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‘Eiffel’ Review: Tony French Meller Concocts Trite Romance as the Inspiration for the Eiffel Tower

This polished period piece seems more interested in telling a made-up love story than in capturing the fascinating true story of Gustave Eiffel's triumph.

By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge

Chief Film Critic

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A handsome if occasionally harebrained addition to the “great man” genre — with the added implication that such heroic feats might not have occurred were it not for an equally impressive lady working behind the scenes — “ Eiffel ” offers the half-invented story of Gustave Eiffel, the civil engineer who built the most recognizable monument in the world.

From the opening seconds, the 2.66:1 CinemaScope aspect ratio is a clue that this project was not designed to capture the vertical progress of the Eiffel Tower’s construction (if that were the case, an upright iPhone screen might be better suited). Rather, director Martin Bourboulon ’s choice to shoot in the same ultra-wide format as “The Bridge on the River Kwai” signals that the movie will remain firmly rooted at ground level, focused on Eiffel the man ( Romain Duris , a modern French star with the right mix of surliness and sensitivity for the role) and the more melodramatic details of his personal life.

Not a biopic so much as a sketchy piece of historical fiction, “Eiffel” identifies itself as “librement inspiré de faits reels,” which roughly translates to “a made-up crock of hooey.” Then again, bait-and-switching dry factual events for a sudsy affair between lovers from separate classes worked well enough for “Titanic” — although that movie had the sinking of an ocean liner up its sleeve. As with James Cameron’s film, audiences already know the ending (though it was intended to come down after the 1889 World’s Fair, the Eiffel Tower still stands), but Bourboulon’s in no position to deliver such a spectacular climax.

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Since the filmmaker can’t afford to show much of late 19th-century Paris, much as we might like to see it, he focuses his dynamic energy (the characters and cameras are constantly moving) on delivering impressive views of the tower’s support struts coming together in an empty field, building to a stirring scene where the massive legs are first raised, then lowered to achieve the first level. Safer still, Bourboulon hatches a second-rate romance, rather than detailing the rich, real-life drama that swirled around Eiffel’s controversial endeavor. He’s set out to concoct a “Citizen Kane”-style Rosebud at the foundation of the 300-meter iron landmark. Since we’re dealing with how France’s most famous phallic symbol came to be erected, it stands to reason that the motive should be a woman.

To inspire such a feat, it can’t be just any old dame. By the late 1880s, when the tower was commissioned, Eiffel was a world-famous celebrity, having built bridges, railway stations and the skeleton that undergirds the Statue of Liberty. According to Jill Jonnes’ “Eiffel’s Tower” (a worthy read for those interested in the backstory), the young Eiffel struck out on several marriage prospects, eventually enlisting his mother’s help in finding a wife. “Really, what I need is a good housekeeper who won’t get on my nerves too much, who will be as faithful as possible, and who will give me fine children,” he wrote at the time.

That’s not at all how one might describe Adrienne Bourgès, the proto-feminist firecracker Bourboulon introduces as Eiffel’s love interest (embodied by relative newcomer Emma Mackey of Netflix series “Sex Education,” with her big eyes, strong jaw and architectural cheekbones). Much of the movie is told through flashback, memories that come flooding in while Eiffel sketches (or rather, endlessly traces designs of) his tower. And so, we meet Adrienne more than two decades after Eiffel did, upon the occasion of an awkward reunion — a dinner party where Eiffel, who’d earlier been seen dismissing a project of no utility to the public, suddenly announces his intention to build an iron tower twice the height of the recently completed Washington Monument.

According to Eiffel’s vision, the structure will be accessible to everybody — “no more class divisions,” he declares. This admirable goal might sound political, although in fact, the comment is meant as a rebuke to Adrienne, whose relatively well-to-do family wouldn’t let them marry all those years earlier. The fact that Eiffel doesn’t realize the true reason she jilted him lends the film its tragic dimension — that and the obstacle that she is now married to an old acquaintance of his, Antoine de Restac (Pierre Deladonchamps).

A tricky isosceles triangle forms a s Eiffel and Adrienne rekindle their earlier passions — although Adrienne soon realizes there’s another party competing for her lover’s attention: the famous dame de fer (or “iron lady”), the tower itself. Seeing as how her husband holds the sort of influence with the press, financiers and committee that could cancel the project, Adrienne ultimately decides to abandon the affair so that Eiffel can complete his creation. While poetic, this development implies that the tower’s detractors may not have been sincere in their opposition, but merely manipulated by Restac’s petty personal agenda (to save his marriage). In fact, the monument’s opponents — which included such prominent figures as author Guy de Maupassant and painter Ernest Meissonier — were aesthetically scandalized, decrying the industrial-looking blemish on the Paris skyline as “useless and monstrous” and an “odious column of bolted metal.” 

Alas, this revisionist idea deprives audiences of the fascinating historical conflict at the heart of the tower’s construction. A more honest telling ought to reflect a sad truth about human nature: More often than not, our species resists bold innovation, such that many beloved landmarks went up against harsh criticism when they were first announced. Consider the newly opened Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles, which overcame a yearslong whisper campaign against its out-there design and off-the-charts cost, or such Paris fixtures as the Centre Pompidou (still considered an eyesore by some) and the unpopular new canopy of Les Halles, both of which — like the Eiffel Tower — clashed with the redesigned style of the city implemented just a few decades earlier by Baron Haussmann.

Perhaps Bourboulon found the initial resistance to the project and the dramatic change in public sentiment too bureaucratic for his purposes, focusing instead on the effective yet largely fictionalized romance. But what use is such invention? By the time the film’s corny penultimate shot arrives — a nod to the tower’s A-like form that makes it impossible to unsee the influence of Eiffel’s imaginary muse — it’s not at all clear how the job actually got done. At least one thing is certain: We should be grateful he didn’t fall for someone named Wanda.

Reviewed at COLCOA film festival, Los Angeles, Nov. 6, 2021. Running time: 108 MIN.

• Production: (France) A Blue Fox Entertainment (in U.S.), Pathé Films (in France) release of a VVZ Prod., Pathé Films production, in co-production with Scope Pictures, Constantin Film Produktion, M6 Films, in association with Sofica Sofitvcine 7, Cofimage 31, Cofinova 31, SG Image 2019, Indefilms 8. (World sales: Pathé Films, Paris.) Executive producer: Vanessa Van Zuylen.
• Crew: Director: Martin Bourboulon. Screenplay: Caroline Bongrand, Thomas Bidegain, Martin Bourboulon, Natalie Carter, Martin Brossolet. Camera: Matias Boucard. Editor: Virginie Bruant. Music: Alexandre Desplat.
• With: Romain Duris, Emma Mackey, Pierre Deladonchamps, Alexandre Steiger, Armande Boulanger, Bruno Raffaelli.

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You might think that a movie about the construction of one of the most iconic structures in the world would be carefully put together. But that is not the case with the sumptuous, often frustrating “Eiffel,” the story of a man whose name is as joined to the Tower emblematic of Paris as the 133-year-old beams that are still sturdily riveted (not bolted) together.

There is no surprise in this story about whether Eiffel can overcome bureaucratic, engineering, and financial problems to get it built, with even the Pope objecting because it would overshadow the Notre Dame cathedral. The Eiffel Tower has been visited by more than 300 million tourists and is as indispensable an element in the establishing shot of any Parisian story as someone carrying a baguette home for dinner or bal-musette music on the soundtrack.

In the first moments of the film we go from Gustave Eiffel (a magnetic Romain Duris ) sketching the tower and envisioning a future ceremony celebrating its opening to three years earlier. In a misguided attempt to add some suspense to the story, the movie continues to hop back and forth in time, with scenes of a fictional thwarted love story between Eiffel and the daughter of a wealthy family named Adrienne (the enticingly sloe-eyed Emma Mackey ). As attractive as the couple is, those scenes do not have the dramatic impact they are intended to. Instead, they are a distraction from the more interesting story of the many obstacles the tower's construction had to overcome. A note just before the credits trying to tie the Tower to Adrienne more directly is overkill in large part because, see above, the love story is made up.

