Avenue Montaigne (2006)

One of my all time favorites.

Fantastic!

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

AVENUE MONTAIGNE (AKA Fauteuils d'Orchestre, or Orchestra Seats) works on many levels. As directed and written (with her son Christopher Thompson who also acts in the film) by Danièle Thompson the story is about need, expectations, disappointments and the opening of new doors. It is sweet, tender, beautifully acted and delivers Paris to the viewer on a dream- like encounter. Jessica (Cécile De France) lives in Mâcon, France with her aging grandmother Madame Roux (veteran actress Suzanne Flon in her last appearance in film): they share a desire - loving luxury - but both are poor in money and rich in spirit. Jessica decides to move to Paris to find good fortune. She has no money and no place to live so she finally finds a job as a waitress in bar next on Avenue Montaigne that caters to the surrounding theaters and the wealthy inhabitants of the area. Not being the requisite 'male waiter' her attention is paid to the people of luxury around her. She meets a famous pianist (Jean-François Lefort) who is married to his manager Valentine (Laura Morante) and their life of luxury is tainted by the pianist's tiring of the superficiality of his career, a famous actress Caterine Versen (Valérie Lemercier) who makes money on TV soaps and struggles with Feydeau stage productions but really would chuck it all to star in a film about Simone de Beauvoir and Sartre directed by the famous Brian Sobinsky (Sydney Pollack), and a great art collector Jacques Grumberg (Claude Brasseur) who is auctioning off his entire art collection to the pleasure of his new young girlfriend Valérie (Annelise Hesme) but to the disappointment of his son Professor Frédéric Grumberg (Christopher Thompson) , and is present in the retirement days of the theater manager Dani (Claudie). Jessica proves to be the catalyst for change in each of these people's lives and fulfills her dream of providing luxury by obtaining an orchestra seat for her grandmother at the pianist's farewell formal concert. Though the plot may sound complex it all spins out in meaningful ways that manage to tie the multiple stories together because of the presence of Jessica. The cinematography by Jean- Marc Fabre sparkles as doe the musical score by Nicola Piovani (with a great assist from Beethoven!). It is a bit of French froth with a message and a pure delight to watch - over and over. Grady Harp

Lay back and let it flow over you. A cool French film: light, 'frothy', beautifully filmed in Paris' theatre district. A pleasure from start to finish. Clichéd? Yes - but who cares. Enjoy it.Well, the system would not accept my short comment - I have to do minimum of 10 lines(!). I do not want to put in any spoilers but here goes - looks like I have no choice. Jessica is a sweet young thing from the provinces, in Paris and looking for a job - and a room to rent. Jobs are scarce but she talks her way into a waitressing job (oops, politically incorrect) - lets say she is a table attendant - at the Cafe des Theatres. While there she comes into contact with a range of interesting people, including Hollywood director (played by the late great, Sydney Pollack - a pleasure to see now that he has left us, a great concert pianist (who wants to give it all up), a soap star who earns heaps but would prefer 'serious' acting, a millionaire dying of cancer who is selling off his his fabulous art collection, a theatres concierge about to retire, and the millionaire's son (and romantic lead, played by director's son and film co-writer, Christopher Thomson). Leaving out the details (thank goodness!) it comes to a predictable and happy ending. Well written, great photography, well acted, a relaxed pleasure to watch.

As in most of the best French films, not a lot happens and people spend a lot of time talking about their problems but somehow it works. The central character played by Cecile de France is largely a ficelle designed to link together the subplots. Each of these involves an apparently enviable character - someone who's apparently got it made - who isn't as happy as he (or she) should be. The malaises of these rich and glitzy characters turn out to be universal human problems - ageing, family strife, boredom. One of the major themes of the film, beautifully woven through all the subplots, is that we should theorise about life (and art) less and respond to life (and art) in an emotionally direct way. Ergo I shall simply say I enjoyed it, I didn't get a numb behind and I was happier after I came out than when I went in. It's worth the price of admission for the Sidney Pollack restaurant scene alone.

