Ahh, the sound of Notre Dame, the coffee.... it's Paris. I like this list of 10 films I probably should have seen beforehand to capture the essence of the city....
1. "Ratatouille": Last year's
animated hit about a rat named Remy who has a talent for cooking; directed by
Brad Bird of "The Incredibles." The Paris backdrop is almost as good
as the real thing, all air brushed and rose colored.
2. "An American in Paris": The 1951
classic starring Gene Kelly as a struggling American artist and Leslie Caron as
a pretty youngparisienne; their "American in Paris Ballet," set to
the music of George Gershwin, makes you want to go to Paris and fall in love,
even if the scenery is right off the back lot.
3. "Love in the Afternoon": Director
Billy Wilder's 1957 bittersweet romantic comedy about an American playboy (Gary
Cooper) and the mischievous Paris gamin (Audrey Hepburn) who attempts to entrap
him; lots of the action takes place at the Ritz, with views of the Place Vendôme
out the window.
4. "Le Divorce": A 2003 movie based on a sly comedy of manners, by novelist Diane Johnson, about the fundamental incompatibility of a French family and an American family; scenes of contemporary Paris, plus French actor Thierry Lhermitte as sexy Uncle Edgar.
5. "Funny Face": Released the same
year as "Love in the Afternoon," with Hepburn again, this time
opposite Fred Astaire, dancing their way through 1950s Paris from beatnik cafes
in Montmartre to the couture ateliers on the Rue du Faubourg St.-Honoré.
6. "Gigi": From a 1944 novel by Colette
and 1951 musical comedy, this 1958 Leslie Caron vehicle won nine Oscars, with
songs by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe; set in a glorious Belle Époque Paris,
with costumes right out of Georges Seurat's "A Sunday Afternoon on the
Island of La Grande Jatte."
7. "Breathless": The landmark 1960
French New Wave film with a too-cool-to-be-real Jean-Paul Belmondo and
heartbreakingly young Jean Seberg running from the cops on the mean streets of
Paris.
8. "The Day of the Jackal": 1973
thriller based on a Frederick Forsyth novel about a hired assassin gunning for
French President Charles de Gaulle.
9. "Is Paris Burning?": A 1966
psuedo-documentary-style re-creation of the liberation of Paris during World
War II with a platoon of stars, including Belmondo, Kirk Douglas, Orson Welles
and Simone Signoret.
10. "Amélie": From 2001, an
eccentric romantic comedy about a shy young waitress looking for love, chiefly
in Montmartre; a popular debut for Audrey Tautou, who went on to star with Tom
Hanks and Paris in 2006's "The Da Vinci Code."
