2006 - PARIS, JE T'AMIE, aka PARIS I LOVE YOU

If you like love stories set in Paris this is the film for you. The catch is that they are only about five minutes long which brings the number of love stories featured in this film to eighteen.  It's safe to say that if you don't care for one short love story another one will come along in a bit.  This film was shot all over Paris by a number of very good directors so it's also a nice tour of the districts of Paris.  My understanding from the special feature included on the DVD is that the directors only had about two days to film their segments but were allowed creative control.

 

This film is well cast and why wouldn't it be.  No actor was stuck on location for months at a time and hey they were in Paris.  It's a mixed cast of British, American and French actors, some I recognized and some I didn't.  The directors were also a mixed bunch as well but they clearly were careful to not let the Parisian landmarks overwhelm their stories.

As far as these love stories go, generally they are pretty good.  Joel and Ethan Coen contribute a short film set in the Paris metro which is one of their typical sourpuss plots with Steve Buscemi as their star/victim.  German director Tom Tyker has a very stylized love story which involves a young Natalie Portman as an actress in love with a blind Parisian student.  Wes Craven of all people does a decent job telling the story of a young woman in the Père Lachaise Cemetery who is infatuated with the writer Oscar Wilde much to her fiancee's irritation.  You get the picture.

 

There is a vampire love story from the underrated but very talented Vincenzo Natali .  Probably the only short film I didn't enjoy was the one about mime artists but I believe it is an accepted fact that nobody can stand mimes.  Towards the end of the film Ben Gazarra and Gena Rowlands, John Cassavetes's wife and close friend have a nice bit in a restaurant where they are waited on by Gérard Depardieu. Alexander Payne summons the film up at the end with a touching story.  Actor Margo Martindale plays a middle aged woman visiting Paris for the first time as she narrates a voice over about her love for the city.

A entertaining if unconventional way to tell a series of love stories but considering the production challenges, very well done.  The producers turned this concept into a series of  films set in New York, Berlin and Rio using the same short story approach with apparently diminishing results.

This film has written by Emmanuel Benbihy with input from the various directors.  The running time is 120 minutes.