Though he was not the sole designer of the Tower, Eiffel and the true story of its construction are plenty interesting enough to fill a movie, especially one as sumptuously designed as this one, with fine work from cinematographer Matias Boucard . The scenes of designing and building the Tower are genuinely powerful, and even if we know it will be built, it is worthwhile to be reminded what made it consequential before it was the site of innumerable Instagram posts. Eiffel, already well established for his bridges, was even granted honorary American citizenship for his work on France’s gift to the United States, the Statue of Liberty. The sculptor was Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, but it was Eiffel and the staff of his engineering company who created the interior structure that kept her standing and kept her torch held high. He was initially not interested in building a tower that was originally intended as a temporary structure for the entrance to the 1889 world’s fair. “I want to build a Metro, not a monument,” he says. And there were many other people who were not interested in his building it. The story deserves better than a character yelling “It’s madness!” at Eiffel. 

Of course he finally decides to do it, with a vision of an edifice taller than the Washington Monument, “France’s revenge on history.” He insists it must be open to everyone, regardless of class or wealth. He is eloquent and inspiring when appearing before financiers: “I am merely a man with an idea grander than myself. I ask only that you let me breathe life into it.” And again, when he speaks to the exhausted and underpaid workers, with his version of a St. Crispin’s Day speech, telling them that it is their tower, not just his. The scenes of the construction itself are very well staged, and because we have seen Eiffel explain the ingenious watertight metal caissons and injected compressed air he used to secure the tower, we are glad to see how they work.

But that keeps being interrupted by the less interesting scenes of the romance, with the over-familiar storyline of disapproving parents who think he is not good enough for their daughter and the less familiar-and-should-remain-so musical chairs birthday party game. Duris and Mackey set off some sparks, especially during a dance with steps matching the back-and-forth of their conversation, but while we do not find out until late in the film what prevented them from being together, their story does not add sufficient drama to make the wait worthwhile. "Eiffel" tries to be a Francophone version of “ Shakespeare in Love .” Yet while that historical film also took great liberties with a romantic storyline, its love story informed the main character as he shaped his play and underscored the underlying themes of the film. "Eiffel" is only a flimsy fantasy retcon in comparison.

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Nell Minow is the Contributing Editor at RogerEbert.com.

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Film credits.

Eiffel (2022)

Rated R for some sexuality/nudity.

108 minutes

Romain Duris as Gustave Eiffel

Emma Mackey as Adrienne Bourgès

Pierre Deladonchamps as Antoine Restac

Armande Boulanger as Claire Eiffel

Andranic Manet as Adolphe Salles

Alexandre Steiger as Jean Compagnon

Philippe Hérisson as Edouard Lockroy

Jérémie Petrus as Edmond

• Martin Bourboulon
• Caroline Bongrand
• Thomas Bidegain
• Nathalie Carter
• Martin Brossollet

Cinematographer

• Matias Boucard
• Virginie Bruant
• Valérie Deseine
• Alexandre Desplat

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'Eiffel': Trailer, Plot, Release Date, and Everything We Know So Far

'Eiffel' tells the story of the man who created the iconic Eiffel Tower in Paris, and it's coming to US theaters on June 3.

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Is there a trailer for eiffel, when will eiffel be released, what is eiffel about, who is in the cast of eiffel, how has eiffel been received globally.

What's more romantic in Paris than wandering along the Seine, spying the Eiffel Tower, and having a picnic underneath, all whilst basking in its breathtaking beauty? You may say munching on a fresh baguette slathered with only the finest cheese, and accompanied by a glass of champagne, but you'd, unfortunately, be wrong. It's the love story behind the structure, of course! Tourists have swarmed the iconic landmark since its erection in the 1800s, and now centuries later, people can finally discover the inspiration behind its origins, all whilst munching on popcorn and lounging in their local movie theater.

Eiffel was released in 2021, circulating amongst the French film festivals internationally, and it's the biopic period drama that you never knew you needed, or I'm sure, never realized truly existed. The film is inspired by the story of Gustave Eiffel , a French engineer who, upon completing his collaboration for the Statue of Liberty, was pestered by the French government to create an astounding piece for the 1889 Paris World Fair. Initially uninspired by the notion, Eiffel instead argued that he wanted to design the Paris subway. But what ignites inspiration? Love, of course.

The film is both a testament to the structure and the man who built it. What's particularly gratifying is that the film is authentically French in that it is a French production, told in the language. This has added an entirely new layer to the storytelling, which audiences everywhere are sure to revel in. Here's everything you need to know about the film.

RELATED: ‘Blast’ Trailer: A Family Is Trapped in a Car Wired to a Bomb in French High-Concept Thriller [Exclusive]

The official trailer for Eiffel was released on June 10 in 2021. The trailer is a terrific taste of what the film has to offer, particularly displaying a fluent French-speaking cast in all of their glory. Viewers can also see the extent of the brilliant visual effects, with the famous Eiffel Tower in varying stages of being built. Watch the trailer to see for yourself!

First released in March 2021 at the Alliance Francaise French Film Festival in Australia, the film was later released to French audiences on October 13 of the same year by Pathé. The film is being released to US theaters by Blue Fox Entertainment on June 3, 2022, for a limited screening.

Eiffel is a historical drama set in Paris in the late 19th century. A tale loosely based on the life and love of engineer, Gustave Eiffel, the movie shows how the French government persuades Eiffel to create a magnificent structure for the Paris World Fair. The audience then meets Adrienne, a woman from Eiffel's past.

As the plot thickens, it becomes apparent that she is the inspiration for his magnificent work - the Eiffel Tower. Besides being a beacon of French engineering and creativity, it also becomes the concrete symbol of the love Eiffel holds for Adrienne. The film is broken between the present moment of 1889, interspersed with fragments of their past, showcasing a beautiful story of where the characters have come from, and what their motives are. These segments of the film are graced with the scenic locations that only France has to offer, making for a cinematic masterpiece.

Related: The Best Period Dramas and Historical Shows on Netflix Right Now

Playing the famed engineer is French actor, Romain Duris . He is perhaps most well known for his role in Cedric Klapisch 's Spanish Apartment trilogy, L'Auberge Espagnole (2002), Russian Dolls (2005), and Chinese Puzzle (2013). Duris won several awards for his role as Thomas Seyr in The Beat That My Heart Skipped (2005), including the Lumieres Award for Best Actor, and was nominated for the European Film Award for Best Actor. More recently, Duris's 2022 film, Final Cut , was released on May 17 for the opening of the Cannes Film Festival. The film is a zombie comedy based on the Japanese film One Cut of the Dead .

Playing the enchanting and beguiling love interest of Gustave Eiffel, Adrienne Bourgès, is none other than Sex Education 's Emma Mackey . The British-French actress made a name for herself in the popular Netflix series, which premiered in 2019, with Season 4 due to be released in September 2022. With a French father, it's no wonder that Mackey so casually tackles the role of Adrienne, effortlessly displaying her French language skills. Not only that, but the film showcases just how diverse Mackey's acting abilities truly are. Playing a character in Eiffel who arguably could be described as the polar opposite of Maeve Wiley in Sex Education , Mackey's performance only convinces us even more that she's truly a force to be reckoned with. Mackey has certainly had a busy couple of years, with not only the hype surrounding the popular series that has made her a household name, but some major films that are due to be released within the next year. With Death on the Nile now behind her, her next on-screen appearances will be in the highly-anticipated Barbie film in 2023 directed by Greta Gerwig , and the historical biopic Emily , where the actress will star as the famous writer Emily Brontë .

Appearing alongside Mackey and Duris is French actor Pierre Deladonchamps . Known for his starring role in the thriller Stranger by the Lake (2013), he went on to win the Cesar Award for Most Promising Actor. He also received a nomination for the Cesar Award for Best Actor for his performance in the 2016 film A Kid .

