Anyone who has never strolled along the paths and graves of the Père-Lachaise cemetery while dreaming of Gothic novels and masochistically listening to “Tous les garçons et les filles” until discovering a drawing of a particularly intriguing couple can cast the first stone.
There are filmmakers who, due to their continuous practice, figure on the cinema scene as metronomes. Friedl vom Gröller is one such figure. Every year she produces between two and six films on film, almost always in black and white, using only a single 16mm reel, so the films usually last no more than three minutes. Each new film marks a change of season or the start of a new year. They are fleeting, lyrical records of everyday life: portraits of friends (or for friends), records of trips or meetings, ironic or parabolic comments on current affairs. Jelena is based on a song, sung a capella by Jelena Arrouas, ‘Tous les garçons et les filles’. Vom Gröller punctuates the film with bare images that are beyond mere illustration: a hand at the window, a stony staircase, an empty boulevard, two faces in a tomb, piercing eyes, a panning shot facing the winter sun. A harbinger of death bursts from the song’s romantic melancholy. (Ricardo Vieira Lisboa)
