Pepe le Pew breaks into a perfume shop and faces off with the owner’s female cat. Only children’s entertainment of this era would include sexual overtones (it’s French, so it’s OK) and suicides! Winner of the Best Short Subject (Cartoon) Oscar of 1950.

Print Courtesy of the National Film and Sound Archive

Dear God, that is a seriously cheesy title. I do hope this movie isn’t a cheap sleazy knock-off like its title. Sorry, but it had to be said, if only to get it out of the way.

Ok, ok, ok. About the movie: it’s got John Travolta (as FBI agent Charlie Wax). Yeah, yeah, John’s getting on a bit – I’ve read he’s actually really bald now – but he’s not all that bad looking, and he’s been in a lot of good things. It’s also got Jonathan Rhys Meyers (as James Reece, an employee at the US embassy in Paris). He’s also been in a lot of good things, and is younger and much cuter for those who want male eye-candy. It’s got some hot chicks in it – it has to; after all it’s called From Paris With Love, and there will be sex scenes. Well, brief ones.

Um, what else? Oh yeah, plot: there’s gonna be a terrorist attack on Paris. Our stars are the good guys. The other guys are the bad guys. The good guys will waste the bad guys. Seriously large amounts of blood and violence. And drugs. And prostitutes. And cool dialogue: “Shoot the f*cker.”. “Next time I tell you to shoot the f*cker, shoot the f*cker!” And so on. You get the picture.

Ok, maybe it will be a sleazy action knock-off (but it won’t have been cheap, not with livestock like the lead actors) but what the hell, when has that ever stopped a real action-lovin’ guy seeing a real action movie? And you may even be able to con your woman into coming and seeing it with you if you tell her it’s about Paris and Love. Ok, that really was cheap and sleazy, I’d better stop now. Just see the damn movie, ok?