Eiffel toured the world in 2021 as an addition to the Alliance Francaise Film Festivals, where it received phenomenal reviews. The largest French production of 2020, the film was highly anticipated as a part of the 2021 festival after the event was interrupted due to COVID the previous year.

As far as the Eiffel Tower goes, people across the globe still flock to the impressive structure every day. Paris is already known as the city of love, and for people who see this film, the famed structure will evoke an even greater sense of lust and passion (even if the love story is exaggerated). An impressive structure erected for the glory of France and its ingenuity, or erected for love? Watch the movie and decide for yourself!

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‘Eiffel’: Review

By Lisa Nesselson 2021-10-11T06:00:00+01:00

• No comments

An old-fashioned homage to France’s towering genius

Source: Pathé, VVZ Production © Antonin Menichetti

Dir: Martin Bourboulon. France-Germany. 2021. 108mins

The Eiffel Tower rose in two years without power tools or computers or construction cranes. Martin Bourboulon’s ambitious, handsomely appointed and unapologetically old-fashioned Eiffel took 25 years to make it to the screen and that’s almost certainly a good thing since digital effects can now convincingly render the various stages of the so-called “staircase to infinity” with startling realism. Forced to re-schedule its French release several times due to the pandemic, this enjoyable slice of popular entertainment — starring Romain Duris and Emma Mackey and with a title which will ring bells with prospective film-goers — should attract audiences worldwide following its October 13 domestic debut.

Issues of class, wealth and power are woven into the tale but this is a bittersweet love story at heart

It’s enjoyable for us, as viewers, to know that the 300 metre tower (as it was then known) will indeed get built when Gustave Eiffel himself, skeptical creditors and his mostly loyal but sometimes unpaid workers have no such certainty. The late 1880s were a time of incredible invention and upheaval and Eiffel was intent on pursuing challenges he could call “modern”. Eiffel’s real-life track record of impressive exploits and setbacks is far too rich to cover in any one film. So Eiffe l narrows its focus by pairing name-recognition with informed speculation about “why” he went from showing scant interest in contributing a structure to the 1889 World’s Fair (he was keen on designing a mass transit system, the Metropolitan) to being hell-bent on devising and constructing the tallest man-made thing to date.

Cherchez la femme.

As the film opens, Eiffel (Duris) has quite recently devised the armature for France’s gift to the USA — the Statue of Liberty. That the same visionary engineer was synonymous with two hard-to-miss pieces of visual shorthand for entire nations is cause enough to have his own film. The charge may be leveled that  this peppy, well-acted venture is a French film trying too hard to be a Hollywood-style affair. Yet with technical gusto on tap, the French film industry needn’t apologise for delving into the life of a real French figure (Abel Gance’s Napoleon , anyone?).

Eiffel, who came from a modest background, was a widower with children who not only had to conceive the tower, he had to inspire the workers who built it. His motivation, the film posits, was to impress a recently re-discovered long lost love. Twenty-five years after incidents that are doled out with the right mix of flashbacks and emotional secrecy, he crosses paths with one Adrienne Bourgès (Emma Mackey), now the wife of an influential newspaper columnist (Pierre Deladonchamps), whose support the marketing-conscious Eiffel needs in order to erect an unavoidably prominent iron structure upon the relatively sedate Paris landscape.

Romain Duris looks fetching in period garb (he played the title gentleman thief in 2004’s big screen Arsène Lupin ) as does Mackey ( Sex Education on Netflix), who is both convincing and fun to watch as a seemingly spoiled young beauty schooled in frivolity and seduction who turns out to have a deeper personality than appearances would suggest.

The scenes in which the feet of the tower seem destined to sink into bog and muck and the hold-your-breath suspense surrounding the ingenious sand-based system intended to properly align the entire structure are keenly depicted and thoroughly entertaining. (The Vatican is opposed to the tower whose height they believe to be humiliating for Notre Dame cathedral.) Issues of class, wealth and power are woven into the tale but this is a bittersweet love story at heart.

International Sales: Pathé International

Producer: Vanessa Van Zuylen

Screenplay: Caroline Bongrand, Thomas Bidegain, Martin Bourboulon, Natalie Carter, Martin Brossollet

Production Design: Stephane Taillasson

Editor: Valerie Deseine

Cinematography: Matias Boucard

Music: Alexandre Desplat

Main cast: Romain Duris, Emma Mackey, Pierre Deladonchamps, Alexandre Steiger, Armande Boulanger, Bruno Raffaelli

• Pathe France

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Eiffel review – the French engineer’s story as corset-twanging romance

Rather than celebrating the towering achievements of the Paris landmark’s maker, this drama starring Romain Duris centres on a fictional love story

I t’s a persistent area of movie myopia – the idea that science or maths or, in this case, engineering is, on its own, not sexy enough to carry a film. Thus portraits of some of the great minds of the 19th century – Mary Anning in Ammonite , and now engineer Gustave Eiffel – are retrofitted with a doomed romance. The way this conventionally handsome period picture tells it, a chance encounter between Eiffel (a tousled Romain Duris) and the long-lost love of his life, Adrienne (Emma Mackey), inspired the tower itself. Adrienne’s challenge to “be audacious” is the catalyst that prompts Eiffel to abandon his pitch for an egalitarian but unglamorous Métro system as his contribution to the 1889 world’s fair, and to dream big instead. Her initial – A – crafted from 7,300 tonnes of wrought iron , is permanently stamped on the Paris cityscape.

Eiffel is not unentertaining – it would pass the time pleasantly enough on a long-haul flight. Together, Duris and Mackey have a corset-twanging chemistry. But the foregrounding of a fictional romance over a feat of engineering does feel like a missed opportunity. The demure score is a case in point – it’s all decorative ribbons and lace where it could have taken rivets and girders as its inspiration and perhaps met the requirement to be audacious.

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‘Eiffel’ Review: Paris Is for Lovers

Gustave Eiffel, the man behind France’s most well-known landmark, is a passionate lover first, and an engineer second in this tedious 19th century romance.

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By Beatrice Loayza

“Eiffel” is as much of a history lesson as “Titanic” is — in other words, it’s basically not one. It’s more like historical fiction, with the real-life 19th century figure Gustave Eiffel, the man responsible for masterminding France’s most iconic landmark, portrayed as a passionate lover first, and an engineer second.

Played by Romain Duris, Gustave contends with naysayers, striking workers and financial setbacks as he commandeers the grand effort to construct the Eiffel Tower. The director Martin Bourboulon intermittently takes us to the construction site, where men toil away, the metal structure gets progressively taller and Gustave pores over architectural blueprints with a furrowed brow.

But the main intrigue involves his romance with Adrienne (Emma Mackey), a married woman with whom he shares an emotional past. Flashbacks from both Gustave and Adrienne’s perspectives show the star-crossed lovers 20 years back, indulging their carnal desires against fireplace backdrops and Parisian sunsets before Adrienne’s disapproving parents step in. Her unexpected return as Gustave deals with various obstacles to the tower’s completion fuels his creativity and commitment.

The film’s shrugging disregard for historical context would be negligible were the romance not so tedious and clichéd. The tower was originally perceived as a foolhardy venture, which provoked national debates and class tensions. But these forces are only vaguely touched upon — too bad considering that tale’s dramatic potential relative to the humdrum love story whipped up here instead. And one can’t help but wonder if “Eiffel” is merely a lame fantasy or a particularly spineless form of mythmaking, whittling down as it does one nation’s politically loaded event to the equivalent of an Eiffel Tower key chain with an inscription reading “city of love.”

Eiffel Rated R for sex scenes, brief nudity and a suicide attempt. Running time: 1 hour 48 minutes. In theaters.

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The Eiffel Tower, a movie diva 

Wednesday 3 February 2021

Modified the 23/02/24

From animated films to great American movie classics, from adventure to romance, the Eiffel Tower has been featured many times on the big screen!  Enjoy some of these must-see movies that will show you the Eiffel Tower from a new perspective, and delight audiences young and old.

