ABSTRACT
This chapter considers several French contemporary, dramatic, omnibus films: Paris Je T’aime (2006), Paris vu par… (1965) and Paris vu par… 20 Ans Après (1984). These are all collaborative works with short segments directed by numerous internationally renowned filmmakers. Most of the episodes are organized according to Parisian neighborhoods but, in general, these locales are given short shrift in comparison to the individuals residing there, and it is largely people’s romantic encounters that are privileged. In Paris Je T’aime, for example, while Bruno Podalydès’s vignette is set in (and titled) Montmartre, we see only a few small streets in that quarter as a man attempts to park. The true focus of the episode is his blossoming relationship with a woman who has fainted on the sidewalk. While such contemporary omnibus films are dramatized (and employ some famous actors), many city-themed works of the 1920s were, in contrast, documentary in mode. Études Sur Paris (1928), for instance, structured itself according to areas of the city, but put its emphasis on obscure vs. touristic sites. It also attended much more to everyday Parisians, often laborers, and to the role of the Seine in connecting Parisian people, places, and capital. Among the questions asked in the essay are: What explains the cartographic impulse of these recent films when the texts seem to care so little for the locales they herald? What can be said of these films in terms of their visions of gender, race, communality, immigration, and work?
