Paris, je t'aime...(21/8)

I was supposed to watch the film last Sunday night, but unexpectedly, the cinema was full and I just could not get into the scene, and so I tried again tonight with some build-up expectation on this film, named 'Paris, je t'aime'...it's an ambitious project and I believe it could be controversial and perhaps political in the sense of filming selection, stories of Paris and packaging of the short films. Being a joint-handed project involving parties like Canal+ and the Municipal of Paris, it is a collection of eighteen short stories of love taken place in 18 arrondisements in Paris (11eme and 15eme were not chosen as the venue out of the twenty arrondisements for the shooting, not sure the reason behind...). Sounds interesting, isn't it? The concept is a bit like the '10 minutes older' collected with the '10 minutes' of various famous directors (http://zirhc.com/polarff12.html & http://zirhc.com/polarff15.html). Paris, je t'aime, however, binds the short stories in the metropolitan where people accredit the place "the City of Love", romance or not, it is a city that I adore too. The quality of the short films varies quite a lot, and among the eighteen pieces, I do find quite a few nice picks. Actually, step 1 of doing these 18 works would be to choose a landmark, a building, a monument or any symbol in each arrondisement to be framed as the focus in front of the camera. As the centre of the stories, these selected landmarks are being adopted as the nomenclature of each short episode:

Montmartre (18eme), written & directed by Bruno Podalydès
Quais de Seine (5eme), written & directed by Gurinder Chadha
Le Marais (4eme), written & directed by Gus Van Sant
Tuileries (1er), written & directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
Loin du 16eme (16eme), written & directed by Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas
Porte de Choisy (13eme), written & directed by Christopher Doyle
Bastille (12eme), written & directed by Isabel Coixet
Place des Victoires (2eme), written & directed by Nobuhiro Suwa
Tour Eiffel (7eme), written & directed by Sylvain Chomet
Parc Monceau (17eme), written & directed by Alfonso Cuaron
Quartier des Enfants Rouges (3eme), written & directed by Olivier Assayas
Place des Fêtes (19eme), written & directed by Oliver Schmitz
Pigalle (11eme), written & directed by Richard LaGravenese
Quartier de la Madeleine (8eme), written & directed by Vincenzo Natali
Père-Lachaise (20eme), written & directed by Wes Craven
Faubourg Saint-Denis (10eme), written & directed by Tom Tykwer
Quartier Latin (6eme), written by Gena Rowlands, directed by Gérard Depardieu & Frédéric Auburtin
14e arrondissement, written & directed by Alexander Payne

True, Paris is a kaleidoscope of multiplicity of people and it constitutes the sophisticated society. Including a few foreign directors, the works did not necessarily make under a paparazzi lens on a tourist-based image of various parts of Paris. On the other hand, each of the eighteen arrondisement became the platform for the directors to demonstrate their love to Paris as well as their impression about how the city embeds a perfect warmhouse for different love stories. Deviated with a wide range of filming angle and attempt of interpretation, the short stories did not resemble too much to each other, except a panoramic view of the streets and the neighborhood districts inside Paris. As anticipated, the multi-racial nature of composition of the Paris population was one of the elements I notice in the series, and there were stories about working life of the migrated people, social problem of youth and drugs, love between the French and the Muslim, and a fantasy perception of a 'shangri-la' like Chinese community (which is a bit too humiliating to me being a Chinese) etc. Being an expatriate who have stayed in the city for some while, I regard all these attempts of imitation for a collective image of the Parisian sometimes over-packaged. Either is the topic somewhat difficult to film under the background of the projects, or actually the directors lack some guts and stylish finishing about the issue they would like to do. Loin du 16e should be a better one among the various stories, at least it appears to me less fake and exaggerated.
Some interesting choices were made for directors like Gus Van Sant as well as Joel and Ethan Coen. The last shot on the running Gaspard Ulliel under the work of Gus Van Sant was chic. The Coen brothers branded their humourous sense in their insight at the Tuileries metro station. A funny story about a Mona Lisa fans who visited Paris with his travel book. I call this stylish and filming charisma. An equally magnificent work would be another visitor story produced by Alexander Payne. Exceptionally brilliant, and narrated with the laughing accent of 'lesson 1' French by Margo Martindale, the story turned out to be a touching moment under sunset with the recognition of life from a forty-something woman - the best one in the 18 episodes.
Another two good works I like in the project are Faubourg Saint-Denis by Tom Tykwer as well as Quartier Latin by Gérard Depardieu & Frédéric Auburtin. The former is a beautiful realisation of love relationship between an actress and a blind man. Natalie Portman is always a lovely actress, and the use of fast forwarding framing at the same spot and the repetitive narrative dialogue in the film produce a perfect effect to a true love situation. The way Thomas 'saw' Francine at the end of the film is virtually belle. The story from Gérard Depardieu & Frédéric Auburtin talks about a divorcing couple, and the film is arranged in a very appropriate and thin manner with humour inside a coffee shop at the area. The intellectual communication and the deep contemplation about how a relationship ends are cool.
Of course, the vampire story at the arrondisement of my working place, the clown's drive under Tour Eiffel and the meeting with Oliver Twist at Père-Lachaise are other imaginative stories about Paris.
Oui, Paris is just simply a stage too rich in history for all the different stories of dream-pursuing to take place.