Who filmed the Eiffel Tower for the first time?

It was the Lumière brothers who first featured the Eiffel Tower in a film in 1898, less than 10 years after the Exposition Universelle! "Panorama during the ascent of the Eiffel Tower" is a short film shot from the elevator in which you can see the Trocadero Palace, built for the World's Fair, and its gardens with the Tower in the foreground. This was in the early days of cinema, so it was truly a technological feat that marked the beginning of a long series of productions at the Tower.

The Eiffel Tower at the heart of history and action

The Crazy Ray Director: René Clair Year: 1924 Genre: Science fiction Country: France Synopsis: As day breaks over Paris, Albert, a night watchman at the Eiffel Tower, wakes up and notices something strange: everyone is either asleep or paralyzed. He later realizes that he is one of only 6 people still present in the city who fell asleep during the night. Viewers discover a quiet Tower, with a view over the Champ de Mars from the top floor, the spiral stairs that Gustave Eiffel used to access his office and superb plans of the structure from the summit to the esplanade. In 1928, there was "La Tour” also from René Clair, a fascinating silent short movie and true declaration of love to the Eiffel Tower. In it, the captivated director depicts the imposing metal structure and the monument's mysteries.  The ascent of the Tower is transformed into cinematographic poetry! Watch it on the Cinémathèque website 

Funny Face Director: Stanley Donen  Year: 1957 Genre: Musical Country: United States “Bonjour, Paris!” In this romantic musical starring Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire, the French capital is in the spotlight, with an iconic musical number filmed at the Tower. Audrey Hepburn plays a young bookshop owner from New York who loves philosophy and is sent to Paris to be a model. But on the night of the fashion show, she runs off to meet a philosophy professor she admires. This classic musical, with music by George Gershwin, will put a smile on your face and make you want to go and dance on the Eiffel Tower!

The 400 Blows Director: François Truffaut  Year: 1959 Genre: Drama Country: France In this classic film, which brought François Truffaut and his young actor Jean-Pierre Léaud to public attention, the film's credits are entirely filmed keeping the Eiffel Tower in sight. It's as if the eyes of the director (who loved the monument) couldn't be torn away from it, in a long tracking shot through Paris scored by Jean Constantin. A must-see!  

Zazie in the Metro  Director: Louis Malle Year: 1960 Genre: Comedy Country: France Synopsis: Zazie arrives in Paris from the countryside to visit her uncle for a few days and dreams of riding on the metro. She discovers Paris and especially the Eiffel Tower as she takes the elevator and then the spiral stairs to the top.

The Great Race Director: Blake Edwards Year: 1965 Genre: Comedy Country: United States Synopsis: The greatest car race between New York and Paris is launched, and the competitors can use any means at their disposal to win! This contest pits Professor Fate against his enemy, the Great Leslie, and both encounter a series of adventures before reaching the finish line at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.

A View to a Kill Director: John Glen Year: 1985 Genre: Action Country: United States Synopsis: In this 14th installment of the James Bond series, agent 007 must stop a manufacturer who plans to kill millions of innocent people in order to prevent the distribution of a microchip.  His inquiry takes him to Paris and on a dizzying chase to the Eiffel Tower in which James Bond is pursuing May Day. In a breathtaking scene, the two of them climb the stairs at breakneck speed, straddle the structure and launch themselves into the air.

The True Legend of the Eiffel Tower Director: Simon Brook Year: 2005 Genre: Documentary fiction Country: France Synopsis: In 1884, Gustave Eiffel and his collaborators plan to build the tallest tower in the world for the 1889 World's Fair in Paris. To offer viewers a glimpse of this very real but exceptional adventure, the film tells the story through the eyes of a fictional character, a reporter for Le Petit Journal named Barbier. From the invention of the Eiffel Tower to its unveiling at the World's Fair, this documentary mixes fiction, fact and historical photos to plunge the audience into the 19th century, at the time of the Tower’s construction.

Ballerina Director: Eric Summer, Eric Warin Year: 2016 Genre: Animation Country: France/Canada Synopsis: The story takes place in France at the time of the World’s Fair in 1889. Félicie and Victor, two children, are going to Paris to realize their dreams. Félicie joins the Paris Opera to become a ballerina and Victor learns to be an inventor alongside Gustave Eiffel. Immersed in the late 19th century, we see a half-built Tower in impressive detail with an unobstructed view of Trocadero Palace and its gardens.

Other films that show the Tower in a different light

These films highlight the unchanging beauty of the Eiffel Tower as it adapts to the wildest situations and brings a touch of French elegance to any setting. 

Science fiction and disasters at the Tower

A symbol of Paris, of our times, and of technological prowess, the Eiffel Tower has appeared in many science fiction films since cinema began. It has also been at the center of Hollywood disaster movies.

Abel Gance's "The End of the World" from 1931 shows a meteorite destroying the Earth, and the Eiffel Tower. 

• Roland Emmerich's " Independence Day: Resurgence " in 2016 also depicts the Tower’s destruction following an alien invasion.
• " In Pursuit of Tomorrow ", a 2015 American science fiction film features 3 adventurers teleported to the top of the Eiffel Tower to accomplish a perilous mission.
• " Men in Black 4 ", an American film from 2019, shows us that Gustave Eiffel was in fact a member of the famous Men in Black and that one of the elevators in the Tower hides an incredible secret.

Romantic films

Could there be a more romantic backdrop than the Eiffel Tower for the most tender love scenes or wedding proposals?

• Ernst Lubitsch's " Ninotchka " from 1940 recounts the astonishing meeting between an American aristocrat and Ninotchka, an emissary sent to Paris by the Russian Ministry.
• " Befikre " by Aditya Chopra from 2016, features Dharam and Shyra, two lovers who challenge each other not to say I love you, but the charms of Paris prove too much for them.
• “ Under the Eiffel Tower " by Archie Borders in 2018. Stuart decides to ask for his lover’s hand during a visit to the Eiffel Tower, but the answer doesn’t live up to the Tower's romantic ideals.

Here are some other film or television productions, some well-known and others less so! 

• The classic " Fantômas " by Louis Feuillade in 1914 was one of the first films with scenes at the Eiffel Tower. It shows Commissioner Juve valiantly climbing the monument in pursuit of Fantômas.
• The now iconic " Ratatouille ", Brad Bird's 2007 animated film set in Paris, narrates the beginnings of an unusual friendship.
• " The Eiffel Tower Mystery ", a French TV detective movie from 2016, shows several of Gustave Eiffel’s engineers murdered in 1889, on the eve of the Tower's completion.
• " The Hostage Tower " an American detective film from 1980, chronicles a spectacular and highly improbable hostage situation!

To find out more about the Tower and the arts, click here .

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The Eiffel Tower in Movies: Comedies, Dramas, and More

Paris has the reputation of being the world’s most romantic city, and the Eiffel Tower is its iconic monument, so it’s not surprising that it features not only in countless romantic comedies but also in spy movies and sci-fi, dramas and documentaries.

While this isn’t a definitive list of all the movies in which the Eiffel Tower appears, it does include some of the best as well as lesser-known favorites worth putting on your must-watch list.

Here is the Eiffel Tower in movies through the years.

Silent films with the Eiffel Tower

The first time the Eiffel Tower was filmed was in 1898, barely 10 years after it had been built.

“ Panorama during the ascent of the Eiffel Tower ” is a 42-second film by Auguste and Louis Lumière, shot from the elevator. It gives a fascinating view of what the Trocadéro, on the opposite bank of the Seine, looked like at the time.

“The Crazy Ray,” also known as “At 3:25” and by its French title “Paris Qui Dort” is a 1924 French science fiction silent comedy directed by René Clair in which a night watchman who sleeps at the very top of the Eiffel Tower wakes up to find that everyone but him and five others in Paris have been frozen by a crazy scientist using an invisible ray.

