosawa]]'s film ''[[Ran (film)|Ran]]''. From this Marker made ''[[A.K. (film)|A.K.]]'', released in 1985. The film focuses more on Kurosawa's remote but polite personality than on the making of the film.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://onfilm.chicagoreader.com/movies/capsules/2_AK| title = Chicago Reader: Dave Kehr's Review of AK}}</ref> The film was screened in the [[Un Certain Regard]] section at the [[1985 Cannes Film Festival]],<ref name="festival-cannes.com">{{cite web |url=http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/1107/year/1985.html |title=Festival de Cannes: A.K. |access-date=28 June 2009|work=festival-cannes.com}}</ref> before ''Ran'' itself had been released.

In 1985, Marker's long-time friend and neighbor [[Simone Signoret]] died of cancer. Marker then made the one-hour TV documentary ''Mémoires pour Simone'' as a tribute to her in 1986.<ref name="Wakeman" />