Directed by:
Woody AllenScreenplay:
Woody AllenCinematography:
Darius KhondjiCast:
Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Marion Cotillard, Kurt Fuller, Mimi Kennedy, Michael Sheen, Alison Pill, Adrien Brody, Sonia Rolland, Léa Seydoux, Kathy Bates (more)VOD (3)
Plots(1)
This is a romantic comedy set in Paris about a family that goes there because of business, and two young people who are engaged to be married in the fall have experiences there that change their lives. It's about a young man`s great love for a city, Paris, and the illusion people have that a life different from theirs would be much better. (official distributor synopsis)
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Reviews (12)
A very nice film. It's not perfect, and it can't match the atmosphere of The Purple Rose of Cairo, but I watched it for an hour and a half with a permanent smile, and that's to be appreciated. Woody Allen's screenplay seems to combine the magic of two of his short stories - “A Twenties Memory", in which he recounts his experiences with Hemingway, Stein, Picasso, Toklas and others, and the excellent “The Kugelmass Episode", whose protagonist starts cheating on his wife with Madame Bovary thanks to an illusionist. Midnight in Paris is an enjoyable watch that could have been more elaborate (especially when it comes to the book Gil buys and reads about himself in), but its idea about the desire to live in other times at the expense of the present and especially its ending are so beautiful that almost all the criticisms had to be put aside.
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As Woody Allen sees it, walking and lounging around in Paris is mainly a pleasant experience. Fortunately without unbearable sweetness and with a willingness to admit that the appealing genre veneer merely provides refuge for a sabre-toothed bitch called life. A declaration of love for the former intellectual and artistic heart of Europe, Midnight in Paris begins with a picture-postcard prologue that inspires comparisons to Manhattan, which of course was filmed at a time when Allen’s jokes were more polished and the conclusions he arrived at were more sceptical. Together, the two films are able to make you take this idealised portrait of the big city as your own and, particularly in this case, declare “Paris, je t'aime“ after the closing credits have rolled. Owen Wilson “became” Allen unexpectedly smoothly; in line with the comedic potential of his face, he toned down the intellectualism and added some – reasonably subdued – grimaces. Unlike flowing romantic comedies, Midnight in Paris is more deliberate and restrained in terms of style (the actors walk nicely in long shots), only reinforcing my fears that Allen has either definitively given up on trying to make a more ambitious film with more layers of meaning and a more sophisticated narrative or he has simply run out of themes that could be developed beyond a pleasant anecdote. 80% Appendix: I most enjoyed the encounter with the surrealists (the charmingly excited Brody) and the affirmation that it took Buňuel just as long to digest the initial situation of The Exterminating Angel (roughly 30 years) as it will take an unprepared viewer to understand its satire.
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The picture has a certain vibration about it and I (it seems I alone of the watching ensemble) enjoyed listening to it. Maybe it was the magic of Paris, pulling me back into the past... I often think that I was born at the wrong moment in time... maybe I have an understanding for the indecisiveness of the main protagonist and his search for (women?) himself. Very well-cast. Wlison’s slightly dumbfounded expression is well-placed, Rachel McAdams is absolutely modern, Marion Cotillard beautifully period and the familiar faces of famous people were fine. And the final “decision"? I think I know what I would have done, but it would be a hard choice.
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Woody Allen is a magician. As a lover of Paris and an admirer of times past, I got lost somewhere between the opening titles and the first dialogue. Not that I expected anything else after a discreet whisper announcing a minor masterpiece, but the dreamy atmosphere, the sexy Marion Cotillard, and Owen Wilson made in the image of a young Allen? This is how to take the breath away from your devoted fans. Manhattan at last has an equally fascinating sequel after more than thirty years.
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Allen doesn’t disappoint. With considerable help from a traditionally excellent cast, and with his most intelligent script in years, he delivers a brilliant and charming advertisement for magical Paris that trumps almost all of his New York ballads in one fell swoop. Time travel has perhaps never been so tastefully entertaining on film, and there's certainly no other work that will make you want to know everything about all those legendary artists, from Hemingway to filmmaker Buñuel. Wilson is permanently likeable, McAdams unfortunately plays second fiddle, but she’s supplemented with grace by the irresistibly adorable Cotillard. Maybe when I can see the beauty of Paris myself, I’ll give it 5*.
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