Paris in the springtime. Paris when it sizzles.
Woody Allen hits the spot with his latest, critically acclaimed 'Midnight in Paris.' The casting is quite perfect, Owen Wilson stars as an unfulfilled Hollywood screenwriter engaged to the pretentious and shallow Inez, played by Rachel McAdams in her second "Mean Girls" type role.
While drunkenly meandering the streets of Paris, wrecked with both uncertainty in his literary talent and nostalgia for the 1920s, Gill (Wilson) comes across a beautiful Peugeot, several French flapper girls, a few flutes of champagne and thus begins his date with destiny. Each night afterwards he returns to the same spot and each night, at the stroke of midnight, he hops into the car to continue his daliance with fate, meeting fantastic and famous characters all along the way. Between receiving literary advice from Ernest Hemingway ('Incpeption's Tom Hardy) and Gertrude Stein (Kathy Bates), Gill falls in love with the stunning Adrianna (Marion Cotillard) and shares a bottle of red wine with Salvador Dali (Adrien Brody). Viewers who are familiar with the works and quotes of the featured literary faces will appreciate small references sprinkled throughout the film, although literary novice audience members will not miss a beat in this delightful tale of magic in the City of Lights.
Each of the big names cast to play literary figures do a fantastic job; Brody portrays Salvador Dali with humor and a more than appropriate eccentricity. The Fitzgeralds, played by Tom Hiddleston and Alison Pill, set the tone for the Gatsby-esque party scene. The real gem, however, is Cotillard's exquisitely nuanced performance as a serial mistress to artists and lover of fashion. She carries herself with the careful balance of grace and sensuality that elevates women to the Coco Chanel level of class.
Beautifully made, the film juxtaposes the J.Crew style of the shallow yuppie elite with the delicious woodwork and deep color of 1920s Parisian bohemia. The only time the film would be in danger of becoming too kitchy is with the repeated (timeless) theme that the grass is always greener in another "golden age." Whether it's the 1920s, the 1890s (La Belle Epoque), or the Renaissance, we're all subject to the same metaphysical dilemmas, the same changing times, and the same mortality.
The film is saved, however, especially with Hardy and Bates' deliveries regarding mortality, passion and love. At once very no-nonsense and beautiful, Allen strikes a certain tone that keeps the movie from bording on cheesy territory and keeps it as a dreamy fairytale.
Definitely worth a trip to the theater and, without a doubt, a very refreshing breath of air in the stifling drudgery of many summer blockbusters.
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