Source Via @twilightish.
Woody Allen's latest travelogue-cum-arthouse-truffle takes a jaunty turn down memory lane as a frustrated writer's premarital trip to Paris whisks him away to headier times, when the likes of Fitzgerald, Faulkner and Picasso drank, smoked and danced the Charleston in the City of Lights. Like a swoony lost chapter from "Paris, je t'aime" agreeably extended to feature length, "Midnight in Paris" is so baldly smitten with its rain-slicked environs you half expect to see Paris' tourism office listed among its backers. Yet and still, there's an undeniably populist appeal, light as meringue and twice as sweet, in the pic's arm's-reach sophistication.
Though the film's time-traveling secret was kept under wraps pre-Cannes, Sony Pictures Classics would do well to embrace it before releasing the pic on May 20 in the U.S. The device itself kicks in just as the second reel is picking up speed, injecting the right dash of magic into what might otherwise have been another of Allen's flouncy Euro-chic getaways. The plot itself has the simplicity of fable, with nostalgia-stricken scribbler Gil Pender (Owen Wilson) getting a unique chance to pal around with his '20s-era idols at the expense of being able to embrace the promise of his own era.
Like many an Allen protag, Gil doubts his own intellect. Part stuttering stand-in for the director, part shallow West Coast caricature, Gil specializes in screenplays, but aspires to putting his name on a novel. He's written one about a fellow who yearns for an earlier time -- that ever-elusive "Golden Age" that always seems a generation or two before. For Allen, it dates back to the Jazz Age, finally allowing him to use his favorite tunes in their original context.
Showing neither affection nor support, Gil's insufferable fiancee, Inez (a disappointingly flat Rachel McAdams), humors her husband-to-be, but spends most of their Paris vacation fawning over a former crush (Michael Sheen), who smugly schools anyone within earshot. "He's so knowledgeable," Inez coos, while unpretentious Gil squirms with discomfort.
Read more here.
No comments:
Post a Comment