Playa Bianca

Charles Petit is the director of this superb video clip to the musical composition “Playa Bianca” with sweet parlando vocals by French writer Michel Houellebecq.

In the words of the director:

“Michel Houellebecq released an album five years ago on the French label Tricatel. The lyrics was from his poems, the music was from Bertrand Burgalat, and I was the director of the video.”

The CD’s title is Présence humaine, and it was released on Bertrand Burgalat’s Tricatel label in 2000.

The track reminds us of “Sea, Sex and Sun[1] by Gainsbourg, but also (and the link is more oblique here) of Deleuze reciting Nietzsche on Richard Pinhas‘s Le Voyageur composition.

“Playa Bianca” means “white beach”.

Tip of the hat to De Papieren Man.

4 thoughts on “Playa Bianca

  1. alex

    this is not a “superb” video. it looks like an 80’s tv series intro wanting to look like miami vice. generic credit card ad footage. music pretty plain too.

    This made me think about “taste” and how it is so different from people to people; i consider some of your posts as fantastic discoveries of interesting things, but others just me me say “uh?” Nevertheless, thanks!

  2. Vedran

    It sounds so summer, and I’m mesmerized by his voice. But the clip does looks like an 80’s tv serie or commercial. Although it has multiple beatiful shots.

  3. mike

    my french isn’t very good, but with all of houellebecq’s books at least tangentially using the travel industry as a conduit for larger ideas, i can’t wonder if the video isn’t at least a bit ironic, or at least hyperbolic intentionally. i think it looks *too much* like an 80s tv series or early 90s travel commercial to not be aware of that.

  4. jahsonic

    Alex,

    Thanks for your comment, I’m glad you have such a mixed reaction to my posts, life would we very boring if we agreed on everything. The key to understanding this clip is, as Mike of Esotika explains, self-awareness. I am a postmodernist at heart and concepts as parody, irony, intention and self-awareness (starting with Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain perhaps?) are essential in appreciating contemporary artifacts such as this clip.

    Thanks Mike and you too for your comment Vedran.

    Jan

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