France 2014: Lyon - Lumière Museum, Basilica de Fourviere, Museum of Miniatures and Cinema

Whether we are strolling along the banks of the Soane River from our hotel, or walking through the Old Town, or it seems like just about anywhere we go, the majestic Baslique de Fourvière towers above us.  Rich must have taken a photo of this church from every conceivable angle, perspective and light.  We even took one last photo of a mural of it as we were leaving Lyon.

We learned from our audio guide walking tour that the Basilica is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, who saved Lyon from a cholera epidemic sweeping Europe in 1643.  She is also credited for stopping the Prussians from conquering Lyon in 1870.  In thanks, each December 8, there is a Festival of Lights ceremony where candles are lit throughout the city.  The audio guide also mentioned that from a certain angle, the church looks like an upside-down elephant, on its back with its four legs (the four steeples) and trunk (the green sculpture atop the turret-shaped chapel) sticking up in the air.  Now we cannot look at Basilique Fourvière without seeing anything else.

Like Croix-Rousse, it was another long steep climb up Fourvière Hill to reach the church at its pinnacle–"Funiculars are for wimps", we scoffed before huffing and puffing up the never-ending slope.  But again, the views at the top were definitely worth the climb!

Inside, the church is beautifully decorated with colourful stained glass windows, tapestries and mosaics depicting religious battles such as ones involving Joan of Arc and the Battle of the Lepanto.

We had heard that confessionals are no longer in vogue and that in some cases they are being used as storage units.  We saw first hand evidence of this when we witnessed a caretaker deposit his mop into one of the stalls.  When we peeked into the opening, we saw that it was stacked full of junk.  After one final look at the stunning view, and several semi-successful attempts at selfies before someone took pity on us and snapped our photo, it was back down the steps towards the Old Town.

The aptly named brothers, Auguste and Louis Lumière, are the inventors of the cinématographe, a motion picture camera and film projector built into one device.  It attempted to improve on Thomas Edison's kinetoscope by providing sharper images with better illumination, and most importantly, the ability to project onto a screen so that multiple people could see the show at once.  The film was hand-cranked through the projector to make it play and in order to keep the proper timing, the projectionist would hum a military march.  The Lumière brothers directed one of the first motion picture films and held public screenings in Paris.

The Lumière Museum is set in the villa that was the brothers' childhood home. The site of the former Lumière factory right next door is used as a movie theatre.  The ground floor of the mansion acts as a history lesson in the science of early film-making and cinematographic equipment, while the second floor's furnishings and artifacts reveal more about the extended Lumière family.

Early motion picture devices involved pulling cards containing multiple images through a projector or spinning a wheel.  The primitive solutions are similar to flip-book animation where you draw the same figure in various poses and then flip the pages to simulate movement.  There was a camera "gun" that "shot" images onto film strips.

 

The members of the Lumière family were early adopters of the latest technologies of the times including the telephone.  The Lumière company also produced and sold camera equipment and film and dabbled in other inventions including medical equipment.

In 1995, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Lumière Brother's first movie shot on their cinématographe, famous directors from all over the world were invited to reenact that footage, which depicted factory workers leaving the Lumière factory.  The scene lasted less than a minute and did not involve much action.  But in the early days of film, seeing any type of motion at all captured on screen was an astounding feat for the audience to witness.  The reenactment was shot on an original cinématographe.

The Musée Miniature et Cinéma is an odd combination of what seems to be two separate but equally fascinating museums, each in their own right.  The first five floors are dedicated to film and TV props and memorabilia.  The top two floors contain an elaborate collection of miniature scenes that are so realistic in their proportion and detail that you would not know you are looking at a photo of miniatures without the presence of the artist's hand or face for perspective.

Props on display included Harry Potter's wand, Jethro Gibbs badge from the TV series NCIS, fake newspaper front pages mocked up for movies like Castaway, Superman Returns and Planet of the Apes, and costumes from Batman, V for Vendetta, The Three Musketeers, Troy, Gladiator, Lincoln and more

There was an arsenal of weapons including rubber foam guns and rifles made for the movies The Matrix, Sherlock Holmes, The American, Bonanza, Munich and more.  In some cases, they showed the trick props used to simulate someone being stabbed with a sword or bludgeoned with an ax.

There were explanations and examples of the various types of special effects, ranging from green screen, matte paintings, computer simulation, stop-motion capture, effects created using devices like fog machines, rain machines, generated explosions and more.

Entire rooms were devoted to blood, gore, aliens and monsters.  Some were prosthetic creations while others were robotic and actually moved and made noises.  Multiple warning signs advised that young children should not enter these sections.  There was a very realistic looking recreation of Gillian Anderson's head for an episode of the X-Files where a dream sequence showed an agent finding her severed head.  Bloody limbs and torsos were abound, from murder victims to zombies to mutilated animals.  The animatronics ranged from cute little Gordy the Disney talking pig, to the Gremlin creatures from Men in Black, to the "pièce de resistance"–a full sized, thrashing, howling monster, possibly from the movie Alien.

Then it was on to the miniatures, created by Dan Ohlmann who was a former cabinet maker before he started a new career creating small scale dioramas.  This includes recreations of famous places like Maxim's restaurant which is reproduced to 1/12 the scale.  I was especially enamoured by one of his swanky apartments that contained miniature recreations of contemporary artworks by no less than Roy Litchenstein, Andy Warhol, Robert Indiana and others.  I would love to live in this loft apartment with its large bay windows and modern decore.

The attention to every tiny detail is incredible including furnishings, carpets, drapery, decorations, and even lighting.  It was fascinating to see pictures of the work in progress of creating these pieces.

It was such a treat to see both of these exhibits within this one museum, although I'm still not sure why they are together.  It was like getting a 2 for 1 deal!