Paris 36

Director: Christophe Barratier
Writer: Christophe Barratier, Pierre Philippe, Julien Rappeneau
Cast: Gérard Jugnot, Clovis Cornillac, Kad Merad, Nora Arnezeder
Language: French
Theatrical Release Date: September 24, 2008
Distributor: Sony Classics
On The Web Film Website IMDB Entry

Synopsis: Spring 1936 - in a working-class district in the north of Paris, a neighborhood that probably had a name once but that everyone now simply calls the Faubourg. In this blue-collar neighborhood, the triumphant election of the Popular Front government is greeted with enthusiasm and hopes for a brighter tomorrow, yet stirs up all kinds of extremism. Among the new government's promises, the famous law on paid holidays that will allow numerous workers to see the sea for the first time. In early May, three inhabitants of the Faubourg, show-business workers and close friends, do not share other people's wild hopes, the Chansonia, the music hall that employed them, closed down four months earlier, leaving them all unemployed. Supported by the locals who live to the rhythm of Monsieur TSF's (Pierre Richard) radio, the three friends decide to take hold of their destiny: they try to force the hand of fate by occupying the Chansonia and producing the "hit" musical that will allow them to buy the place. [Synopsis courtesy of Sony Pictures]

Round-up: “Staking its success on a vibrant reproduction of 1930s Paris and a surfeit of nostalgic charm, Paris 36’‘s homage to a milieu and cinema of the past aims for let’s-put-on-a-show razzmatazz but disappointingly settles on being not much more than a pretty, pleasant diversion” writes Michael Joshua Rowin in his review for indieWIRE of French director Christophe Barratier’s follow up to 2004’s “The Chorus." The main objection critics raise has to do with what they see as the cheaply sentimental and schmaltzy tone of the movie. The Village Voice’s Melissa Anderson writes: “Assault by relentless accordion-playing, ‘Paris 36’ proves that sometimes, imitation is the highest form of flatulence. Christophe Barratier follows up his equally pandering ‘The Chorus’ (2004) with an aggressively nostalgic, tinny homage to French musicals of the 1930s and ‘40s… Though Paris 36 looks pretty (it was lensed by frequent Eastwood cinematographer Tom Stern), Barratier’s version of ‘Frenchness’ is non-site-specific, Euro playground; 90 percent of the film was shot in the Czech Republic. Like ‘Amélie’s’ scrubbed-up City of Lights, ‘Paris 36’ is an antiseptic arthouse trifle, so eager to soothe that it only numbs.” The Times’ Edward Porter would seem to agree. In his opinion, “The phrase that comes to mind is cinéma de papa, the term used by the nouvelle vague to decry the bland, old-fashioned movies against which they rebelled.” Ultimately, however, it may not matter what the critics think since the film, it seems, has potential as crowd pleaser with a built in audience of musicals fans and Francophiles. The Hollywood Reporter’s Peter Brunette though not a fan of the film himself (he calls it a “formulaic feel-good movie set unconvincingly during the political upheavals of 1930’s France”) does concede that “Those who admired French director Barratier’s previous outing, ‘The Chorus’ (most ticket-buying viewers), which also headlined veteran comic actor Gerard Jugnot, will surely admire ‘Paris 36,’ another heartwarming tale of a determined man overcoming great odds to triumph in the end, though the admiration might be a bit more tepid this time around.”