Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here. You know, there are other films besides SPIDER-MAN 3 opening this weekend. LUCKY YOU, for example, or perhaps PARIS JE T'AIME, which our own MiraJeff has a review of today. I know Quint quite likes this one, and I’m curious just because of that amazing roster of filmmakers involved:
Greetings AICN, MiraJeff here with a look at “Paris je t'aime,” a bold but ultimately meaningless under-taking from some of the world's finest filmmakers. Allow me to begin by pleading my ignorance regarding the nature of the short film format. That doesn't mean I don't like them or understand why they exist or what purpose they serve, it just means, I don't know the criteria on which to critique them. The only thing I do know is that most shorts are either unbelievably good or ridiculously bad. If you want to get a read on what I consider a great short, check this out. Regardless, if you're going to do a two-hour love letter to Paris in the form of 18 short films, you could do far worse than offerings from the Coen Brothers, Gus Van Sant, Alexander Payne, Alfonso Cuaron, Wes Craven, Tom Tykwer, Oliver Assayas, Richard LaGravanese, Christopher Doyle, Gurinder Chadha, Sylvain Chomet, Walter Salles, Gerard Depardieu and a handful of other acclaimed international filmmakers. The anthology concept was developed by producers Emmanuel Benbihy and Claudie Ossard, based on an idea from French TV director Tristan Carne. Each director was asked to tell the story of a romantic encounter in under five minutes in one of Paris' diverse neighborhoods, on a tight budget and a 2-3 day shooting schedule. "Paris je t'aime" is the uneven result. It's pretty pointless to review the film as a singular entity, since there's no cohesion and the segments share nothing in common besides setting and language, so, for the purposes of this review, I've decided to rank the 18 shorts in order of my personal preference, from best to worst. 1. Faubourg Saint-Denis by Tom Tykwer- I guess this one was shot in 2002 under the title "True." Either way, this was by far the most visually interesting of the lot. Natalie Portman stars as a girl breaking up with her blind boyfriend (Melchior Beslon) over the phone. During their conversation, the boy retraces their relationship from his point of "view." Kind of spastic but altogether interesting and dynamic. I'd love to see this in its full form. 2. Bastille by Isabel Coixet- As a man prepares to tell his wife he's leaving her for his stewardess mistress, she reveals that she's been diagnosed with cancer. The man promptly texts his mistress 'forget me' and over the next several months, falls in love with his wife again as he tends to her needs. By acting like a man in love, he falls in love all over again, and when his wife eventually dies in his arms, his heart falls into an emotional coma it never recovers from. Stirring performances from Sergio Castellitto and Miranda Richardson sold me on this one, a standout of the group that reminded me of one of the stories in "Amores Perros." 3. Quartier Latin by Frederic Auburtin and Gerard Depardieu- Gena Rowlands wrote and co-stars in this installment opposite Ben Gazzara. They play separated spouses who are amicably settling the terms of their divorce. As painful as it is to move on, and despite some hurtful words ex-changed, they can't ignore the once-in-a-lifetime connection they share. In case you've forgotten how good she can be from her appearances in low-grade fare like "The Skeleton Key," Rowlands proves she is still as powerful an actress as her Cassavetes days, and Gazzara compliments her wonderfully. I think older audiences will like this one the best. 4. Quartier de la Madeleine by Vincenzo Natali (Canada)- The most thematically and visually different, Natali's segment stars Elijah Wood as a young man who stumbles upon a female vampire’s feeding frenzy. At first he's afraid but her beauty is so alluring, he is inevitably intrigued. Cutting his wrist with a broken bottle, he offers his blood to her. The bloodlust drives her crazy and soon they are both consumed by the thirst. This was the closest to Sin City/300 in its unique dark blue aesthetic, and Wood admirably conveys fear without making so much as a whimper or a scream. I would've sworn this one was Wes Craven's if I didn't know any better. 5. Tuileries by Joel and Ethan Coen- Probably the funniest entry of the bunch. I mean, from the moment Steve Buscemi turns his head toward the camera, you can tell this one is a lighthearted confection. Buscemi is silent all the way through. He's on the Metro, reading a tourist book of phrases and such, when he reads that under no circumstance should he make eye contact with anyone. Of course he locks eyes with a couple (Julie Bataille and Axel Kiener) who are making out across the tracks. The boyfriend takes offense and starts yelling at Buscemi, 'what the fuck are you looking at.' This gets the girl mad and she storms over to Buscemi's side to make out with him and get her boyfriend jealous. The kicker is that she has a lip growth that may or may not be herpes. Not surprising, considering Paris is the city for lovers of love. Eventually the boyfriend comes over to administer a Parisian beating, which is to say, not much of a beating at all. Tony Blundetto would've whacked this punk. All in all, an entertaining five minutes. 