In 1928, Clair shot a silent film, just 14 minutes long, called “La Tour,” which you can watch for free .

Fun fact: Clair said he shot “La Tour” for his own pleasure “to the glory of this big iron lady that I’ve always been in love with” and because he’d been frustrated at not being able to film as much of the Eiffel Tower as he’d wanted in “The Crazy Ray.”

The Eiffel Tower in musicals and comedies

The Eiffel Tower continued its movie star career into the mid 20th century.

“ The Lavender Hill Mob ,” released in 1951, is a British crime comedy in which a meek bank clerk who oversees the shipment of bullion joins with an eccentric neighbor to steal gold bars and smuggle them out of the country as miniature Eiffel Towers. The scene where Holland and Pendlebury run down the Eiffel Tower’s spiral staircase and become increasingly dizzy and erratic, as does the camera work, has become a classic.

Then in 1957, Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn starred in “Funny Face,” a romantic musical with an iconic number filmed at the Eiffel Tower which you can see at the 36:31-minute mark.

“Zazie in the Metro” is a 1960 French comedy by Louis Malle.

Zazie, an 11-year-old country girl, arrives in Paris to spend a weekend with her uncle Gabriel in Paris. She really wants to ride the metro, but it’s closed because of a strike, so Gabriel shows her other iconic landmarks, including the Eiffel Tower where a group of tourists mistake him for a guide.

Five years later, Blake Edwards made “The Great Race,” the story of a car race between New York and Paris in which the competitors can use any means to be the first to cross the finishing line, which is, of course, at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.

The Eiffel Tower in romantic films

The Eiffel Tower serves as the backdrop in a number of romantic movies. Here are some of the best.

• “Ninotchka,” shown above, is a 1940 romantic comedy and political satire by Ernst Lubitsch. Greta Garbo plays the role of a Russian diplomat in Paris on business who is attracted to a man (Melvyn Douglas) representing everything she is meant to detest. There’s an amusing dialogue in which Garbo explains she’s not interested in the Eiffel Tower for the view “but from a technical standpoint.” A minute or two later, Garbo asks an employee for the “exact width of the foundation on which these piers are resting,” and Douglas chirps in with some interesting technical details about the tower.
• “Befikre” (translates to “Carefree”), a 2016 musical by Aditya Chopra, is a Hindi-language romantic comedy featuring Ranveer Singh as Dharam, an Indian who moved to Paris to pursue a career as a stand-up comedian and Vaani Kapoor as Shyra, a tourist guide in Paris whose parents are Indian but who was born and raised in France.
• “Under the Eiffel Tower,” a 2019 comedy by Archie Borders, opens with the hero, Stuart, who’s over 50 years old, proposing under the Eiffel Tower to the 25-year-old daughter of his friend. Shocked, she turns him down, so Stuart decides to go home but a meeting at the airport changes his plans.

Dramas, thrillers and sci-fi films featuring the Eiffel Tower

A number of disaster, thriller and science fiction movies have also featured the Eiffel Tower. Here are some of the best.

“The End of the World”

Abel Gance’s 1931 film “The End of the World” is one of the first French full-length talking movies. In this short documentary about the film, you’ll see the segment shot at the Eiffel Tower with the fictional collapse of one of the elevators.

“The 400 Blows”

François Truffaut’s first feature length film, “ Les 400 Coups ” (or “The 400 Blows”) released in 1959 is somber. It opens with the credits filmed with the Eiffel Tower as the fixed point. This major French film tells the story of 12-year-old Antoine Doinel who lives with his indifferent parents in a small apartment in Paris. He’s a trouble-maker at school and gets up to all kinds of misadventures, which lead him on a tragic downward spiral.

“A View to a Kill”

The 1985 Bond movie “ A View to a Kill ” gives me sweaty hands as Roger Moore, alias James Bond, chases Grace Jones, alias May Day, up the stairs of the Eiffel Tower before she (actually stuntman B.J. Worth) jumps off.

According to the film’s director, John Glen, the sequence was complicated because permissions had to be obtained not only from the Eiffel Tower authorities — and there are very strict rules about stunts from the tower — but also from the Paris authorities as that’s where Worth was landing!

As the bottom of the tower is much wider than the top, a ramp was built for Worth to jump off to ensure he would jump wide enough. He began practicing by jumping from hot air balloons, while producer Michael G. Wilson calculated that Worth had to open the parachute three and a half seconds after jumping. And he only got one go, at dawn on August 4, 1984, one of the first scenes to be filmed.

Animated movies where the Eiffel Tower appears

It’s not the real Eiffel Tower, of course, but these two films are worth a mention.

The first is a relatively recent Disney classic. “Ratatouille,” released in 2007, is the story of a rat, Rémy, who lives in an attic just outside Paris and whose greatest ambition is to become a chef. Having had to flee from the attic he gets lost and eventually scuttles up onto a rooftop from which he gets a wonderful view over the city with the Eiffel Tower in the center. The tower pops up several times during the movie.

“Ballerina” is a Franco-Canadian animated movie that came out in 2016 about Félicie, a poor red-headed orphan from Brittany whose dream is to become a ballerina in Paris at the time of the World’s Fair in 1889. The first appearance of the Eiffel Tower in the film shows it still under construction.

Movies starring the Eiffel Tower

If there’s one movie to see before you visit the Eiffel Tower yourself, I highly recommend a 2005 French 90-minute documentary fiction directed by Simon Brook called “The True Legend of the Eiffel Tower” (“La légende vraie de la Tour Eiffel”), shown above. It’s a fascinating account of how the Eiffel Tower came into being.

Fun fact: In this movie, we learn that it was Maurice Koechlin (1856-1946), a Swiss-Alsatian engineer who was the head of Gustave Eiffel’s design team and whose original idea in 1884 of a “300-meter tall pylon” eventually became the Eiffel Tower.

The most recent movie in which the Eiffel Tower features is a Franco-German film produced by Martin Bourboulon (released in France in 2021 and elsewhere this year), called simply “Eiffel.” This biopic concentrates more on a love affair that the famous engineer may have had when he was a young man rather than on the tower that bears his name.

And, last but not least, as I was researching for this piece, I came across these remarkable scenes and outtakes for the May 1953 Pathé News Story “Eiffel Tower Goes Gay.” You’ll see acrobatic painters clambering unattached all over the tower.

Speaking of, how does the Eiffel Tower get its various coats of paint and what colors has it been? Read all about the remarkable story behind the Eiffel Tower’s paint jobs on our blog.

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Eiffel, la guerre des tours

Behind the iconic Eiffel Tower lies the story of an incredible challenge to erect the first thousand-foot tower, pitting Gustave Eiffel against now forgotten rivals, iron vs stone, engineers... Read all Behind the iconic Eiffel Tower lies the story of an incredible challenge to erect the first thousand-foot tower, pitting Gustave Eiffel against now forgotten rivals, iron vs stone, engineers vs architects, and modernists vs classicists. Behind the iconic Eiffel Tower lies the story of an incredible challenge to erect the first thousand-foot tower, pitting Gustave Eiffel against now forgotten rivals, iron vs stone, engineers vs architects, and modernists vs classicists.

• Mathieu Schwartz
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• Trivia The project was initiated by writer-director and Eiffel descendant Savin Yeatman-Eiffel. He wanted to revisit his ancestor's work for the centenary of his death with a fresh perspective, replacing it in the context of the great transformations the second half of the 19th century went through, as well as reminding everyone of the many battles Gustave Eiffel had to fight to impose his project against now forgotten rivals, to build it of course, and also to fight off very aggressive opponents.

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The Iconic Eiffel Tower Lights Up in Anticipation of Taylor Swift’s Paris Performance for The Eras Tour

A s the city of Paris prepares to host Taylor Swift for The Eras Tour, a spectacular tribute has taken over one of its most famous landmarks. 

