COOL STUFF

Check This Out: Unique 'Life of Pi' Floating Boats Screening in Paris

by Alex Billington
December 7, 2012
Source: EW, Movies.com

This is a great example of a Hollywood publicity stunt gone right. Perfect execution, unique concept, works for the movie and plays online wonderfully after. EW (via Movies.com) recently wrote about a movie event that happened in Paris, France called L'Odyssée de Pi: Cinéma sur l'eau - which directly translates to The Odyssey of Pi: Cinema on the Water. Fox France held a premiere screening, with the help of the City of Paris, of Ang Lee's wonderful Life of Pi—a must see if you haven't yet—inside the Piscine Pailleron swimming pool, a listed building in Paris. If you've read the book or seen the movie, that's how Pi gets his name. The audience sat in "Tsimtsum" lifeboats, complete with life jackets, to watch the 3D movie. Amazing.

The event was captured on video via YouTube, of course, for online promotion and it's worth watch. If only to make you jealous that you weren't there, in France, to experience this kind of screening yourself. The contents of the video described best by EW: "from boats being pushed into the pool to a red carpet rolled out next to the pool to fashionable Parisian audience members brightly proclaiming 'magnifique!'" Watch here:

"The next part of the story you will find hard to believe." If you haven't seen Life of Pi yet, be sure to catch it (my review). I really enjoyed this video and screening publicity "stunt" - I wish I had been there! Great idea. For a few more photos of the event, click over to EW.com. Bravo, Fox. I'm a big fan of Life of Pi and I hope it continues to get awards acclaim this season, it deserves plenty. Even actor Ewan McGregor tweeted about loving it: "I saw 'The Life of Pi' last night. It's absolutely wonderful. I want to see it again and again."

Life of Pi is the story of an Indian boy named Pi, a zookeeper's son who finds himself in the company of a hyena, zebra, orangutan, and a Bengal tiger after a shipwreck sets them adrift in the Pacific. Life of Pi, based on Yann Martel's novel, is being directed in 3D by Oscar winning Taiwanese filmmaker Ang Lee, of Taking Woodstock, Lust Caution, Brokeback Mountain, Hulk and Crouching Tiger previously. The cast includes Irrfan Khan, Adil Hussain and Tabu, in addition to the animals and Pi. 20th Century Fox first released Life of Pi in theaters in 3D on November 21st - it's currently playing, check local listings. Jeremy's review.

Filed under Cool Stuff, Feat, Movie News, To Watch

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