ORCHESTRA SEATS/FAUTEUILS D'ORCHESTRE: Danièle Thompson's third directorial outing (preceded by La Bûche and Jet Lag/Décolage horaire) flows brilliantly on a grand scale doling out clichés and pungent acting in equal measure. It could do quite well with the older generation US art house audience and if the Film Society was looking for French films unlikely to be distributed here, this and the opener Palais Royal! were odd choices. Series viewers begin with a big dose of Valérie Lemercier, since she is prominent in both this and Palais Royal! Three high-profile lives will meet deadlines on Paris' chic Avenue Montaigne on the 17th of the month in this story – a famous pianist is going to perform Beethoven, a popular TV actress debuts in a Feydeau farce, and a millionaire is going to auction off the great collection of modern art he's spent a lifetime assembling. All three are dissatisfied. TV star Catherine Versen (Valérie Lemercier) gets extravagant paychecks for playing a problem-solving mayor on a popular high toned soap and runs into passionate fans wherever she goes, but she'd really much rather be a serious actress and play, say, Simone de Beauvoir in the movie a famous American director, Brian Sobinski (Sydney Pollack) is in town to cast. Millionaire businessman Jacques Grunberg (Claude Brasseur) is still enjoying life, but he knows not much of it remains to him. He is ill, and his relations with his grumpy professor son Frédéric (Christopher Thomson, the director's son) are cold. His collection is no longer alive to him either. He makes up for it with a young trophy girlfriend. Pianist Jean-Francois Lefort (Albert Dupontel) is managed by his mournful but devoted wife Valentine (Laura Morante, the mother in Moretti's The Son's Room) and he's booked solid for the next six years, but the whole concert life feels as constrictive to him as the evening clothes he must wear for concerts (Dupontel looks like a hunkier version of the sad pianist played by Charles Aznavour in Truffaut's Shoot the Piano Player). Jean-Francois wants to dump it all, but his wife, whom he loves, may bolt if he does.Tying all these celebs together are a couple of charming observers, Jessica and Claudie. Claudie (Dani) is the theater concierge and she's about to retire. Claudie has lived her dream of meeting all the pop stars as well as classical performers of decades past. She had no talent, she announces, so she chose to be around talent, and she succeeded and feels her life was very worthwhile. The moments when we see her lip-sync old French pop songs whose singers she's known through her job are perhaps the film's happiest. As a kind of Ariel and mascot for the piece there is Jessica (Cécile de France), a naive cutie from the provinces with a pretty face and charming smile (the Belgian-born Cécile has been one of French film's most promising young female stars of recent years) who's just landed a wait job at the old-fashioned Café des Arts – a place that serves every level of society that works in the quarter – and who, wouldn't you know it, quickly meets Jacques, Jean-Francois, Catherine, and even Frérdéric, who's eventually smitten, and Jessica hears them all unload their problems.Book-ending the piece is the relationship of Jessica and the grandma who raised her (Suzanne Flon), Madame Roux, whose life foreshadowed Jessica's: she "always loved luxury" but was poor so when she went to Paris she worked as a maid in the ladies room of the Ritz. Flon just died at 87 and the film is dedicated to her: one of those great French cinematic troupers, she was performing, delightfully, in films right up until the end -- eight films in the past five years.There's climax, romance, and reconciliation in store at the end for the cast. This is very glossy mainstream French stuff, good writing by Christopher Thompson in collaboration with his mother Danièle, smooth directing, good work by the stellar cast. Lemercider isn't as buffoonish as she was in Palais Royal!—one begins to see her appeal. The movie doesn't take itself too seriously even if the scenes between the pianist and his Italian wife are a bit intense, due to casting. The question is, what's this all about, and why must we concern ourselves with the "predicaments" of people who from the looks of it are so singularly fortunate in life? (Shwon as part of the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema series at Lincoln Center, March 2006, Fauteuils d'orchestre opened in Paris February 15, 2006.)