Midnight In Paris

2011, 12, Directed by Woody Allen
Starring: Owen Wilson, Rachel MacAdams, Marion Cotillard, Tom Hiddleston

Not since Vicky Cristina Barcelona has Woody Allen truly shown that he still can match his heyday offerings. A few passable inputs later (Whatever Works, You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger), and Allen is less focused on the cynical side of life than the charming and influential. Merging elements from what have become sincere classics, Allen’s trademark cynicism is expressed through nostalgia. Owen Wilson fills his shoes here as Gil, a struggling writer who is lugged around Paris with his fiancée and her overbearing parents. Taking a walk one night, the clock strikes twelve – and he encounters what life would have been like if he were to rub shoulders with his literary heroes. Such a daft concept is dealt with deftly and it is largely down to the player’s Allen has assembled that Midnight in Paris works. Tom Hiddleston charms as F. Scott Fitzgerald, with Scott Pilgrim alumni Alison Pill playing his estranged wife, Darla. It’s Wilson’s awestruck wonder expressed whenever he is introduced to yet another literary icon that separate this from pure fantasy (a highlight is when Gil, attempting to make the most of this unusual circumstance, asks Ernest Hemingway to have a read of his troubled novel). To name who else appears would be to remove the numerous cherries on top, but let it be said, Wilson is a knockout. 

Time-travel occurs in Midnight in Paris, but without mention of space and time; science-fiction technicalities have nothing to do with the point Woody Allen is trying to make (or the fun he is trying to have). The clock strikes twelve and a vintage car passes to signal the time change - it's as simple as that. As the film draws to a close, like Gil, you come to understand that whatever beauty is featured in the art surrounding us today will not manifest itself until this time is past. So for now, sit back and enjoy the ride whose charm will remain upheld long after the credits have rolled.  In an alternate universe, Midnight in Paris is actually a film about an aspiring director who converses with his idols come nightfall; Woody Allen will no doubt be among them. And yes, he is playing himself.

4/5