It’s hard to go into a film fresh, viewing it as a single work, as opposed to comparing it to similar films or previous films from the creator. Especially when it comes to Woody Allen.
He is a writer/director who has had, in many critics’ eyes, a very specific golden age. There’s been many calls of a ‘return to form’, but these are often followed up by huge flops.
Sweet and Lowdown was followed by Small Time Crooks, Match Point by Scoop and Casandra’s Dream, Vicky Cristina Barcelona by Whatever Works.
Everyone wants to see him hit his heights again, and so are constantly comparing his recent output to early greats like Annie Hall and Manhattan. However, this is unfair to Allen, and it’s a point he makes well in his most recent ‘return to form’.
While many could see Midnight in Paris as a love letter to a bygone era, it can also been seen as a dig at critics who are always looking for something greater in the past.
After all, it’s about a screenwriter who has been successful in the Hollywood system but who is trying to break out in writing something real, a true work of art, his great American novel.
Allen has been doing this his whole career – yet he’s been trapped by mainstream success. Even in Annie Hall, Alfie suffered a similar problem.
Like the critics who endlessly long for the days of Hannah and her Sisters, Owen Wilson’s Gil longs for Paris in the 1920’s. And, through one of the most simple time travel devices ever, he manages to find it.
Hemingway, the Fitzgerald’s, Dali, Picasso and many more all happen to be holidays in Paris and Gil takes a tour of his dream world with the greatest hosts he could imagine. However, it’s when he meets Marion Cotillard’s ‘art groupy’ that things start to get real for him.
Not only does she highlight the problems he’s facing with his soon-to-be wife in the real world, she, too, also longs for a different era, declaring Paris in the 20’s to be boring.
As a movie, it’s the most fun Allen has been in a while. While not really touching upon some of the bigger issues Allen has handled in the past, it doesn’t matter as its so funny, charming, and beautifully shot.