Midnight in Paris

Gil Pender is a Hollywood movie screenwriter who is visiting Paris with his fiancé Inez and her parents who are there on business. He's enraptured with the magic of the city and it's historic influence on writers and artists. He impulsively wants to give up his successful life in California and indulge in a dream of living as a writer in Paris.

Woody Allen has found a replacement for his stuttering, whiny persona by casting dour faced Owen Wilson as his alter ego. Wilson looks like the Malibu version of Allen's NYC denizen with docker pants, tweedy jackets and ties. Rachel McAdams plays his gorgeous wife-to-be who is befuddled by Gil's attraction to Paris, much less enjoying romantic walks in the rain with him. She drags him along with her friend Paul Bates (Michael Sheen) an abrasive know it all who even argues with a Paris tour guide on Rodin's romantic relationships. Gil is caught in a rut with his first novel that has to do with nostalgia and he can't see to find his groove. It doesn't help that he is being distracted by outings with materialistic Inez and her interior designer mother looking at 18,000 Euro chairs to decorate their future home. One night while out for another competitive night with Paul and his girlfriend, Inez wants to continue the evening dancing. Gil bows out tired of Paul and decides to walk back to the hotel. Lost and slightly drunk, he sits a staircase enjoying the ambiance when an 20ish style taxi stops and the people inside beckon him to join them. Enticed by the free for all attitude and period fashion, they take him to a party where he meets Zelda (Alison Pill) and F. Scott Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston). There begins a series of adventures into Gil's ideal period of time. What he considers the “Golden Age” where writers and artists hung out and influenced each other to the peak of creativity. He meets Hemingway (Corey Stoll) who is obsessed with guns and fist fighting, Salvador Dali (Adrian Brody) seeing rhinoceroses in everything, Gertrude Stein (Kathy Bates) who reads his novel giving him literary advice, and Adriana (Marion Cotillard) Picasso's girlfriend who Gil says takes Art Groupie to a whole other level.

The streets of Paris are romantically photographed and the first few minutes of the film are dedicated to a visual tour around the city. Allen doesn't indulge in any twinkly lights or other scifi gimmicks to signal the entry to another time except when clock strikes midnight. The famous characters that encounter Gil accept and take him at face value when he says he's a writer letting him enter their world. Wilson is perfect as the slightly spacey Gil who fits into his favorite time period like a glove. It's fun watching Gil giving Luis Buñuel (Adrien de Van as) a story suggestion for his next movie, or trying to calm a frantic Zelda with a Valium. Allen, who at 76 is still producing, writing and directing is an inspiration despite his tabloid personal life. He wanted to show Paris through his eyes, and it debuted at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival in May. It's a lovely song to a beautiful city even in the rain.
(Review by reesa)