Movie review: Paris

Pierre's heart takes a lickin'. Will it keep on tickin'?

by John P. Meyer

Director Cédric Klapisch's Paris is an annoyingly-long (130 minutes) ensemble drama that verges on painfully episodic. Fortunately for those who decide to sit through it anyway, the movie is episodically touching, romantic, insightful, and hilariously funny.

The choppy nature of the narrative is established right from the start, with a series of 20-second snippets opening windows onto the lives of seemingly unconnected people going about their unconnected business in the titular metropolis -- not to mention a continent away in a West African shanty town. The jazzy score set to accompany the action has a decided world music tenor.

The peripatetic camera eventually settles into the orbit of ex-Moulin Rouge dancer Pierre (hunky Romain Duris), who is about to receive the kind of medical diagnosis that no one -- young or old -- ever wants to hear. Pierre, you see, is dying, and his only hope lies in the universal coverage health care system finding him a viable heart to replace the defective one currently malfunctioning inside his ribcage. (Cue the dour Satie piano solo.)

Pierre is, quite naturally, devastated, and seeks the support of his sister Élise (Juliette Binoche, lovely and engaging as ever), with whom he hasn't had much to do in recent years. Élise, a social worker, is at first angry with her prodigal brother for his insistence on keeping his condition from their mother, but she quickly works through her knee-jerk shock and comes to Pierre's aid by moving into his apartment as a caretaker -- bringing along her three young children. (Élise is a single mom, having split with her husband some years prior, we learn.)

Speaking of Pierre's apartment, it's got a really great fifth-floor view looking out over the city. (Either those dancing jobs pay really well, or Paris has an abundance of affordable housing with stellar amenities.) Over the course of his illness, Pierre spends a great deal of time standing on his balcony, observing the goings-on in the street, and peering into the open windows of surrounding domiciles.

Not far into the cinematic narrative, we intuit that some (or perhaps all) of the unconnected characters glimpsed earlier are going to end up being connected in some form or fashion, and that Pierre is likely to be the Kevin Bacon of this tale. Here are some of the other players in our connectedness game:

* Verneuil (Frabrice Luchini), a history professor whose father has passed away at the age of 95 and whose successful architect brother, Philippe (François Cluzet, late of Tell No One), is all broken up about it. Verneuil, on the other hand, appears not to be. (Key word: appears.)

* Laetitia (Mélanie Laurent, dazzling in Inglourious Basterds), a student in Verneuil's class who seems lately to have attracted the attention of a text-stalker. (Not to mention that of Verneuil himself.)

* A bakery shop owner (Karin Viard) who is amusingly two-faced: while snarlingly mean to her apprentice clerks, she's fawningly cheery to her customers -- typically within the same conversation.

* A group of vendors involved in the operation of fruit and vegetable stalls in a street market. In particular we focus on Jean (Albert Dupontel), whose ex-wife Caroline (Julie Ferrier) still works in the stall beside him -- and flirts alarmingly with all his friends. She likes living dangerously ...

* An immigrant couple from Cameroon struggling to make a go of big city life, and a relative of theirs who is trying to sneak into France by boat.

* A quartet of leggy runway models out for a post-runway night on the town -- one of whom (Audrey Marnay as Marjolaine) has a wispy yet momentous connection to the Cameroon relative mentioned above. As a group, the girls find themselves bedazzled by greengrocer chic.

Once we come to grips with the film's premise that Paris is a city that holds many people who are each at the center of their own important story, it's easier to abide the point-of-view hopscotching. Fortunately, each of the stories we spend attention on proves to be diverting, if not outright enthralling.

Take the case of Verneuil, for instance. As hinted, his reaction to the death of his father -- while sublimated -- is no less intense than that experienced by his younger brother. In the most insightful and hilarious episode of the film, Verneuil consults a psychologist after falling prey to emotional breakdowns on the job. It's only after several minutes of discussion that the fact of his father's recent death actually makes it into the conversation. The shrink -- played by Maurice Bénichou -- remains stony-faced for as long as he possibly can.

Klapisch's artfully photographed film (credit Christophe Beaucarne) frames its characters within the lush, colorful backgrounds of the city; conversations are conducted on rooftops, along tree-lined avenues, and in romantic neighborhood cafés. In uniquely French fashion, Paris demonstrates a laissez-faire approach to sexuality: only in a Gallic tale would the stalker-ish older man end up in bed with the ravishing coed after he's been exposed as her tormentor; only in a French film would the object of a boorish oaf's blatant harassment end up orchestrating a lunchtime quickie with him the following afternoon.

If you do decide to see Paris, be sure to continue sitting through the end credits, which are embellished with great little video windows offering additional glimpses into the lives of the characters you've just spent 130 minutes getting to know. (If your butt can take it.)