Film: Midnight in Paris (2011), written and directed by Woody Allen
THE formula works like a charm. You line up a star-studded cast (Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Marion Cottilard, Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody, Michael Sheen, and, yes, Carla Bruni whom everyone wants to see if the French First Lady could really act), people the story with celebrated icons of the arts (Ernest Hemingway, F Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Cole Porter, T S Eliot, Paul Gauguin, Edgar Degas, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and Man Ray), and shoot the film in Paris. The result is triple A for romance and best picture nomination for the Oscars.
Woody Allen who wrote and directed the play (by the way, he won the Golden Globe best screenplay) admitted that it was easy writing the story, because he did not have to be serious about exacting the famous characters that protagonist Gil Pender (played by Owen Wilson) met in the course of the story before realizing that for all the nostalgia of a past romantic era of his dream, the present is all that must matter in the end. There can be no question of which era is the best, as when Pender and Adriana (Marion Cottilard) parted over that disagreement.
It is fantasy, so you cannot go wrong there. It is a story that any one of us would imagine we could write and wish we did. When Gil was introduced to T S Eliot, he was full of awe and disbelief. “Thomas Stearns Eliot? T S Eliot? T S Eliot?” he said. “Prufrock is my mantra.” Watching the film, many of us may have unwittingly stepped into the shoes of Gil.
Yet the story runs smoothly, traversing eras with subtle links such as the truth about Inez (Rachel McAdams)’s infidelity when Gertrude Stein, in reviewing Gil’s first novel, asked why the main character had not realized that his fiancée was having an affair with a friend whom Inez had earlier introduced to him.
The big winner is Paris, the eternal city of romance. And as Adriana said, “That Paris exists and anyone could choose to live anywhere else in the world will always be a mystery to me.” You will want to pack your bag and head for the airport.
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Tags: Adrien Brody, Carla Bruin, Cole Porter, Edgar Degas, Ernest hemmingway, F Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Kathy Bates, Man Ray, Marion Cottilard, Michael Sheen, Midnight in Paris, Owen Wilson, Pablo Picasso, Paris, Paul Ganguin, Rachel McAdam, Salvador Dali, T S Eliot, Woody Allen, Zelda Fitzgerald
