Paris in 1957 ... magic time.

Rome in the early '60s - the LA DOLCE VITA era; London in the mid-'60s - it swung; New York in the '70s - tough and gritty .... the zeitgeist always moves on and comes full circle again ..... it was Paris in the 1890s, that Fin de Siecle era, and in that jazz age the 1920s with Hemingway and Fitzgerland and the 'Lost Generation', but in the late '50s Paris was also, it seems, the place to be. Hollywood studios must have been falling over each other there (like they were in Rome in 1962).

Fred and Audrey were doing FUNNY FACE .... with Donen creating a magical Paris, not least with Audrey being photographed Avedon-style, in all those locations ...

Fred and Cyd heading up SILK STOCKINGS .... I wonder how much of this was actually filmed in Gay Paree ?

Gene Kelly, often in Paris - got in the act with his dance troupe LES GIRLS - but this was actually filmed at MGM - Kay Kendall's only film actually made in Hollywood, but George Cukor and Heuningen Heune gave it the required French look, and with Orry Kelly's clothes, the girls were perfect. I simply love their French apartment, which seems to be on several levels ... 

Otto too had Jean Seberg driving around Paris in those moody black and white scenes in his seminal BONJOUR TRISTESSE - more Sagan - or dancing while - who else? - Juliette Greco intoned that theme song ...before Godard teamed her with Belmondo in some other French classic ...

1958 saw Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh in Paris in their comedy THE PERFECT FURLOUGH, an early Blake Edwards film. Later in 1961 Tony Perkins and Ingrid Bergman (right) were driving around Paris in Sagan's GOODBYE AGAIN - review at Bergman label - while Tony teamed again in Paris with Sophia for 1962's FIVE MILES TO MIDNIGHT. Hollywood was also in town for Ritt's PARIS BLUES with jazz musicians Newman and Poitier. By then the Nouvelle Vague was in full swing after Malle's LIFT TO THE SCAFFOLD in 1958, and Truffaut's 400 BLOWS, Chabrol's LES COUSINS, Mocky's LES DRAGUEURS, another Paris-by-night opus, all 1959 ...

1962 saw Truffaut's JULES ET JIM in Paris, where Agnes Varda's CLEO FROM 5 TO 7, wandered around, waiting for her medical test results ... Audrey Hepburn of course practically lived in Paris with so many of hers set there ... 1957 also saw LOVERS OF MONTPARNASSE (left) about the painter Modigliani practically starving in a garret, with those quintessential Parisians Gerard Philipe and  Anouk Aimee,

Brigitte charmed us too as UNE PARISIENNE in 1957, with Henri Vidal, who was also (his last film) in her COME DANCE WITH ME (VOULEZ VOUS DANSER AVEC MOI?) in 1959 ...  more on all these at French label.

Next location: Australia and the Outback !!!

A glamorous weekend at the movies

Both PLEIN SOLEIL and BONJOUR TRISTESSE have been re-released and are back in selected specialist cinemas - seek them out if you are in London - and want to weekend in Italy or the South of France; alternatively, put the dvds on! (PLEIN SOLEIL - see THE TALENTED MR RIPLEY book, post below - is of course a perennial favourite of mine: it opened my eyes to art and beauty and Europe when I was 14 - will be out too on a restored Blu-Ray - different from the Criterion American one. I will have that next week ...).

Otto's BONJOUR TRISTESSE, from the Sagan best-seller, is also of course a marvellous treat and will look terrific on the big screen. Jean Seberg and Deborah Kerr are at their best here, and the movie still dazzles. See Bonjour Tristesse & Plein Soleil, Mr Ripley labels. One cinema in London, The Rio, is showing both of them, plus CLEOPATRA ! ...

Summer with Audrey, Jean, Alain, Rupert and Buika !

Today's "Daily Telegraph" Review section has an intresting feature by David Gritten on forthcoming movies back on big screens here (in London), as ROMAN HOLIDAY is re-released, as well as Hitch's DIAL M FOR MURDER, the vastly expensive western HEAVEN'S GATE (didn't think that would ever see the light of a projector again), and of course CLEOPATRA is also on 30 screens here at the moment. Two interesting ones coming up are - yes, here it is again - PLEIN SOLEIL at the end of the month - that should gather it a lot of new admirers - and Preminger's BONJOUR TRISTESSE - certainly a good Summer movie choice, one I will have to re-view again.

