Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs and I are watching movies that take place in Paris this spring.

Up this week was Paris Blue, which isn’t as happy or cheerful as the other two we watched but it’s the real Paris in the 1960s at the height of the Jazz movement. It shows the difference between the U.S. and France when it came to how black people were treated, the way Jazz was exploding around the world at the time, but especially Paris, and just what Paris of the 60s was like.

It also shows the struggles musicians often have with trying to break into the business and become more than a musician simply entertaining a small group in a Jazz club.

The movie was shot in Paris and was based on a book Harold Flenders 1957 novel.

The movie stars Paul Newman as Ram Bowen, a famous jazz trombonist who is trying to become even more famous while living and working in Paris. He plays the music but now he wants to also write it and become even more famous.

He and his friend Eddie Cook, portrayed by Sidney Poitier, play in a band together, attracting music lovers who aren’t at the club to drink but to really take in the music.

It’s clear right from the beginning that Ram can be your stereotypical temperamental musician. He finishes playing a piece for Eddie and wants his opinion,  but when Eddie seems less enthusiastic than he hoped, Ram pops off some frustration at his friend.

“If you don’t like it, just tell me,” he says.

Eddie assures he likes the music just fine and tells Ram to calm down.

The next day Ram is in the city at the trainstation, along with a bunch of screaming young women who are excited for a musician named Wild Man Moore, who is arriving to play a concert. We are shown Ram is fairly well-known when a young woman stops him and asks for his autograph.

Ram hops the now stopped train with a folder of music in his hand and we aren’t sure what he’s going to do but before he gets to his destination, he runs into Connie (Diahann Carroll) trying to communicate with a French-speaking porter who is trying to take her bags for her.

Ram zeroes right in on Connie, a cocky smirk crossing his mouth, signaling that he is ready to flirt. She tells him she’s waiting for her friend who she is on vacation with, looks him up and down and adds, “She’s white.”

Ram quips, “She might be hard to pick out. There are a lot of white girls in Paris and they all look alike.”

A few minutes later we will learn that Connie’s friend is a pretty blond with short hair named Lillian (Joanne Woodward…Paul’s wife in real life, which is one reason they click so well in the movie).

When Lillian does show up, Ram is quite dismissive of her and that continues later that night after the friends show up at the club to hear him play. He had invited Connie to come but she didn’t want to. Lillian, however, wanted to because she’s heard Ram’s records and wants to hear him live. It is clear she has a pretty big crush on him by the way she looks at him.

Connie does agree to go and when she does and gets out of the taxis and sees Eddie…well…hello — she’s happy to be there, shall we say.

Eddie and Connie are used to the idea of segregation from the United States. White man with the white woman and black man with the black girl. Ram doesn’t care about those rules in Paris and his eye is on Connie through the first part of the movie.

He makes that very clear when the club closes and Eddie says they all should go out for breakfast. He’s flat out rude to Lillian and Connie both when Connie resists. Eddie, Connie, and Lillian call him out on it.

He ends up offering a very fake and snotty apology and then softens and offers a sincere one, saying he needs to decline the breakfast invitation because he’s in a bad mood.

Lillian watches him leave, still enamored with him despite his rudeness and maybe because of it and his bad boy image.

The race issue will come up later in the movie as well, by the way, and while it is a big part of the movie, it is not the only focus.

The other focus is Ram and his all-consuming desire to become successful, no matter who he hurts.

The race issue is an overarching issue because at this time Paris was a refuge for black musicians — a place they could perform and express themselves without being judged as “less than” because of their race.

This movie isn’t a happy movie in many ways. It deals with drug addiction, depression, failed expectations, etc., but the music and acting were great.

While I don’t want to give away too much of the film, I do think it is worth mentioning that the original screenplay and the book coupled the white man with the black woman and the black man with the white woman.

It was later decided that America wasn’t yet ready for such a “revolutionary” idea so, at the last minute, the decision was made to made the two black people  a couple and the two white people a couple.  What I won’t say is what happens to the two couples by the end of the movie.

Ram and Lillian will eventually start an affair while Eddie starts one with Connie. According to an article on TCM.com the affair between Diahann and Sidney was almost real after they’d fallen in love during the filming of Porgy and Bess (1959). Both stayed with their spouses but the tension was real on the set of Paris Blues.

Sidney’s family was even with him on location during the filming.

I got the feeling while watching this movie that these actors were just having a blast together, not only the couples. They were laughing and messing around, which I am sure was part of the script, but it also seemed extremely genuine. There were also tense moments, of course. I wasn’t a fan of how the women seemed to want to change the men in only two weeks and  how Connie was trying to tell Eddie that he had to come back to the US and fight for all black people when he was simply happy with how kind and normal he was treated in Paris.  

The whole movie might just be worth the trauma of some of the topics in the movie, if just to see the ten-minute jam with Louis Armstrong and his band and Ram (Paul) and his band.  That and to watch four physically beautiful people interact and enjoy each other’s company.

I’ve watched this movie before, so I previously researched to see if he actually learned to play the trombone for the movie and he did. He was coached by composer Billy Byers. He did not play the music on the soundtrack, however. That went to Murray McEachern. The soundtrack and score was composed by Duke Ellington, who was nominated for an Oscar. The soundtrack was also performed by Ellington with Louis Armstrong showing up for two of the songs on the soundtrack.

There are some great lines and exchanges in this movie.

Eddie to Lillian: “That’s because you are one of the day people and we are of the night.”

Lillian laughs. “Do you think they can mix?

Eddie grins. “Well, I certainly wouldn’t want one of them marrying my sister.”

Have you seen this one? 

If you want to read Erin’s impression of the movie, visit her blog here.

Up next on our schedule is Hugo.

If you have watched any of the movies on our list and shared your thoughts on your blog you can link up below.

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Additional resources: Paris Blues review:

https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/16151/paris-blues/#articles-reviews?articleId=17728

https://fresh.inlinkz.com/js/widget/load.js?id=c0efdbe6b4add43dd7ef