Anticipation is building just days before the globally recognized “Fortnight” singer begins the European leg of her groundbreaking concert series. French station NRJ has orchestrated an exceptional greeting for Swift and her followers, and the level of excitement among Swifties is beyond measure. 

An enchanting video shared on X (formerly Twitter) by the NRJ account showcased the Eiffel Tower adorned with enormous friendship bracelets featuring Swift’s name, draping elegantly around its tip.  

While the specifics behind the video’s editing are not disclosed, the graphics give a mesmerizing illusion of gigantic friendship bracelets cascading from the heavens onto the tower. 

The greeting “Welcome to France Taylor Swift,” resonates as the clip concludes, with the spectacular footage then shared by the official Eras Tour account . The account pronounced the Eiffel Tower’s transformation as nothing short of “EPIC!” 

Swift’s appearance at Paris La Défense Arena is eagerly awaited on Thursday, May 9, with additional dates on May 10, 11, and 12. 

These performances represent the critically-acclaimed return of The Eras Tour, which Swift, at age 34, paused since March. 

Swifties are also highly anticipating Swift’s latest musical release, The Tortured Poets Department , which is expected to be integrated into the upcoming shows. 

Swift fans, the question now is, are you “…Ready For It?”

Related: Travis Kelce Discusses His Support for The Eras Tour and Taylor Swift’s Future Plans

FAQ Section

Q: What are the performance dates for Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour in Paris?

A: Taylor Swift is scheduled to perform at the Paris La Défense Arena on May 9, with additional shows on May 10, 11, and 12.

Q: Can I see the video of the Eiffel Tower’s tribute to Taylor Swift?

A: Yes, you can view the video on X (formerly Twitter) via the NRJ account’s post.

Q: Has Taylor Swift released a new album recently?

A: Yes, Taylor Swift released her new album The Tortured Poets Department , which is expected to be incorporated into her Eras Tour setlist.

The City of Lights is radiating even more as it gears up to welcome Taylor Swift and her Eras Tour. The Eiffel Tower, standing as an emblem of friendship and admiration, dons a personalized tribute to the beloved singer-songwriter. With fans worldwide and in France enlivened, Paris is set to experience a series of unforgettable nights that promise to infuse the city’s airs with the enchanting tunes of Taylor Swift.

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Personal butlers, Eiffel Tower view: The luxury Parisian hotel that hosted Taylor Swift

• Oops! Something went wrong. Please try again later. More content below

The latest episode of the “New Heights” podcast Wednesday gave a timely nod to the movie, “An American in Paris.”

The American, in this case, is Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.

The podcast title? “A Kelce in Paris, NFL Schedule Reactions and Horse Beef.”

After the introductory music, Travis Kelce opened the show with the Frenchiest of greetings: “ Bonjour !”

His brother, Jason Kelce, asked: “Travis, where are you at?”

As if the world didn’t already know where he was over the weekend.

Who didn’t see Travis Kelce dancing and enjoying girlfriend Taylor Swift ’s 87th “Eras Tour” concert in Paris? (Yes, 87, Kelce’s jersey number.)

The tour continues Friday in Stockholm, Sweden, so it appears the couple is spending some downtime “on the continent” before Kelce Jam this weekend at Azura Amphitheater.

“I can neither disclose that information, nor do I know,” responded Travis, who at one point was drinking from a tea cup. “I can give you a continent: I’m in Europe. This isn’t like the guessing game. We’re not guessing where Travis is.”

Before leaving Paris, Swift was staying at the historic Hôtel de Crillon with its Michelin-starred restaurant, one of the city’s most luxurious hotels where suites range from $4,600 to $21,000 a night, according to the New York Post.

It sits in the heart of the city, next door to the heavily guarded U.S. Embassy and within easy walking distance of the city’s most famous attractions — the Champs Elysees, the Louvre and designer stores including Louis Vuitton.

Tourists snapped photos of Kelce shopping at Louis Vuitton and Kelce met one wearing a Chiefs jersey .

Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck stayed at the hotel during their honeymoon in 2022 , just two in a long line of celebrities who have laid their heads there — Leonard Bernstein, Madonna, Andy Warhol, Bette Davis, Sophia Loren among them.

“The storied neoclassic property dates back to the 18th century, when King Louis XV asked architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel to build two palaces a few blocks away from the Seine ,” Vogue wrote when the couple stayed there.

“The western building has had many lives: its where Benjamin Franklin signed a treaty with the French government that recognized the Declaration of Independence, where King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette holed up before being guillotined during the French Revolution, and, after it officially became a hotel in 1901, where Woodrow Wilson stayed while in town to sign the Treaty of Versailles.”

As a hotel now managed by Rosewood Hotels & Resorts, it is known for luxurious amenities including “ Les Grands Appartements ” designed by the late fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld.

What would Marie Antoinette have said about a TV in the bathroom?

The hotel “has a way of making all of its guests feel like VIPs ,” lifestyle journalist Erica Wertheim Zohar wrote for Forbes in 2022 after staying there.

“There is no check-in desk at the hotel; instead, arriving guests are led into a separate discrete reception room where the check in process is handled by multiple staff.”

Zohar noted that the hotel has become an attraction itself, “as evidenced by the ever-present crowd of curious onlookers typically found outside its front entrance.”

And oh, the cuisine.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Hôtel de Crillon (@rosewoodhoteldecrillon)

“And while the luxe hotel includes quite a few equally impressive perks — like a personal butler service — the haunt’s culinary vision takes the experience a whole step further ,” notes Delish.

“The property’s on-site restaurant, Nonos par Paul Pairet, features traditional French cuisine ‘with a twist’ and includes an expansive oyster bar, steak frites, and a lobster gratin.

“The main dining hall has fresh seafood, charcuterie, and artisan cheeses while guests (like Swift) can enjoy 24/7 room service.

“We have a feeling Taylor didn’t go hungry during the stay.”

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Inside the Paris hotel where Taylor Swift stayed during Eras Tour...

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Inside the Paris hotel where Taylor Swift stayed during Eras Tour stops: $21K-per-night suites, Karl Lagerfeld designs and more

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During the Paris leg of her Eras Tour, Taylor Swift stayed at the elegant Hôtel De Crillon, where she had access to luxurious amenities, Michelin-starred dining and charmingly sophisticated decor.

The gorgeous Rosewood Hotels & Resorts mainstay features massive suites ranging in price from $4,600 to $21,000 per night depending on the accommodation’s size and layout.

The property’s 10 signature suites “embody an expressly Parisian residential style that is equally warm and refined,” the hotel’s website states .

The late Karl Lagerfeld designed the residential-style guest rooms, which offer “an incomparable atmosphere of contemporary sophistication that respects the landmark’s 18th-century heritage.”

The chic suites come with butler service and have a mixture of bespoke furnishings, antique pieces and carefully selected objets d’art that bring an air of refinement to the palatial Parisian retreats.

Spacious en suite bathrooms are immaculately designed with marble finishes and full-size soaking tubs for ultimate relaxation.

There are also several delectable dining options on-site for guests to enjoy.

The Nonos par Paul Pairet is an upscale restaurant serving traditional French cuisine “with a twist,” like steak frites and beef fillet, as well as a selection of desserts, including chocolate soufflé and strawberry and raspberry chantilly.

Connected to the main dining hall is a delicatessen offering fresh seafood, charcuterie, smoked fish and cheeses perfect to grab on the go for a picnic under the Eiffel Tower.

For those ready to indulge in the finest dining option, A-list guests can eat and drink at the Michelin-starred gastronomic restaurant L’Écrin.

The fancy fair offers an “exceptional culinary experience characterized by the subtlety of [their] dishes and remarkable pairings,” the website states.

Dishes are carefully crafted based on beverage pairings and prepared with seasonal produce for an “unforgettable sensory expedition” that can be served as a five- or seven-course meal.

The Jardin d’Hiver is a stunning tea room where guests can go for all-day dining and munch on desserts by head pastry chef Matthieu Carlin.

