the museums of Paris

Loved the Musée d'Orsay, which had a fascinating pastel series among other goodies. Unfortunately, the line to get into the Picasso/Manet exhibit was repressively long, so we missed that.

The Musée du Cinéma was next, and while it was heavily centered on technicality (there were endless cameras from the late 19th/early 20th century; cool stuff, but not what really excites me about cinema), there was still lots for me to love. Particularly awesome was a vast exhibit about Georges Méliès, a heavily influential director from the early 1900's who was one of the first filmmakers to blend reality and imagination on screen. I knew next to nothing about him before my visit here, and there are few things I love more than discovering a great new director, so I left the museum with a DVD of most of his shorts. Can't wait to watch them this week. Other highlights included the original gears from Chaplin's Modern Times (1936) and some dazzling prints from Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927) and M (1931), and much of Murnau's work - I'm now eager to revisit Faust (1926), which I didn't much care for five years ago.

That Salvador Dali was one wacky fellow. The Dali musem was great; after spending an hour there, it's pretty evident why he and Buñuel were close! Their minds work in ways that I can't even comprehend, and I consider myself a pretty creative guy. His multiple images of the melted watch on various forms is just brilliant, as is the montage of photographs of his mustache at work (yes, really). I loved everything about his art - talk about up my alley.

We also visited the prison where Marie Antoinette was held, which was really cool, and visited the Arc de Triomphe, which was magnificent to look at from the outside and packed some sort of view from the top. Talk about panoramic! Also, Notre Dame is pretty stunning.

Today, we're heading to another museum or two, and to possibly tour the catacombs. This damn sleeping 'til 12 thing isn't helping, though!