Park Circus is the market leader in these re-issues. It seems the re-issue business is in good health, with appreciative audiences and good notices from the critics. Of course back in days of revival houses we were used to seeing reissues at the cinema, but thats a rare pleasure now if one is not near a complex like the London BFI.

Interesting quote from Nick Varley from Park Circus: "With CASABLANCA for instance, everyone thinks they've seen it. And maybe they have, on television. But when you watch it in a theatre with an audience, its totally different. The script is so clever and witty, you find yourself feeding off the audience's emotions and laughter". That applies to so many movies we love, whether ALL ABOUT EVE or SOME LIKE IT HOT, sharing the experience of seeing them on the large screen.

Yet another PLEIN SOLEIL re-issue!

Studio Canal is another company specialising in re-issues and restoring films, and have a great dvd back catalogue. They are releasing another PLEIL SOLEIL (restored with the Cinematheque Francaise) to cinemas and on dvd and Blu-ray on August 30 (I had just reviewed the Criterion Blu-ray below): "Featuring a score by Nino Rota and the vivid sun-drenched camera work of Henri Decae its argeuably director Rene Clement's best-loved film", and is re-released now for the centenary of Clement's birth. BONJOUR TRISTESSE also with its sun-drenched South of France will also look good on a big screen. ROMAN HOLIDAY will also do well: "its a great summer movie, Audrey Hepburn always brings in a crowd, and it has a feel-good quality".  Sometimes, as with LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, when it comes to watching movies only a big screen will do.

One of my theatre highlights last year was seeing Rupert Everett as Oscar Wilde in David Hare's THE JUDAS KISS which we saw at the compact Hampstead Theatre last summer, before its west end run earlier this year. Rupert also had his second volume of memoirs out VANISHED YEARS which I bought in hardback, but only got around to reading it now - and its like listening to an old witty friend. Totally enjoyable, as per the splendid reviews, and its out now in paperback. Essential holiday reading. Though the likes of Richard Curtis and Emma Freud, Tina Brown, Madonna, Harvey Weinstein, Piers Morgan, Alistair Campbell, Ross Kemp and others must have found it alarming reading. Rupert deliciously skewers our trashy celebrity culture, as in "success for a movie star is no longer simply based on a good performance in a good film. It is measured in perfumes, and book deals, clothing contracts and celebrity endorsements, and the perception of success is as important as the actual quality of the product", 
How very true, as nobody seems ashamed of making trash anymore, as we see them promoting their wares on tv every week ...

A new discovery: Concha Buika, flamenco superstar (ok, I had not heard of her before...) she is a house diva with a new album LA NOCHE MAS LARGA which is "multi-layered, multi-textured Afro-latin-flamenco-jazz fusion, as she takes standards by Jacques Brel (Ne Me Quitte Pas) and Billie Holliday (Don't Explain) to places their creators never knew existed". This sounds like one to investigate ....

Jean Seberg: In the French style ....

A trio of Seberg's best ....

Nice to see - and get - a new edition of IN THE FRENCH STYLE, another of 1963's stylish romantic dramas, featuring that perennial - the American girl in Europe. I have done reports on this before here, see Jean Seberg label. I like the cover of this, showing part of Jean's goodbye speech to Stanley Baker at that bittersweet airport meeting.

She is now that brittle playgirl, as opposed to the naive young innocent who first arrives in Paris - to learn how to paint and study art! We get her father's disapproval, the young man she first gets involved with, men about town like Stanley Baker who loves his foreign correspondent job more than her, as she becomes a "Citizen of Paris" and "embraces its endless parties and jaded view of love." Then there is the doctor who adores her and whom she decides to marry and go back to America with (played by a favourite writer of mine, James Leo Herlihy), all based on two Irwin Shaw (TWO WEEKS IN ANOTHER TOWN) stories which make up this Robert Parrish film. It has that early '60s black-and-white international jetset look in spades, as Jean refines her American Girl in Paris after of course BREATHLESS ...

It is always a pleasure too to go back to 1958's BONJOUR TRISTESSE, her second film with Otto Preminger, from - that word again - the bittersweet Francoise Sagan tale. More on this too at Seberg label, and photographer Bob Willoughby's photos from the set, as above left. More on that at Bonjour Tristesse label.  IN THE FRENCH STYLE, below.

