Why they need to put on a festival to encourage people to see movies, especially in this city, is a mystery to us here at Parisist, but we're sure glad they're doing it anyway.

The low-down: The Printemps du Cinéma this Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday allows you to see any movie (at participating theaters) for 3.50 euro. Yep, you heard right. That's often less than half the cost of a full price ticket. Hooray! Check out the website for a listing of movies and to listen to Just Jack's "Writer's Block" which was oddly chosen as the site's musical background.

If you've been on a movie hiatus lately, here's what Parisist can recommend:

La Vie des Autres (Das Leben der Anderen)
Academy Award winning German film about a group of writers, actors, and artists that are more of less sanctioned by the DDR and the Stasi man who is employed to find out dirt about them by constant surveillance. The story is intelligently and skillfully told, the actors deliver top performances, there is suspense, beauty, love, hate, humanity, etc. and the movie will stay with you for days, if not weeks, after you've seen it. (We were also delighted to see that the French subtitle translation for "Das ist nicht koscher." "That's not kosher." was "Ce n'est pas catholique.") And here, Anthony Lane's marvelous review.

Chronique d'une Scandale (Notes on a Scandal)
Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett deliver some of their best in this kind of off-the-wall cinematic experience. You will not have seen anything quite like it. The twists and turns will keep you breathless and searching for your own moral compass, which seems to have been lost in the darkness of the theatre.

Le Dernier Roi d'Ecosse (The Last King of Scotland)
Parisist wants to go see this movie because we love crazy megalomaniacs. Oh yeah, and then there's that Academy Award for principal actor Forest Whitaker.

Here's a pre-lunch poem by Barbara Hamby: When moviegoers die, instead of paradise they go to Paris.

Which movies can you, dear readers, recommend?