Paris seen by Hollywood

If your idea of Paris is pretty women in elegant dresses, men with high hats, people kissing on every street corner and cancan, champagne and horse drawn carriages, then you have probably watched too many films made in Hollywood. An exhibition about Paris seen by Hollywood has just opened at the Hôtel de Ville link, and last Saturday morning I was queuing outside the entrance to the Hôtel de Ville to be among the first to visit the exhibition on that day.

Paris has apparently been the subject of about 800 Hollywood films from the silent movies to Hugo Cabret in 2011. Until the 1960ies most Hollywood films about Paris were filmed in Hollywood..... Whole streets were built in Hollywood, often with the aide of photos taken by French photographers. Whenever a scene was taken at the Seine or e.g. near the Eiffel Tower, the background was painted.... It wasn't until the 1960ies that Hollywood directors actually ventured to Paris and filmed in the streets of Paris!

Perhaps you have watched An American in Paris with Gene Kelly on a rainy Sunday afternoon when you were a child? Perhaps you have admired Audrey Hepburn in one of the eight Paris films she played in? Perhaps you enjoyed Woody Allen's film Midnight in Paris last year? The films were all there: photos, extracts, drawings, programmes, dresses, shoes, tickets, songs, etc.

The week before last the iconic French film director inaugurated his idea of Hollywood in his new Cité du Cinema in Saint-Denis where it will be possible to make 9 films simultaneously link . Will Hollywood come more often to Paris?

Apparently lots of Americans arrive in Paris expecting to find Paris just like in the films, and to be honest, they will not be disappointed, though Paris is also modern architecture, beggars, Starbucks, noisy busses, street works and cars every where. Paris seen by Hollywood, yes, but Paris should be seen by yourself!