 

Another favourite is the 1965 MOMENT TO MOMENT, a late Mervyn LeRoy romantic thriller which we like a lot, Jean as I said before is perfection here in that Yves St Laurent wardrobe (which would still be very chic today), driving around St Paul de Vence in her red sportscar and taking her naval officer lover to the Colombe D'Or restaurant, while her husband is away. Add in Honor Blackman  (just after

her GOLDFINGER stint) as the maneater next door, a missing body, a husband and suspicious detectives and the stage is set for a fabulous drama. A lot of it is studio bound but the South of France locations are enjoyable too .... as is that Henry Mancini score.

These were Jean's good years, after Rossen's LILITH (one to re-see), before those darker late ones - that Chabrol thriller THE ROUTE TO CORINTH in '67 was enjoyable too. 

More French stuff next: R-Patz as BEL AMI ! 

Fantasy Holiday

Let's head off to St Paul De Vence in the South of France and have lunch at The Colombe D'Or restaurant, its still the chic fashionable place to go (though some say its an over-priced tourist trap now). Just like back in 1966 in the lush romantic thriller MOMENT TO MOMENT when Jean Seberg in that fabulous Yves St Laurent wardrobe, drives her little red car to it and strolls around the town with her love interest, Sean Garrison - as per reviews at Jean Seberg label. Its a "Movie I Love". At the restaurant they watch the doves flying into sun "saying farewell to the day", as Henry Mancini's great score swells.

I have just been reading about St Paul De Vence as a great South of France destination, its been years since I have been around that way, and it whets my appetite. It is an exquisite fortified village up in the hills near those other towns like Nice, Menton, Juan-Les-Pins, and it has medieval stone cottages and also a great art gallery, not to mention that restaurant...I wonder whats on today's menu ...
http://www.la-colombe-dor.com/indexEN.html

Movies I love: Moment to Moment

MOMENT TO MOMENT in 1966 is a glossy romantic thriller by old hand Mervyn Le Roy (his last film in fact) set in the South of France and is a fabulous treat to see now at this remove. It was part of a double-bill on release initially.

The first half is lushly romantic as Jean Seberg drives around Nice in her snazzy red sports car, sporting a Yves St Laurent wardrobe that would still be the height of chic today - she is a bored wife whose (dull) husband Arthur Hill is away on business, and she gets romantically involved [as one does] with a sailor on the loose - Sean Garrison, a bit wooden but does what is required of him, ie - he fills out his uniform nicely. Jean resists at first but ... add in Honor Blackman [just after her stint as Pussy Galore with James Bond] as the maneater next door and the stage is set for some fireworks.

Then it turns into a Chabrol-like thriller with a missing body, police on the prowl, the return of the husband and the missing body (very much alive). It is though all nicely worked out, a lot of it studio bound, but nice locations too. Jean is perfect here and its a perfect mid'60s treat. Great Henry Mancini score too .... it deserves to be much better known and would be a much better chick flick now than some of the current examples. There is a lovely moment at the well-known Colombe D'Or restaurant (still going strong at St-Paul-de-Vence - I read a recommendtion on it last week) with the doves flying into the sun .... perfectly romantic then with a few Hitchcockian twists and Seberg is in her lovely prime here. What's not to like? My IMDB pal Timshelboy loves it as well.

Bonjour Tristesse

Staying with 1957 for now, I should have been at a screening of BONJOUR TRISTESSE last evening [part of the National Film Theatre's Deborah Kerr retrospective] but a knee injury intervened - apologies, Donal and Jerry (Timshelboy) - so its back to the dvd of this Otto Preminger classic, made in '57 for '58 release. That ace photojournalist Bob Willoughby was on the set (as he seems to have been on all the important-to-me movies of the late '50s, and he shot this classic shot of Seberg (above) and (botttom) best-selling author Francoise Sagan on set with Niven and Kerr.

