Flash-back

(Flash back / Retour en arriere)

This is a narrative device allowing for a return to the past. This can be in a subjective way when it is remembered by a character, as in Rashomon (1950) by Akira Kurosawa, or in an objective way when it fits the needs of the story, as in The Killers (1946) by Robert Siodmak. Some stories start with a striking sequence that is soon shown to be the end result of a process, so after the initial episode the flash back occurs in order to explain the causes. In effect, in this case the whole story is a flashback. This can be seen in Sunset Boulevard (1950) by Billy Wilder, where the murdered screenwriter appears floating in the swimming pool of a Hollywood mansion and his voiceover begins to tell us how it all happened, and in Saving Private Ryan (1998), where a World War II veteran in a cemetery remembers an incident that begins with the Normandy landings.

One of the first audio-visual flash-backs is in the film History of a Crime (Histoire d'un crime, 1901) by Ferdinand Zecca, where the murderer condemned to death remembers -through images in the same frame in which the character appears- the events of his life that have led him to his situation.

Although the flash-back is a normal resource of any audio-visual story, it is normally more frequent in several types of thrillers

Although flash-back is a common device that can be used in any audio-visual story, it is more commonly found in different types of thriller, and in one of these, the whodunit, it is practically obligatory: an initial crime is investigated to find out who has committed it, various suspects give their alibis under questioning, producing a succession of flashbacks before a final flashback establishes the truth of what happened. This can be seen in most adaptations of the works of Agatha Christie such as And then there were none (1945) directed by René Clair. It can also be seen in any of the episodes of television series such as CSI, Maigret, Inspector Wallander and Sherlock.

Sunset Boulevard

Sunset Boulevard / Boulevard du Crépuscule | Billy Wilder, 1950, EE.UU.

Told in flashback from the point of view of a corpse floating in a swimming pool, the film tells the story of Joe Gillis, a second-rate author and screenwriter. Hounded by his creditors he randomly takes refuge in the mansion of Norma Desmond, a former silent film star who lives in a fantasy world accompanied only by her devoted servant Max. At this chance encounter, the actress wants Joe to correct a script that she has written and should mean her triumphant return to the Hollywood industry.

Portrait of Billy Wilder
The most important thing is to have a good script. Film makers are not alchemists. You can’t turn hen shit into chocolate

Billy Wilder

(1906-2002)

Samuel Wilder was born in Sucha, a small town in southern Poland, on 22 June 1906. At that time, Sucha was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, so Wilder's earliest memories related to the decline of the monarchy and the outbreak of the Great War. When this ended, his family moved to Vienna, the idea being that Samuel would go to university. Instead he chose to become a journalist and move to Berlin, the city where he would write his first scripts. Hitler's victory in the 1933 elections led him to cross the Atlantic to settle in Los Angeles. Despite not speaking a word of English, Wilder ends up being hired by Paramount, the production company where he would start his meteoric career as one of the best screenwriters and directors of all time. An unconditional admirer of Ernst Lubitsch (for whom he would write some of his most famous titles), his maxim was always "thou shalt not bore." Wilder always stood out for his brilliant directing of actors, his gentle irony and the quality of his scripts (most of which he wrote in collaboration with I. A. L. Diamond), in which he liked to dissect, almost always in a tone of comedy, the social conventions of the American middle class and expose its internal contradictions. His filmography includes titles such as The Lost Weekend (1945), Ace in the Hole (1951), Sabrina (1954), The Seven Year Itch (1957), Some Like It Hot (1959), The Apartment (1960) and One, Two, Three (1961). After his retirement in the early 1980s he received many tributes and honorary awards, including an Oscar from the Academy Awards in 1988 in recognition of all his masterpieces.