Paris: The Luminous Years—Toward the Making of the Modern

This PBS-aired documentary succeeds in synthesizing about 25 years of essential art history into two riveting hours, bringing to life Paris in its modernist heyday of 1904 to around 1930. Director Perry Miller Adato ropes in all the usual academic suspects for commentary: musicologists, literary historians, professors emeritus, art historians, and so forth. From the bohemian proto-modernist Montmartre triumvirate of Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, and the poet Apollinaire, to Marcel Duchamp and the Dadaists of the 1920s and 1930s, the film barrels through the developmental history of modern art with comprehensive agility. In addition to the aforementioned “Picasso Gang,” the documentary showcases an extraordinary parade of luminaries whose artistic paths crossed with Parisian society during these years, from Ernest Hemingway to Gertrude Stein, from Nijinsky to Stravinsky. Adato wisely avoids dealing with any particular artistic discipline in a vacuum; the emphasis here is on the collective mindset and interaction among writers, artists, musicians, and dancers that turned modernist art into a powerful and cohesive (but still incredibly varied) movement. Paris: The Luminous Years combines grainy period footage with contemporary panoramic shots of Paris as the visual accompaniment to surprisingly stimulating input from the academic experts, whose effusive commentary transcends the usual Sahara-dry professor-speak. Highly recommended. Aud: C, P. (M. Sandlin)