Paris with a view / Paris avec vue

Everyone has seen, or at least heard of Amelie, Jean-Pierre Jeunet's feel-good film about a young waitress living in Montmartre, who decides to help people and make them happy or happier. It is contagious, needless to say. Yann Tiersen's score makes the experience more unforgettable and indissociable with Montmartre and Paris in general. Indeed, images were touched up, graffiti on walls were digitally deleted to give the impression of Paris as a timeless city. One might wonder whether it was needed.
It is the image one keeps of the French capital and its suburbs, far from the ones the world is showing at the moment: torched cars, burning warehouses and rioting. A different view, full of the shock of reality. A very depressing one. It is reminiscent of the rising of the "banlieues" in Lyon back in the 1980s and has already been compared to May 68, mutatis mutandis of course, the actors and the location being entirely antagonistic : on the one hand, poor youngsters in derelict highly-unemployed estates, on the other hand, middle-classe students in France's most prestigious university, the Sorbonne. In both cases, there is at stake the rejection of a model and the refusal to bow to a certain form of authority and order.

Chacun a vu ou entendu parler du Fabuleux destin d'Amelie Poulain, le film de la joie de vivre de Jeunet situe dans Montmartre autour d'une jeune serveuse qui tente d'apporter du bonheur (ou plus de bonheur) aux gens. La partition de Tiersen rend Paris et le film indissociables et inoubliables. En effet, les images furent retouchees, les graffitis sur les murs effaces, ceci pour donner une intemporalite au Paris de cartes postales - si besoin etait. C'est l'image que l'on garde de la capitale francaise et de ses environs, aux antipodes de celle que les medias montrent en ce moment: les voitures incendiees, les entrepots en flammes et les emeutes. Une vue differente, pleine du choc de la realite. Deprimante. Elle rappelle la revolte des banlieues de Lyon dans les annees 1980 et a deja ete comparee a Mai 68, mutatis mutandis bien entendu, les acteurs et les lieux etant antagonistes: d'un cote, les jeunes desargentes des zones delabrees ou le chomage prospere, de l'autre, les etudiants des classes aisees dans l'universite francaise la plus prestigieuse, la Sorbonne. Dans les deux cas, le meme rejet d'un modele et le refus de se plier a une certaine forme d'autorite et d'ordre.