David Niven plays a wealthy playboy, the father of teenaged Cecile (Jean Seberg). Cecile tolerates father’s girlfriends, particularly Mylene Demongeot, but doesn’t know what to make of the prudish Anne (Deborah Kerr), who will not cohabit with Niven until after they’re married. Feeling that her own relationship with her father will be disrupted by Anne’s presence and the plans for her further education, Cecile does her malicious best to break up the relationship, only to be beaten by Niven, who despite his promises of fidelity to Anne cannot give up his hedonistic lifestyle.

The combination of the daughter’s disdain and the father’s rakishness leads a fatal accident. Niven and Seberg continue pursuing their lavish but empty lifestyle, though both realize that their lack of moral fibre has destroyed a life, but was it an accident or suicide? The incestuous undertones of the original Sagan novel are only slightly downplayed in the film; the “tristesse” (sadness) is visually conveyed by filming the flashback scenes in colour and the opening and closing of the film in bleak black and white, as they drive and party around Paris - another Sagan best-seller "Aimez vous Brahms" filmed in 1961 as GOODBYE AGAIN is another bittersweet tale (which I must revisit) also with lots of driving around Paris by Anthony Perkins and Ingrid Bergman .... TRISTESSE is perfectly directed by Preminger with his SAINT JOAN star Seberg in her element here, Geoffrey Horne is her boyfriend, Juliette Greco sings the theme song "... my heart has no address, bonjour tristesse" in a nightclub and then the colour seeps in as the memories intrude ... Niven and Kerr are perfectly cast here, as opposed to their playing against type next in SEPARATE TABLES.

50th birthdays ...

Iconic movies never go out of style - age does not wither them. BREATHLESS is just released in a new 50th anniversary print - like Varda's CLEO FROM 5 TO 7 (also re-released recently) it is a poem to early '60s Paris; L'AVVENTURA and PSYCHO were similarly re-released, and I finally discovered THE APARTMENT this year! Also due for re-release (though its never really gone away) should be Delon and Clement's endlessly fascinating stylish PLEIN SOLEIL with its real mediterranean of that iconic year 1960... I have written about them previously here and will probably continue to do so...

Jean Seberg trio

IN THE FRENCH STYLE is a charming entry in the American Girl in Paris stakes by Robert Parrish in 1963, from Irwin Shaw stories. Jean Seberg is quite charming here going from naïve young girl to sophisticated woman of affairs before giving it all up for domesticity with an American doctor (played by one of my favourite writers James Leo Herlihy, author of All Fall Down and Midnight Cowboy, among others). Stanley Baker is one of her lovers so cue lots of meetings at airports and a decadent party that prefigures the one in DARLING. Its an interesting American take on the international film scene of the early '60s and Seberg's iconic place in it.

MOMENT TO MOMENT in 1965 is a glossy romantic thriller by old hand Mervyn Le Roy (his last film in fact) set in the South of France and is a fabulous treat to see now at this remove. The first half is lushly romantic as Jean drives around Nice in her snazzy red sports car, sporting a Yves St Laurent wardrobe that would still be the height of chic today - she is a bored wife whose (dull) husband Arthur Hill is away on business, and she gets romantically involved with a sailor on the loose - Sean Garrison, a bit wooden but does what is required of him, ie - he fills out his uniform nicely. Jean resists at first but ... add in Honor Blackman [just after her stint as Pussy Galore with James Bond] as the maneater next door and the stage is set for some fireworks. Then it turns into a Chabrol-like thriller with a missing body, police on the prowl, the return of the husband and the missing body. It is though all nicely worked out, a lot of it studio bound, but nice locations too. Jean is perfect here and its a perfect mid'60s treat. Great Henry Mancini score too .... it deserves to be much better known and would be a much better chick flick now than some of the current examples.

THE ROAD TO CORINTH (LA ROUTE DE CORINTHE) is real Chabrol - an amusing thriller in sunny daylight as Jean looking lovelier than ever and Maurice Ronet chase after some McGuffin all over Greece, in 1967. It is nice to see Jean at this period, after BREATHLESS and LILITH before things darkened for her.

Jean was "the girl from Marshalltown, Iowa" as I remember reading as a child, when discovered by Otto Preminger for ST JOAN, she is marvellous as Cecile in BONJOUR TRISTESSE (my comments on it are a few posts back here), now if one could only see missing items like her husband Romain Gary's THE BIRDS COME TO DIE IN PERU.... Like Romy Schneider's, Jean's is one of the more fascinating careers in international cinema.