Widower Thomas Jefferson (3rd US president 1801-09) lives in Paris 1785-90 with his daughter. He has a pretty slave girl accompany his other daughter to France. He has an alleged affair with... Read allWidower Thomas Jefferson (3rd US president 1801-09) lives in Paris 1785-90 with his daughter. He has a pretty slave girl accompany his other daughter to France. He has an alleged affair with her resulting in children.Widower Thomas Jefferson (3rd US president 1801-09) lives in Paris 1785-90 with his daughter. He has a pretty slave girl accompany his other daughter to France. He has an alleged affair with her resulting in children.
- Awards
- 2 nominations
- Sally Hemings
- (as Thandie Newton)
- Mutilated Officer
- (as F. van den Driessche)
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe film accepts at face value the 1873 statement by Madison Hemings ( James Earl Jones ) that he and the other five children of Sally Hemings were all fathered by Thomas Jefferson. At the time this film was released this assertion was much more controversial than it became later. Three years after this film was released, extensive DNA testing on Sally Hemings's many descendants strongly confirmed that Jefferson was almost certainly the father of all six. (The tests were done in 1998-1999, and the results published in 2000.) As of 2022, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which is in charge of Jefferson's historical estate in Monticello, accepts the findings (and includes extensive information about the Hemings family and Jefferson as a slave-owner on both the tour and their website), while the Thomas Jefferson Heritage Society (founded shortly after the DNA study) disputes the conclusions.
- GoofsThomas buys items from Parisian merchants who use the metric system of measure over a decade before the adoption of metric units in France.
- Quotes
Maria Cosway: That's how it is here. People play at love. It's not serious. It is different in Italy. There, we kill for it!
- SoundtracksVIOLIN SONATA La Follia, OPUS 5, No. 12
Music by Arcangelo Corelli
Performed by Hiro Kurosaki (violin), Emmanuel Balssa (cello) and William Christie (clavecin) (uncredited)
Philosopher, inventor, politician, farmer, musician, and chronicler of events this film focuses on Jefferson as father and lover and slavemaster. Whatever else he was Thomas Jefferson was a product of his times and culture in the colonial plantation culture of tidewater Virginia.
Nick Nolte who did a lot of action/adventure films cuts a nice figure as Jefferson. Certainly better than the originally intended Jack Nicholson would have been. No reflection on Jack, but can you see all those imitators reciting the Declaration of Independence in that Nicholson voice?
When Jefferson became our Minister to France under the Articles of Confederation he brought his eldest surviving daughter Patsy played by Gwyneth Paltrow. He was a widower at the time, formerly married to Martha Wayles Skelton who died in 1781.
During that time Jefferson had a rather open affair with artist Maria Cosway who was married to a regency rake type Richard Cosway. As Cosway played by Simon Callow was a serial cheater, Maria didn't let grass grow under her feet either. The times were pretty bawdy in Paris during those last years of Louis XVI. A seductive Cosway is played by Greta Sacchi.
Later on Jefferson is joined by his younger daughter Polly and she gets accompanied by slave Sally Hemmings who was maybe 15 at the time she first came over. Hemmings was actually a biological half sister of his late wife,, she was fathered by the father of the late Mrs. Jefferson. As played by Thandie Newton, Sally is one sly little minx.
Over earlier with Jefferson was her brother who was brought over to Paris to learn the art of French cooking. The dialog between Seth Gilliam as the brother and Thandie Newton about how slaves survive in a white man's world is quite insightful. In fact Gilliam demands and gets wages from Jefferson while in Paris.
Paris and continental France may not have had slaves, but I daresay Gilliam might have changed certain attitudes as he was not possibly aware of what the French were doing in the West Indies, especially Haiti. That pot would boil over in the beginning of the upcoming century.
What I liked best was the recreation of decadent Paris of the 1780s before the Revolution. The producing directing team of Merchant-Ivory did a superb job recreating the period with Nick Nolte narrating some of the correspondence of Jefferson as commentary. Other foreign observers had a much different take on these events. Just read A Tale Of Two Cities for an alternative view of events.
Jefferson In Paris is a superb production and highly recommended to those who want to learn about Thomas Jefferson and a slice of the time he lived in.
- bkoganbing
- Dec 30, 2017
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Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Official sites
- Languages
- Also known as
- Джефферсон у Парижі
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $14,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $2,473,668
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $61,349
- Apr 2, 1995
- Gross worldwide
- $2,473,668
- Runtime2 hours 19 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1