Midnight In Paris

Midnight in Paris

OOO1/2

Rated PG-13 for some sexual references and smoking


I count myself as a Woody Allen fan, even though I've probably seen only half of the 41 movies he's directed, and none since 2000's Small Time Crooks.  I didn't care for that one, as I remember.  I thought it had a good set up and then kind of drifted a bit.  I understand he went through a critical drought for a while, and has since rebounded.  His latest romantic comedy, Midnight in Paris, sees Allen covering what is very familiar ground for him, but doing it in a fresh and quite enjoyable way, as well as delivering a solid message to boot.

Gill Pender (Owen Wilson) is on vacation in Paris with his fiance Inez (Rachel McAdams) and her parents (Kurt Fuller and Mimi Kennedy).  His future father-in-law is there on business, so the couple decide to tag along.  Gill is a Hollywood screenwriter who longs to be a serious author of novels, like his heroes Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald.  He is also in love with Paris, only not as it exists today but rather as the mythic City of Lights of his imagination; an idealized "Golden Age" of the 1920's.  One night, after a little too much wine, he decides to take a walk while Inez goes dancing with friends of hers that happened to be in Paris at the same time.  Paul (Michael Sheen) teaches at the Sorbonne and comes off as a bit of a know it all.  After a couple of days of putting up with Paul's snobbery Gill takes this opportunity to sneak way on his own.  On a dark side street, as the chimes hit midnight, a mysterious 1920's vintage Peugeot limousine pulls up and he's encouraged to enter by what appears to be an equally tipsy group of revelers.  He's brought to a party and comes to the realization that its being hosted by Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.  Hemingway is there to boot, and he even gets introduced to Gertrude Stein, who agrees to read the manuscript of the novel he's been working on. This is all too good to be true, and he is convinced that this is all just the red wine taking its toll.  But he finally understands that this all is really happening, and makes return visits each night.  Along the way he meets a beautiful and alluring woman (Marion Cotillard) who he falls immediately in love with.  As they get to know each other over the course of these nights she reveals that for her the Paris of the 1920's is ordinary and boring, but the true "Golden Age" was the Paris of Toulouse-Lautrec, Gauguin and Degas.  Eventually they find their way to the 1890's by a similarly odd circumstance that got Gill back to the 1920's, only to discover that the people of that time thought that the Renaissance was the true high point of Paris life, and their own age is a trifle.


Midnight in Paris has a basic message, that we should be happy in the time we are in and not try to idealize the past.  All ages are spectacular, and all are ordinary.   This is our Golden Age, if you will, and we'll miss it trying to live in a fantasy.

My only observation is that Allen's writing style is so distinctive it's almost becoming self parody.  Even though he's not acting in the picture, you know it's him speaking.  He's well into his seventies now, and he has made a boatload of movies, and a few stage plays as well, not to mention numerous short stories, so who am I do give him advise.  But I almost wish he would work with a co-writer, or adapt someone else's screenplay for a change.  I've met the snob before in other films of his, for instance, and the neurotic ticks that he gives his leading men are getting old.  And I'm not sure how much new he has to say about the relations between the sexes.

In the end, this is a very good film, inventive and imaginative.  He doesn't try to rationalize or explain away the situation; this guy really is being transported back in time, and there appears to be portals to other ages as well.  It's farcical and doesn't apologize for it. This is not a belly laugh type of movie, the humor is more subtle, but there is one brief gag toward the end that reminded me of his earlier films, when his comedy was more slapstick and crazy. It was almost like he was paying homage to himself, and I loved it.  The performances are solid all around, and rumors of French First Lady Carla Bruni's inability to act were highly exaggerated. She has but a cameo, and handles it just fine.  Also, Adrien Brody almost steals the movie with a couple of scenes as Salvador Dali which are truly uncanny and hilarious. 

I recommend Midnight in Paris.  It's message may not be all that profound, but it's worth being reminded of.  And it's delivered in that patented Woody Allen style, which for all its predictability is still pretty great.  And if all you walk out of the theater with is the lesson that these are the good old days, as Carly Simon might say, and that we better enjoy them while we have them, you got more than you would have from most of the other movies playing around town right now.