The Eiffel Tower Turns Into a Free Cinema
Cinema Paradiso will bring a pop-up film festival to the Eiffel Tower for the first time this autumn. The mk2-backed event will turn the Salle Gustave Eiffel into a temporary cinema, giving film fans a rare chance to watch screenings inside one of Paris’s most recognisable monuments. The full film line-up has not yet been released.
How to Try for a Seat
- Event: Cinéma Paradiso Tour Eiffel
- Venue: Salle Gustave Eiffel, first floor of the Eiffel Tower
- Dates: 24–27 September 2026
- Films: nine screenings planned
- Price: free entry
- Tickets: allocated through a lottery, not sold
- Lottery opens: 8 September 2026
- Programme: films and guests announced the same day
- How to enter: visitors must use the "Billetterie" section on the mk2 Festival Paradiso website, join the draw, then choose an available screening if selected
- Ticket delivery: successful applicants receive their tickets by email
Cinema Paradiso has been staging film events in unusual French venues since 2013, including the Grand Palais, La Seine Musicale, Villa Carmignac and the 24 Hours of Le Mans circuit. The Eiffel Tower edition follows a Louvre event earlier this summer, where directors including Wes Anderson and Joachim Trier introduced films. The format mixes cinema with a strong sense of place.
The setting also changes how visitors can use the Eiffel Tower during a Paris trip. A screening can sit neatly beside Champ de Mars, the Seine, Trocadéro, Rue Cler or a Left Bank dinner, rather than being treated as a separate theatre night. Anyone picked in the lottery should plan extra time for monument access, security checks and queues.
Tickets will not be sold at the door, so anyone hoping to go should check the mk2 Festival Paradiso site when the programme and lottery open on 8 September. If selected, choose one available session quickly and wait for the e-ticket by email. It is worth having another evening plan in Paris, because free seats inside the Eiffel Tower will not last long.