Vive la Paris: Why the city has such a magical effect in films

With the release of ‘Mrs Harris Goes to Paris’ later this year, starring Lesley Manville as a British cleaning lady going to Paris to buy a Dior dress, Geoffrey Macnab looks back at films set in Paris and says when it comes to wish-fulfilment fantasies on screen, there has only ever been one city on the itinerary

Lesley Manville as a British cleaning lady who heads to the French capital in search of high couture in the upcoming film ‘Mrs Harris Goes to Paris’ (Liam Daniel/Ada Films Ltd/Harris Squared Kft)

It’s the city of light and love – or at least that is how Paris appears to outsiders who make their movies there. From Woody Allen (Midnight in Paris), and Gene Kelly (An American in Paris) to Gary Cooper (Love in the Afternoon), and Elizabeth Taylor (The Last Time I Saw Paris) – or, even more recently, Lily Collins in the Netflix series Emily in Paris – there has been a whole sub-genre of movies and TV dramas about expats living gilded lives within sight of the Eiffel Tower.

Even the city’s rodents have a measure of style. The rats in Pixar’s Ratatouille (2007) are far more discerning and cosmopolitan than the verminous creatures found in movies elsewhere.

In Richard Linklater’s Before Sunset (2004), the novelist played by Ethan Hawke needs only to spend a few hours in Paris, walking by the Seine and having high-minded conversations about life, love, and art, to rekindle his romance with Céline (Julie Delpy), a woman he hasn’t seen in almost a decade.