The bar Les Ambassadeurs is where travelers can sip on creative cocktails while listening to live music.

As for those seeking an extremely private dining experience, visitors can feast inside the hotel’s private dining room dubbed La Cave.

For round-the-clock sweets, patrons can enjoy fresh pastries from Butterfly Pâtisserie.

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The hotel’s modern fitness studio is reserved for guests only and has state-of-the-art equipment, including a treadmill, bike, weight-training station and more.

Gym-goers can also book sessions with the hotel’s personal trainer for a one-on-one sweat session.

The Sense spa is the hotel’s tranquil space with a luxurious pool, steam room, sauna, rain showers and a resting area with a Himalayan salt wall.

Several wellness treatments are available to book, including massages, facials, aromatherapy and body scrubs.

Guests also have the option to schedule a haircut, blowout, color treatment or grooming session at the hotel’s hair salon with celebrity stylist David Lucas.

Other stars who have stayed at the revered hotel prior to Swift’s four-night run at the Paris La Défense Arena include Madonna, Mariah Carey, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jennifer Lopez.

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Taylor Swift may attract more U.S. luxury travelers to Paris for Eras Tour than Olympics

PARIS — Try and come for Taylor Swift's job. The superstar is playing a four-night stint in Paris, jumpstarting the 18-city European leg of the Eras Tour , and she may have drawn more Americans to France than the upcoming Olympics.

Jack Ezon, the CEO of Embark Beyond , a luxury travel agency based in New York City, said the Swift is generating five times the bookings as the summer games, as first reported in the Strait Times .

Although there is still time to arrange trips for the Olympics, held from July 26–Aug. 11, Ezon said his company has booked more than 200 Parisian vacations for Swifties. The average stay is three nights, and a third of the reservations are for mothers and daughters.

Cheaper to buy French vacation than one U.S. ticket

Swift changed up her three-plus-hour show to incorporate her 11th studio album, "The Tortured Poets Department." She's been working on the change for 8-9 months , since the singer-songwriter took a two-month break in fall 2023 to premiere her concert movie to theaters and release "1989 (Taylor's Version)." The updates have driven up excitement and demand for the Eras Tour with American fans wanting to see the modified show.

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"The tickets to go to Indianapolis are like $5,000 apiece," says Stephanie Gottschalk waiting in line for the second Paris show with her daughter Brooklynn. "For us to fly here, stay in the hotel and buy the tickets was about $5,000 total. So half the price. And we got to experience Europe. We got to go to the Eiffel Tower and create memories that we're going to remember for the rest of our lives."

Dressed in "Bejeweled" outfits, the Gottschalks were already planning another trip back to Europe to see the record-breaking tour again.

"We've already started looking into Switzerland," Stephanie says. Swift will play in Zürich's Stadion Letzigrund for two nights July 9-10.

The Eras Tour will head back to the U.S. in the fall with October and November shows in Miami, New Orleans and Indianapolis. As of Saturday, the cheapest U.S. ticket on resale site StubHub.com was $1,615 for New Orleans. The most expensive VIP seat was worth $11,701 for Miami.

Global impact felt

The Swift Effect — a boost to local, state and national economies — was felt during the first year of the Eras Tour. According to Bloomberg Economics, Swift's concerts contributed $4.3 billion to America's gross domestic product. In Japan, the massive concert is estimated to have pumped $228 million (¥34.1 billion) into the country with $162.7 million (¥24.3 billion) going directly to Tokyo. In Australia, Swift was expected to sell $66 million worth of merchandise . Edwin Tong, Singapore politican and minister for culture, community and youth, said the country paid Swift $2-3 million dollars to exclusively play in the country.

Swift will perform Sunday night in La Défense Arena in Paris before heading to Stockholm, Sweden.

Don't miss any Taylor Swift news; sign up for the  free, weekly newsletter This Swift Beat.

Follow Bryan West, the USA TODAY Network's Taylor Swift reporter, on  Instagram ,  TikTok  and  X as @BryanWestTV .

When Is the Taylor Swift Eras Tour Movie Streaming?

The concert film is available to rent now, and will stream on Disney+ very soon.

Every item on this page was chosen by a Town & Country editor. We may earn commission on some of the items you choose to buy.

"The Eras Tour has been the most meaningful, electric experience of my life so far and I’m overjoyed to tell you that it’ll be coming to the big screen soon," Swift wrote on Instagram announcing the film. She added, "Eras attire, friendship bracelets, singing and dancing encouraged." ( We have some Eras Tour movie attire suggestions right this way .)

Unlike Swift's previous concert films and documentaries—including the film of her Reputation Tour , her Netflix documentary Miss Americana, and Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions — the Eras Tour was not immediately released on a streaming platform. Instead, the pop star partnered exclusively with AMC theaters to release it.

On November 27, Swift announced on Instagram that the film will be available to rent on demand starting on her birthday, December 13. "Well, so, basically I have a birthday coming up and I was thinking a fun way to celebrate the year we’ve had together would be to make The Eras Tour Concert Film available for you to watch at home!" she wrote. "Very happy to be able to tell you that the extended version of the film including 'Wildest Dreams,' 'The Archer' and 'Long Live' will be available to rent on demand in the US, Canada & additional countries to be announced soon."

Here's where you can rent the film:

The Eras Tour on Apple TV

The Eras Tour concert film is also on Xfinity, Vudu, Google Play, and YouTubeTV.

Next week, starting on March 14, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour will stream exclusively on Disney+, including five songs that weren't available in theaters or in the rental version. "For the first time we’ll be showing the entire concert (including 'cardigan', plus 4 additional songs from the acoustic section!!) and I’m calling it, huge shock, 'Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour (Taylor’s Version),'" Swift posted on social media.

Disney CEO Bob Iger said, " The Eras Tour has been a true phenomenon that has and continues to thrill fans around the world, and we are very excited to bring this electrifying concert to audiences whenever they want, exclusively on Disney+."

The Eras Tour film drops on Disney+ on March 14, 2024 at 6 p.m. pacific/9 p.m. eastern.

Sign up for Disney+

We'll update this as soon as we learn more.

Emily Burack (she/her) is the Senior News Editor for Town & Country, where she covers entertainment, culture, the royals, and a range of other subjects. Before joining T&C, she was the deputy managing editor at Hey Alma , a Jewish culture site. Follow her @emburack on Twitter and Instagram .

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Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’ on VOD, a Sloppy But Enjoyable Display of Kaiju Crunch

Where to stream:.

• Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’ Comes To Digital, But When Will ‘Godzilla x Kong’ Stream on Max?

‘monarch: legacy of monsters’ season 1 finale recap: reunion, ‘monarch: legacy of monsters’ episode 9 recap: notes from underground, ‘monarch: legacy of monsters’ episode 8 recap: hand in hand.

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire ( now streaming on VOD services like Amazon Prime Video) turns Godzilla into a hot-pink radioactive diva, Kong into a sad boi with a power glove and director Adam Wingard into a kinda wannabe James Gunn. None of this is bad, especially if you’re a fan of the Monsterverse , now on its fifth film of, well, however many they decide to make as long as they keep raking in the dough ( Godzilla x Kong earned a wily $558 million at the box office, virtually guaranteeing an eventual follow-up). And it may take being a kaiju apologist (guilty!) to truly appreciate this movie, which is an intensely silly thing, directed by Adam Wingard (returning after helming 2021’s Godzilla vs. Kong ), with a nearly incomprehensible plot, starring Rebecca Hall as a character given the thankless and graceless task of trying to explain it. The good thing is, that’s mostly moot, because we’re here for the monster fights, and on that front, this movie delivers, like the pizza guy ringing your doorbell and smashing the pie right in your face.

