Paris Can Wait: A Visually Sensual Tour of the French Countryside
Eleanor Coppola’s Paris Can Wait is a visually sumptuous and wonderfully heartfelt film on the wife (Diane Lane) of a film producer (Alec Baldwin) taking a trip to Paris with his friend, Jacques (Arnaud Viard) after she can’t fly due to her ears. Instead of going straight to Paris, Jacques shows Anne (Lane) the beauty of the French Countryside and gives her (and the audience members) a tour of The Best of France with an overabundance of food and historic locales. Anne starts falling for Jacques’ impressive skills of impressing her with food and complete and utter knowledge of everything France has to offer, but remains reluctant of starting a relationship and having an affair with him while his [non-existent] husband is off producing big-shot movies.
The film is riddled with eye-widening and mouth-watering cinematography that completely takes your breath away in 4k UHD HDR whatever this new gimmick is. Every single shot is a painting, and if the film keeps referencing Manet and Renoir while showing, briefly, different types of these paintings. It’s great to look at, it’s a film to soak your eyes in and admire the pure visual beauty of the french countryside, and also admire the food that the film keeps shoving in your eyes. It’s half “wonderful French countryside landscape”, and half “food-porn”, which equates to wonderfully eye-soaking cinematography. It’s the best aspect of the film, alongside its wonderfully non-predictive and witty score from Laura Karpman. Every sequence is enhanced by its brilliant music that was woefully snubbed for Academy Awards contention. The score is the best I’ve heard in all 2017, and the most memorable one at that. If you don’t believe me, just listen (with headphones, of course!)
Karpman’s music transports you in the film like SEGA’s Rhythm Thief and the Emperor’s Treasure, or any Professor Layton game developed by Nintendo. The soundtrack is so damn similar, because of its non-predictive vibes and soothing music that complements the scene you’re listening to so brilliantly that you can’t help but soak in the wonderful music that complements its visual style so well. Then you’re in awe at the film’s fantastic lead performances.
It’s worth noting that, while Alec Baldwin isn’t in the film much, his performance is one of the best he’s given in his career, because of his non-presence. When he’s not on screen and calls Anne from time to time, you know, through his voice and his non-existence, that he just doesn’t really care about Anne or his children, but only cares about profit and being recognized at Cannes La Croisette. That’s the brilliance of his non-existing performance. Lane is also excellent, with Viard’s Jacques. The dialogue is fresh and simple, but its simplicity is complexified by Lane’s character, who confesses in her Christian beliefs and spirituality in one of the most heart-wrenching sequences of 2017, when she enters the church at Vézelay. In another brilliant sequence, the film goes back to the primitive roots of cinema at the Lumière museum, showcasing the Cinématographe and pre-cinema, while also self-referencing movies that are made today (including the one you are watching). Cinema is returned to its primitive form, and Paris Can Wait resurrects contemporary cinema by aligning and acknowledging primitive cinema.
Viard tries too much to impress Lane, which falters the film a bit. His “subtlety” isn’t subtle at all, and feels wholly forced. What if the film was like Jean Pierre Lefebvre’s Les Fleurs Sauvages, in which nothing [extra]ordinary would happen and it would just be a banal tour of the French Countryside. I would’ve liked it even more, but alas, the film needs a romantic aspect, and when Lane winks the camera at the end of the movie, sealing her fate with Jacques, I was like “Oh, come on!” If only this movie was one grand adventure and everything would end up back to normal, but in Hollywood, it doesn’t happen like that. Thankfully, Lane & Viard share some incredible moments together, because the film keeps it at its most simple. And it’s when the film is at its most simple, in its freshly written script, wonderfully sumptuous cinematography, it’s a truly wonderful tour of the French countryside, done in Coppola fashion. Not in Sofia Coppola’s perpetuating self-indulgence in pretentious movies, but in the way Francis Ford Coppola would do a comedy like this: keep it simple, don’t overthink it, and give the best performances A-list actors like Diane Lane and Alec Baldwin can give. Screw Rotten Tomatoes, and give this movie a chance. It’s a communal experience you will surely love, if you’re a fan of traveling, it’s an amazing travelogue for the eyes & ears. Simple and elegant. Something for everyone is found in Paris Can Wait.
✯✯✯✯½
