The producer was making two short films on Paris to be shown in schools as a learning resource for kids learning French, and needed two native French kids to narrate and present the films so she was put in touch with ME because, well, I HAVE KIDS. (Not literally...) So, Juliette was up for it (I helped her out by featuring in a podcast for her school work) and she brought along a male friend, Pierre, to also present the short films. One is called 'Un Journee a Paris' (A Day in Paris), and the other is about the fetes and celebrations in France, such as Easter, Galette de Roi and Bastille Day. We met the film crew on Saturday morning at their hotel, and set off round Paris to film. It was so exciting, and so cool - we got VIP passes to the Eiffel Tower, so went in a private lift to the top without having to queue which was pretty awesome! We took taxi's round Paris to the monuments and filmed at L'Arc de Triomphe, Eiffel Tower and the Louvre, and then we were at Notre Dame at 9am this morning, and then back to L'Arc de Triomphe and then down the Champs Elysees... it was so amazing, and so incredible to see how films are made - we filmed so many 'fillers' such as people walking down the Champs Elysees and around Notre Dame, and Juliette and Pierre walking towards the camera or into a metro station - so when everything's being spliced together and shortened from about 60 hours of footage to 18 minutes of film, we have extra scenes if we decide to have a voice-over whilst showing views of Paris or things that relate to the script.
The crew were absolutely fab, and half of them spoke fluent French as well, and Juliette and Pierre spoke really good English, so we were all just chopping and changing languages whenever. I felt so intelligent! :) And it was just such good fun, being with ENGLISH PEOPLE - friends of my Aunt and Granny, so we had connections, and they were just generally such great people! We had a lot of good laughs. One of my jobs was holding the reflector screen, which reflects light rays (e.g. the sun) onto Juliette and Pierre's faces when they're on camera to avoid shadows. You get them in the dreaded School Photo sessions... I also have to add that I did an absolutely awesome job at getting us around the Eiffel Tower Second Level - it was absolutely jam-packed with people queuing, so to their disgust, I marched right through them holding our guest passes and with the film entourage behind me all the way round the Eiffel Tower. :)
I think filming at the Louvre was my favourite place because despite not being able to actually film in the courtyard by the glass pyramid, we went round with a camera taking really fast single-shot sequences of Juliette and Pierre running, jumping, doing crazy poses etc to put them into a polaroid-photo effect in the movie for variety. I'm so excited to see the film when it's all been cut and edited - it's going to look absolutely fabulous and so professional, but with the difference that I was beside the camera!
It was such an amazing experience though, and so much fun! So great to see Paris from a filming point of view, and always good to see the monuments with someone else beside you. Definitely one for the CV and an extra unique memory of my time in Paris!
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