GODZILLA X KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE : STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Hope you’re reasonably well-versed in 2021’s Godzilla vs. Kong , because we pick up sorta where that one left off, which should be in a whole lotta rubble – rest assured though, there’s plenty more world to destroy, specifically Hollow Earth, the Earth within the Regular Earth where our best giganto-ape buddy Kong lives. All by himself. We catch up with him as he’s being chased by very nasty wolf beasts, which he kills in a series of traps that prove he’s probably the smartest thing around here. He seems almost reluctant to eat them. They could’ve been his buddies maybe, curling up in front of the fireplace while he binges The Barefoot Contessa . But Kong is the last of his kind, and therefore must binge shitty TV all by his lonesome. 

This is How It Must Be, because Godzilla is up on Regular Earth, and if the two of them live on the same Earth, their competitive tendencies will kick in, and things are gonna get very incredibly broken. You may recall from the previous outing that Godzilla and Kong stopped whaling on each other long enough to tag-team against Mechagodzilla and save the planet, but now they’re right back to being mortal enemies. It is nature’s way. Godzilla serves a purpose on the surface, vanquishing superhuge tentacle crabs and crap, following the directives of his instinctual wiring to lord over all he sees more so than protecting humanity. But humans are nevertheless grateful for Godzilla for barely acknowledging them and only causing insane amounts of property damage and killing countless thousands instead of just vaporizing everybody and everything with his radioactive projectile-belches – before curling up for long naps inside the Roman Colosseum. It’s a kaiju’s life for he.

Unfortunately, there are human characters in this movie. It’s not unfortunate that they’re played by these particular actors, just that they have the thankless task of filling in the boring parts in between the parts where the monsters bash each other’s faces in and/or interact with miniature baby versions of themselves (more on that in a second). Dr. Ilene Andrews (Hall) runs the Kong research division of Monarch, a company that does significant scientific and electronical things that have to do with giant monsters, I think. I don’t know exactly what Monarch does, beyond existing because it must, in a world where humans suddenly got usurped from the top of the food chain. Dr. Andrews adopted young Jia (Kaylie Hottle), a girl who’s the last of her tribe and who also can communicate with Kong, which comes in handy when he emerges from a portal with a toothache and needs kaiju vet Trapper (Dan Stevens) to yank a canine and replace it with a metal one that can “cut through the Eiffel Tower.” Kaiju vet? Yeah. Kaiju vet. It’s a living.

One day, Dr. Andrews receives a strange beacon emanating from Hollow Earth and needs to find the source. So she and Trapper, Jia and kaiju conspiracy-theorist podcaster Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry, returning from the previous movie) follow Kong back to his upside-down world to investigate. As they poke around, Kong is attacked by some fellow giant apes, bonobos I believe, including a baby who ultimately sees the error of his ways and lets Kong, well, sorta adopt him, I guess. Baby Kong leads Regular Kong-ass Kong to an underground hellhole led by a bonobo cult leader who, thanks to Dr. Andrews’ eventual recitation of exposition, is named Skar, and in general is a cruel, power-hungry cretin who teases Kong for his false tooth and uses a magic crystal to mind-control a giant ice-belching Godzilla named Shimo. It becomes increasingly clear that Skar needs to have his hairy ass kicked. Meanwhile, where’s Godzilla? Well, he’s off eating radiation from nuclear reactor leaks, amassing power for reasons yet to be revealed. He’s also chilling out waiting to be activated as a big ol’ plot device. Maybe he’ll enjoy more character development in the next movie, like Kong does here. It’s only fair.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Here we go – thee definitive ranking of the five Monsterverse movies:

5. Godzilla: King of the Monsters – Reintroducing Godzilla to his longtime foes-slash-pals Rodan, Ghidorah and Mothra ended up being monumentally unmemorable, and a big disappointment. 

4. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire – This one’s hopefully as stoopid as this franchise gets, and the plot is a mess – please don’t ask me what “the new empire” even is, because I don’t know – but the parade of beasts beating the pus out of each other is nonetheless enjoyable. 

3. Kong: Skull Island – Please bring director Jordan Vogt-Roberts back to the franchise – he made this one a highly entertaining and colorful blend of kaiju action and Apocalypse Now , with the series’ best human characters played by Tom Hiddleston, Brie Larson, John Goodman, John C. Reilly and Samuel L. Jackson.

2. Godzilla vs. Kong – This one had the perfect amount of XXXXXL roundhouses and chomporama, and pitting the title boyz against a new, crazy version of Mechagodzilla was chef’s kiss .

1. Godzilla – The 2014 movie that kicked it all off is the most serious of the bunch, and actually has something to say about nature and evolution and humanity’s place in it to maybe almost rival Jurassic Park . It offers the series’ best-directed action sequences (lots of scary on-the-ground perspectives). And it also has Godzilla ripping rival monsters’ heads clean off. Gotta love it.

Performance Worth Watching: There are human performances in this movie? I’ve seen it twice now and that’s news to me. 

Memorable Dialogue: I didn’t bother to mention the pilot who flies our human people into Hollow Earth, because he’s expendable. So when he dies, Trapper says a word in mourning that prompts Bernie to incredulously retort, “You just watched a man get devoured by a topiary nightmare and you wanna quote Tennyson ?”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: …and maybe in the next movie Godzilla will hatch a Baby Godzilla so the wee tyke can use the Pantheon as a diaper genie. I mean, Baby Godzilla was established in the pantheon decades ago, so what the f— are y’all waiting for? 

This time, though, the Kongscapades take precedent, possibly because it’s easier to anthropomorphize an ape and his all-too-human eyes than the icy glare of a towering lizard. And here, Wingard takes his biggest risk, allowing Kong to interact with other apes during extended sequences that forego dialogue for hoots, grunts and gestures. That’s far preferable to the human interactions, where dialogue consists of breathlessexhortationsofexposition that Hall is (gasp, pant) asked to recite, or limp attempts at banter between Stevens and Henry, who are good sports about all this, and maintain their likability in spite of it. This is the type of movie that puts the subtitle ARCTIC OCEAN: TIAMAT’S DOMAIN on the screen, then immediately has a character say, “We’re entering Tiamat’s domain,” just to make sure we’re 100 percent sure that this scene is, indeed, set not in Tiamat’s garage, or Tiamat’s preferred coffeeshop, but Tiamat’s domain – and then promptly has Godzilla turn Tiamat into eel bait. IT IS NO ONE’S DOMAIN NOW.

Point being, the less people talk in this movie, the better it is. And even then, it gets a shade too goofy during the kerfuffles between beasts, with part of the big final megabash taking place in an antigravity field where… well, let’s not spoil things, but suffice to say that’s a confusing mess that thankfully washes up on the beach in Rio and orients itself so the monsters can tail-whip and ground-and-pound each other atop cityscapes in classical fashion. This is what we came for: Mass destruction. There’s a moment here where the Great Pyramids of Giza are turned to scree you could sift with a gold miner’s sluice box, and not only are we torn between enjoying the fight and cringing at the careless demolition of one of the great wonders of the world, but we’re also wondering how they put the Pyramids back together after the Transformers smashed them to rubble a decade or so ago. This is where we’re at as movie watchers now, my friends.

Wingard doesn’t take a single second of this stuff seriously. He maintains a consistently upbeat, energetic and gee-whizzy tone, with an ear for a classic-rock needle drop and the occasional emphasis on gooshy sentiment; think James Gunn’s vibrant approach to Guardians of the Galaxy , but less substantive and effective. A word of advice: Don’t even try to keep up with the plot, unless you fetishize futility. It drops the ball by loading up on the comic-booky gobbledygook and not prompting us to feel emotionally invested in Kong’s rebellion against the bully Skar, who enslaves his fellow apes and is just generally a good old-fashioned butthole. Then again, we’re not here to see Kong become Moses. We’re here to see him and his cohorts beat the shit out of each other, and they do it in spectacular fashion. Well, spectacular enough, anyway.

Our Call: Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire ranges from ludicrous to downright sloppy, but there’s enjoyment to be culled from either extreme. It’s moderately satisfying for more forgiving audiences (again: guilty!), so STREAM IT – but nonbelievers will roll their eyes more than they pump their fists.  

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

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