6. Place des Victoires by Nobuhiro Suwa- Juliette Binoche plays a grieving mother who hears her young son's voice and follows it to the middle of an empty street. She keeps repeating his last words. Out of nowhere, a mystical cowboy played by Willem Dafoe appears, granting them one last moment together. In the end, God give her the strength to move on. Binoche does an excellent job of communicating a mother's grief. A melancholic parable about faith, this is probably the most haunting entry in the film, and for that reason, it stays with you. 7. Quais de Seine by Gurinder Chadha- Three obnoxious teenagers sit by the bank of the Seine and cat-call women as they pass by. A cute Muslim girl listening to their raunchy conversation (Leila Bekhti) trips in front of them and her hijab falls off. One of the boys, Francois (Cyril Descours), helps her up and is instantly smitten with her as she explains the significance of her hijab. His friends tease him, but after the girl leaves to attend mosque, he ditches his friends and follows her, eventually meeting her father. This a hopeful fable of acceptance that challenges conventions of beauty and racial stereotyping. Just as Francois and his friends are initially skeptical of someone who dresses differently, it seemed to me like the girl's father was skeptical of Francois, who could've been little more than an ignorant local, but instead wants to know more about a culture different than his own. Chadha, of Bend It Like Beckham fame, seems genuinely interested in educating the audience and her thought-provoking short actually has a beginning, middle and end. Not only does the girl teach Francois how to treat a lady, it teaches the audience that beauty is about being comfortable in your own skin. Job well done. 8. Pigalle by Richard LaGravenese- An older gentleman (Bob Hoskins) sips a drink in a bar. A love song plays on the jukebox. He raises his glass to an older woman (Fanny Ardant) sitting across the bar. She tells him that the same song was playing the first and only time she fell in love. Then he disappears to the backroom to get a private dance from a stripper. The older woman follows him to the backroom and begins offering her goods, much to the stripper's surprise. It soon becomes clear that the older couple are married and trying to rekindle their fading love. They argue on their way out of the bar but stop when a group of street musicians begin playing the one and only love song. Hopkins brings a nice sense of humor to this scene and there is a touching poignancy to the couple's story. This one might've been a bit higher up if I didn't prefer the Gazzara/Rowlands segment more. 9. Place des Fetes by Oliver Schmitz- A male Lagos immigrant lays dying in a public park. A female inexperienced medic tends to his stomach's stab wound. As the man sings her a song and begs her to go to coffee with him, she realizes that they've met before. Hmmm... running out of adjectives already... let's just call this one interesting and move on. 10. 14eme Arrondissement by Alexander Payne- Payne and co-writer Nadine Eid concoct an oddball story of a middle-aged woman (Margo Martindale) who is on her dream vacation in Paris... all alone. There's a prevalent sadness to looms over her character, a mailwoman. As she walks around the city practicing her clumsy French, we can't help but feel bad for her as she reflects on her lonely life, of which she is fully accepting. Eventually this self-reflection leads her toward an epiphany about herself and about Paris. Maybe, just maybe, the two are the perfect match for each other. The blunt, matter-of-fact delivery of the script is kind of goofy, but Martin-dale carries the segment on her broad shoulders, shining as bright as Debbie Doebereiner in Bubble. Still, I would not have chosen to end the film on this note. 11. Quartier des Enfants Rouges by Oliver Assayas- I saw Demonlover. It wasn't my favorite but it was kinda cool. Assayas has a unique style, but unfortunately this segment does nothing to showcase it. Maggie Gyllenhaal is an actress in a period drama. She buys drugs from a local dealer. They go to an ATM together and share a weird moment. Later, she calls the dealer again under the pretense that she needs more drugs (she is an actress, after all, so that part is believable), but really she just wants to see him again. However, at this point, it is just a business transaction to the dealer and an insignificant one at that, so he sends his motorbike-riding lackey to deliver the drugs, leaving Maggie feeling all empty and alone. So basically this one teaches us drugs are neither good nor bad, but drug dealers that yearn to give love are perhaps incapable of it? I have no idea. 12. Le Marais by Gus Van Sant- Hmm... this one stars Hannibal Rising himself, Gaspard Ulliel, as a guy imaginatively named Gaspard. He works for Marianne Faithfull who takes him to a printer's shop. Here, he meets a young man named Eli (Elias McConnell). Gaspard has a feeling that Eli will be someone important to him. Eli rolls his own cigarettes and doesn't know how to respond. Literally. The joke is that Eli's French sucks and he really has very little idea what Gaspard is saying. Once he realizes it could've been something important, he runs down the street to find him. Aaaand scene! Ladies and gentlemen, Gus Van Sant! Cue inappropriate applause because no one has any idea what they're clapping at. Gus has now done Elephant, Gerry, Last Days, and now this. Very little happens in any of these stories. Hopefully Van Sant will reclaim his glory days and write an actual script for the Harvey Milk film he hopes to make. Despite Ulliel's subtle performance, his beady eyes hiding behind an unkempt mop of hair, this one was just too meta for me. 13. Montmartre by Bruno Podalydes- A middling opening scene featuring a lonely man (Podalydes himself) sitting in his car, watching women as they stroll by, wondering what is wrong with him that he can't go talk to one of them. His life is as empty as his glove box. His daydreaming is interrupted when a woman (Florence Muller) faints beside his car. This segment was a bit boring but thoroughly prepared me for what I was in store for. Both leads are charming and I like the way the director frames the shots of the woman lying down in the backseat of the car, but ultimately there wasn't much there to sink my teeth into and invest myself in. 14. Loin Du 16eme by Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas- This one might be the most simple segment of the film. Catalina Sandino Moreno plays a woman who sings a very intoxicating nursery rhyme. It works and puts babies right to bed. It's catchy and her soft voice made me like it a lot. That's about all that happens here. She leaves her baby in a local nursery while she works as a nanny in a ritzy neighborhood. Maybe the point is that as babies, we're all equal, there is no class system. All infants like being sung to, and falling asleep. Nice message. Boring short film. Sorry. 