Vintage views of France, Russia

The American Cinematheque’s “Remembrance of Things to Come: New and Classic Work From Chris Marker” features recent and rarely seen works from France’s enigmatic, legendary experimental documentarian among more familiar titles.

The weekend series commences Friday at the Egyptian with the local premiere of “Remembrance of Things to Come” (2001), a dazzling montage of the images of photographer Denise Bellon, whose filmmaker daughter Yannick Bellon collaborated with Marker on this 42-minute film. The filmmakers see Denise Bellon as prophet with a profound affinity with the Surrealist movement, as well as a recorder of a world about to vanish with the advent of World War II.

Andrei Tarkovsky (1932-86) can be described as “a pure Russian” and Alexander Medvedkin (1900-89) “a pure Communist,” yet both filmmakers pursued their careers only with the greatest difficulty in the face of Soviet censorship. Tarkovsky finally had to leave his homeland six years before his death to continue making films, while Medvedkin at last acceded to government restrictions to keep working. Marker was close to both men, and his 2000 “One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevitch” and 1993’s “The Last Bolshevik” are awe-inspiring evocations of the art and personalities of the pair.

The first is a sublime mediation on the poetic, surreal universe of Tarkovsky while the second is a survey of the history of the Soviet cinema and that of the former Soviet Union itself through the long life of Medvedkin, whose commitment to revealing the realities of Soviet life through documentary and satire got him into trouble.

Marker’s two-part, three-hour “The Grin Without a Cat” (1977, 1993) draws upon archival footage, charting the ebb and flow of leftist movements in the ‘60s and ‘70s, prefigured by images of the famous slaughter on the Odessa Steps in “Potemkin,” which, significantly and ironically, never actually happened, to the fall of the former Soviet Union. Provocative but grueling.

Last stop, Japan

The Laemmle Theaters’ Around the World in Sixty Days series concludes with Hideo Tanaka’s deliciously convoluted thriller “Chaos,” in which a Tokyo chief executive (Ken Mitsuishi) invites his wife (Miki Nakatani) to lunch. While he pays the check, she steps outside -- and promptly vanishes. To say that things are not what they seem is a reckless understatement.

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Screenings

Remembrance of Things to Come: New and Classic Work From Chris Marker

Friday: “Remembrance of Things to Come,” 7 p.m., followed by “La Jetee.” “Sans Soleil,” 9:30 p.m. Saturday: “Remembrance,” 5 p.m., followed by “One Day in the Life of Andrei Arsenevich.” “The Grin Without a Cat,” 7:30 p.m. Sunday: “Remembrance,” 5 p.m., followed by “The Last Bolshevik.”

Where: Egyptian Theatre, 6712 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood

Info: (323) 466-FILM

Around the World

in Sixty Days

“Chaos”: Friday-Saturday, midnight; Saturday-Sunday,

11 a.m., at the Fairfax Cinemas, 7907 Beverly Blvd., L.A., (323) 655-4010; Sept. 13-14, 11 a.m. at the Monica 4-Plex, 1332 2nd St., Santa Monica, (310) 394-9741; Sept. 20-21, 11 a.m. at the Playhouse 7, 673 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (626) 844-6500; and Sept. 27-28, 11 a.m. at the Fallbrook, 6731 Fallbrook Ave., West Hills, (818) 340-8710.