Driven to Paris by her grandmother’s tales of glamorous Paris, Jessica (Cecile De France) of Mâcon heads to the City of Light, but like her grandmother (Eve Ruggieri), Jessica might be able to work around luxury, but is she able to live it? That’s the premise, if not the underlying theme of Daniele Thompson’s film “Avenue Montaigne,” released Tuesday on DVD.
In French with English subtitles, the film’s original title is “Fauteuils d’orchestre.”
“I couldn’t live in luxury,” says the grandmother that raised her after her parents’ death when she was just 4, but at least she could work among it at her job at The Ritz.
Of course, the sparkling, star-lit world that Jessica finds when she takes a job as a waitress at an Avenue Montaigne café -- where she is the first woman ever to be hired -- is glamorous and she arrives at just the right moment.
Famous TV soap star Catherine Fersen (Valerie Lemercier) – Jessica and her grandma are big fans – is in a play at the theater across the street. Renowned concert pianist Jean-Francois Lefort (Albert Dupontel) has a big concert in a hall there and next door in the auction rooms, self-made millionaire Jacques Grumberg (Claude Brasseur) is liquidating a lifetime’s collection of modern art.
But despite their celebrity, Jessica soon discovers that the rich, famous and talented are no less tortured than everyone else, by sickness, by love, by self-doubt, dissatisfaction, and pain.
Fersen wants to do serious roles but her celebrity (“It’s not my fault they love me!”) prevents film directors considering her. Lefort loves music but is frustrated by the world of classical music and his celebrity, too. Grumberg, despite having a stunning young woman on his arm, misses the love of his life – the mother of his adult son Frederic (Christopher Thompson, who co-wrote the script with the director).
Claudie, who works at the theater complex where the concert and play are taking place worked at the Olympia for 30 years and there she rubbed shoulders -- and perhaps more -- with Becaud and the other pop stars she loved. Without an ear for classical music, she relives her glory years via an iPod and a room full of memorabilia.
Jessica’s boss at the café has a haughty demeanor and an inability to shake an icy exterior that hides God knows what.
Jessica, with her eager attitude, her youthful curiosity, her searching eyes and her open ears, manages to befriend this entire tortured cast of luxurious characters and helps them see their way forward.
De France is especially engaging as the naïve, sometimes agog Jessica, whose lust for life keeps her afloat even when she has no place to live or sleep in Paris. She watches the trials and tribulations of these stars and it doesn’t diminish her own joie di vivre, even if that spirit wanes occasionally.
Daniele Thompson has sketched an interesting portrait of lives at the crossroads and the ways that causal encounters with strangers or mild acquaintances can provide insight to weary minds.
“Avenue Montaigne” is deceptive. It feels bright most of the time – thanks to Jessica – but it takes a serious look at life and it is radiant with hope. That’s not a bad thing these days, is it?
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