15. Parc Monceau by Alfonso Cuaron- Wow. I have no idea what the hell this was about. Nick Nolte stars as Ludivine Sagnier's dad. (Now there's a stretch) They used to have a close relationship but now she caters too much to her boyfriend's demands. They walk down a sidewalk and talk, which for Nolte these days seems increasingly difficult. At the end, the daughter leaves to enjoy a night with a friend of hers, while Nolte keeps an eye on somebody's baby and blows smoke in its face. Lovely. What a great time at the movies. This sums up Paris quite nicely. People blowing smoke without a care in the world. It feels like the majority of the film, if not the whole thing, is done in one-take, a la Children of Men, but you'd never guess they were directed by the same guy. 16. Pere-Lachaise by Wes Craven- Rufus Sewell plays a guy who's perfectly comfortable not having a sense of humor. Emily Mortimer plays his fiancé. She decides to visit Oscar Wilde's grave because he made her laugh. Sewell finds nothing funny in spending a Parisian vacation in a cemetery. She doesn't want to spend the rest of her life with someone who has such a cheerless disposition. She calls off the wedding and runs away amongst the tombstones. Wilde's ghost (played by Alexander Payne) appears to Sewell urging him to run after her lest he'll die of a broken heart. He does. They kiss. The end. Wes doesn't really bring any visual flourishes to his story, which commits the cardinal sin of being boring. Damn it's hard to review short films. I mean, it'd help to know something about the characters so we can feel their pain, and later rejoice when they're reunited, but this felt like a waste of 5 minutes. Nice change of pace Wes, but I liked you better when you were directing old-school horror classics (Last House on the Left) or reinventing the new school (Scream). This and writing Hills Have Eyes 2 with your kid ain't cutting it for a master of the horror genre. 17. Porte de Choisy by Christopher Doyle- I tried to get a handle on Doyle while reading that Shyamalan book where he came across like one strange dude. This head-scratching little oddball reinforces that idea. I don't know what the hell to make of this one. It is by far the most random and scattershot. Barbet Schroeder (as in, the director) visits a Chinese hair salon run by a real ass-kicker named Madame Lee. He helps her style some women's hair-dos. This was the most surreal, abstract entry in the film. 18. Tour Eiffel by Sylvain Chomet (France)- Two mimes fall in love in jail after the obnoxious male mime gets arrested for being annoying. Is there anything worse than an annoying mime? I just didn't like this one for a variety of reasons. I didn't like how the wacky characters feet are whirring blurs of motion as they move along the streets. It just seemed too cutesy and whimsical for its own good. This marks the first time Chomet uses real actors and it kind of shows. It might look cool, bringing to mind Smashing Pumpkins' video for "Tonight, Tonight," but this is certainly no Triplets of Belleville. Allow me to rant, if you will. Why on Earth was this film made? Was it to show the differences between the 18 neighborhoods of Paris? Does anyone outside of Paris even care about those neighborhoods? Maybe I'm an unenlightened schmuck, but this film did nothing for me except reaffirm the bond I have with my wristwatch, which I stared at for most of this film's running time. To be fair, I think the second half is actually a bit better than the first, so it wasn't a completely torturous two hours, but still. What was the point of this film? There is no narrative thread to hold on to. We don't get to know any of the characters long enough to really care about them. What is the point of shorts in general? To show that you could make a great feature film with the proper time and resources? If one of these filmmakers really felt the need to tell a story about Paris, why didn't they do a feature-length? These seem like vanity projects that are "art" for art's sake. I mean, there is some truly good, interesting work on display here, but it's buried in so much lovey-dovey shit that's not worth sifting through to find the diamond in the rough. Forgive me for being so cynical, but I can't think of a single reason to recommend this theatrical experience to anyone. This should've been a straight-to-DVD effort so people could skip certain slow segments that bring nothing to the table. Why did all these talented actors and directors agree to take part in this cataclysmic undertaking that would've been better left as a series of home movies instead of a feature film to be released in theaters for people to somehow enjoy? I've gotta tip my hat to Benbihy for having the sheer balls to finance a film as tough a sell as this one, and to the filmmakers for at least trying something new and taking a risk, but like nearly every story in the film, it doesn't pay off. And isn't that why we go to the movies? For the payoff. For the money shot. For resolution. This is just a mish mash hodge podge of idealistic virtues. That'll do it for me, folks. I'll be back with a positive look at The Wendell Baker Story, a Wilson Brothers movie that's been sitting on a shelf for two years for no apparent reason. Email is welcome. 'Til next time, this is MiraJeff bidding adieu...
