IMDb > Paris Blues (1961)

Paris Blues (1961) More at IMDbPro »

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Overview

User Rating:
6.7/10   609 votes
MOVIEmeter: ?
Up 14% in popularity this week. See why on IMDbPro.
Director:
Martin Ritt
Writers:
Walter Bernstein (writer)
Harold Flender (novel)
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Contact:
View company contact information for Paris Blues on IMDbPro.
Release Date:
27 September 1961 (USA) more
Genre:
Drama | Music | Romance more
Tagline:
A Love So Spectacular, So Personally Exciting, You Feel It Happening To You!
Plot:
Ram Bowen and Eddie Cook are two expatriate jazz musicians living in Paris where, unlike America at the time... more | full synopsis
Plot Keywords:
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Awards:
Nominated for Oscar. Another 1 nomination more
NewsDesk:
(3 articles)
Paul Newman dies of cancer at 83
 (From The Hollywood News. 27 September 2008, 6:25 PM, PDT)
Robert Redford 'Beyond Words' over Newman’s Death
 (From PEOPLE.com. 27 September 2008, 12:00 AM, PDT)
User Comments:
"The Frenchmen's all prefer what they call, le jazz hot." more (21 total)

Cast

  (Credited cast)

Paul Newman ... Ram Bowen

Joanne Woodward ... Lillian Corning

Sidney Poitier ... Eddie Cook

Louis Armstrong ... Wild Man Moore

Diahann Carroll ... Connie Lampson
Barbara Laage ... Marie Seoul
André Luguet ... Rene Bernard
Marie Versini ... Nicole
Moustache ... Drummer
Aaron Bridgers ... Pianist
Guy Pederson ... Bass Player
Serge Reggiani ... Michel Duvigne
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Emilien Antille ... Man with alto sax in jazz cave when Armstrong enters
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Additional Details

Parents Guide:
Add content advisory for parents
Runtime:
98 min
Country:
USA
Language:
English | French
Color:
Black and White
Aspect Ratio:
1.66 : 1 more
Sound Mix:
Mono
Certification:
Australia:PG | Australia:M (DVD rating) | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:11 | USA:Approved (PCA #19792)
Filming Locations:
Paris, France
Company:
Diane Productions more

Fun Stuff

Trivia:
Although Duke Ellington received an Academy Award nomination for Best Music, Scoring a Musical Picture, this film is not a musical, but rather a romantic drama in a jazz-music setting. more
Quotes:
Ram Bowen: You just do anything I say, don't you?
Lillian Corning: Well, I want to stay.
Ram Bowen: You're a nut. Well, I ain't gettin' involved with no nut!
more
Movie Connections:
Featured in Century of Black Cinema (2003) (V) more

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User Comments

   (Comment on this title)
14 out of 22 people found the following comment useful.
"The Frenchmen's all prefer what they call, le jazz hot.", 15 December 2005
7/10
Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

The American in Paris theme has been done very often in American cinema. The tradition is huge splashy technicolor with Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Jane Powell, Audrey Hepburn cavorting around the well known streets and landmarks. Those are nice films, but that ain't what you get here.

No Louvre, no Arc de Triomphe, no Eiffel Tower, a brief shot of Notre Dame from a distance; that's about it from the well known Paris. The Paris we see here in this black and white film is of the jazz clubs of the Left Bank where two expatriate musicians, Paul Newman and Sidney Poitier, eke out a living doing what they love.

Newman has ambitions though, he'd like to be a serious composer not a trombonist all his life. Poitier has come to Paris for reasons of the race problems in the USA.

Into their lives two American tourists come, Joanne Woodward and Diahann Carroll. A couple of dual romances commence.

Carroll and Poitier have a spirited debate over civil rights. The movement is getting into high gear in America and Carroll wants him to return and be part of it. No thanks, says Poitier, he just wants to do his jazz thing where his skin color isn't anyone's problem least of all his own.

Interestingly Carroll was doing a kind of warm up for another part of a black woman in Paris on Broadway the following year in Richard Rodgers, No Strings. In that play she falls for an expatriate writer played by Richard Kiley. An interracial romance, one of the first shown on the Broadway stage, still a lot of the same issues were in that show.

Paris Blues is a different slice of Parisian life for an American film to explore. All four leads do just fine, though the film probably doesn't rank in the top work of any of them.

Lots of jazz music for the aficionado. And of course the presence of the incomparable Louis Armstrong. The highlight of the film is the jam session with those two ersatz musicians Newman and Poitier.

The way Satchmo is received by the public only proves the truth of that line he sang in High Society about the way the French love American jazz.

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