Paris 36

One of the surprises of the recent announcement of Oscar nominations was in the Best Song category--one of the nominees was "Loin de Paname," a song from a film that I suspect few had ever heard of before that moment--Paris 36. I took a look at it last night.

The film is lovely to look at, but a woefully amateurish stab at recreating nostalgia for a bygone era, and rehashes many cliches of the backstage story. It's easy to see the enthusiasm on screen from the cast and creators, but the film is a dreary disaster.

As one would guess by the title, the action is in Paris in 1936 (the film starts on new year's eve, 1935). The film's French title is Faubourg 36, with that word referring to an unnamed district, which I guess means something to the French but not to anyone else. Anyway, we are introduced to the workers at an old theater that puts on revues, featuring comedians, singers, etc. The stage manager is Pigoil (Gerard Jugnot), a dumpling of a man, who is married to the announcer and has a son who likes to play the accordion. We also meet the spotlight guy, who is a Marxist, and a very bad impressionist, who thinks he's talented. But in the course of the evening Jugnot will discover his wife has been sleeping around, and the local gangster will call in a loan on the theater's owner, and take over ownership. Everyone is put out of work.

The plucky theater workers attempt to put on a new show, and end up hiring a young singer (Nora Arnezeder), who is also under the wing of the gangster. But she falls for the Marxist. Complications ensue--will the theater become successful? All of this is told in flashback by Jugnot to a policeman--he's been arrested for murder.

The good things about Paris 36 are the photography by Tom Stern (a regular of Clint Eastwood's) who recreates the lighting of the time period quite beautifully, and the look of the theater in general. But beyond that, this film is full of wince-inducing moments. The script feels like the senior project of a student. But perhaps the biggest problem is that none of these performers are particularly talented in their stage show. Arnezeder, we are led to believe, wows people so much that she's wooed away by a big producer. Now, she can sing fine, but not well enough to convince us that she'd be a big star. The musical revue that puts the theater into the black is an homage to old Busby Berkeley musicals, but again, it's hard to believe audiences would flock to it in droves.

And what about the song? There are several in the film, and none of them stood out. They are reminiscent of the songs of Edith Piaf, but without her magic stamp on them. I suspect it will not win on Sunday night.