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The Cinephile's Paradise
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19874 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
4 / 1992 |
2,109 Words |
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Cynthia Grenier
Cynthia Grenier is contributing editor to the Arts section of
The World & I. |
The French really have a thing about movies. Americans may have Hollywood and, yes, U.S. movies are the ones that have been racking up the biggest box office scores throughout the world - to say nothing of shaping fantasies around the globe for well over half a century. But when it comes to passion for the cinema-true, deep passion-no people on the face of the earth can match the French, and above all, the Parisians.
For starters, by way of comparison let us briefly consider the statistics. New York City, the American metropolis with the most movie houses--and largest population--has ninety-one theaters, a number of which are twinned or multiplexed. In a typical week, some fifty movies are on display, most of them American, with a sprinkling of foreign films, somewhere from one to five in number. (The percentage of foreign films playing in the whole United States in any given year represents less than 1 percent of the total number of films shown.)
Paris, with approximately eight million people (compared with New York City's fourteen million), boasts of 102 movie houses, most of which are multiplexed with five and six screens a piece. (The renowned Guide Michelin attributes to the French capital some four hundred movie screens.) In an ordinary week, 290 films are programmed. And what a collection of films from around the world: Leaving aside the obvious latest French and American productions, your are likely to find Italian, Russian, Polish, British, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Algerian, Moroccan, Belgian, Dutch, Czech, Egyptian, Australian, German, Spanish, Venezuelan, Iranian, and Yugoslavian films, as well as a sprinkling of movies from sundry African countries.
In addition to the regular commercial movie houses, there is the super film lover's delight, the Cinematheque Francaise, with screening rooms in three different museums: the Pompidou in the historic Marais, the Palais de Tokyo, and the Palais de Chaillot in the fashionable 16th arrondissement. Founded nearly fifty years ago by the now-legendary Henri Langloirs, the Cinematheque at its three venues carries on the Langlois tradition of showing three different films a day, seven days a week. This provides an additional sixty three movies a week from which the film devotee can choose.
Then there is cine clubs, as well as a certain number of regular movies houses presenting "homages" to honor various filmmakers and actors. Recently you could find a Satyajit Ray festival, a Marlon Brando Night (running through to the next day, with breakfast included in the price
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