Les Parisiens

A Feature film of

Claude Lelouch

Produced by

Les Films 13

Production year2004

French release15/09/2004

Runtime

1h 59m

Synopsis

Let’s imagine a spy satellite floating above the Earth, zooming in on a sample group of individuals (and, just like a drop of water can sum up an ocean, Paris could symbolize the world) who represent all the foibles of human beings. We have a ruined banker, a homeless person for whom the end is preferable to hunger, the manager of a brasserie, “Gare du Nord,” looking for adventure, a police captain madly in love with his colleague’s wife, a film director trying to find a subject, a jewelry seller (who, is in fact, a gold-digger), a fake cab driver but a real crook, an impresario who is as charming as he is Machiavellian, a shady real estate agent, a mad cow that’s wandered on to the high-speed train tracks, a prostitute as honest as she is maternal, an underground restaurant not listed in any guide, a Christ crucified in front of the Sacré Coeur, and opera-loving and swinger politicians. In short, an entire inventory in the Prévert style, a whole sample of men and women who all dream of being on the same level of what we could call a Richter love scale. But the truth is, we are rarely all on the same level. AND WE REMAIN FAITHFUL FOR AS LONG AS WE DON'T FIND ANYTHING BETTER!
All of us are in a state of permanent jetlag when it comes to each other. It’s well known that A still loves B who loves C who prefers D. Racine created tragedies from this material, whereas, we propose to describe this quest for love as pure comedy. We could almost call it a musical, for the weft of “Parisians” is woven by a pair of singers (Shaa and Massimo) who comment on this human microcosm through song.
These two singers even become, little by little, the main characters of this adventure, and, alone, symbolize some of the joys and difficulties of living in the City of Lights. Claude Lelouch