Every three or four films, Woody Allen comes up with something that gets hailed as a “return to form,” although critics don’t always agree about which movies qualify for that accolade.
For the record, my choices would be “Match Point” and “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.”
His newest picture, however, “Midnight in Paris,” has been inspiring near-unanimity: This Woody is a goodie. The movie’s got charm, humor and a playful sense of fantasy (but it doesn’t have Allen; he doesn’t act in this one).
“Midnight in Paris” follows an American screenwriter, Gil (Owen Wilson), on vacation in the City of Light with his fiancee (Rachel McAdams) and her perfectly dreadful parents. Gil is full of daydreams about throwing away his soulless Hollywood job and moving to Paris, where he can finally finish that novel he has always talked about.
The fiancee is dubious about this. She has had enough of hearing Gil romanticize the Paris of the 1920s, when Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald crossed paths with Cole Porter and Picasso.
In Allen’s magical scenario, one night, Gil finds himself whisked away to that very world: A place where Hemingway (Corey Stoll, precisely balancing parody and tribute) promises to take Gil’s manuscript to Gertrude Stein (Kathy Bates), and Salvador Dali (Adrien Brody) talks surrealism, and the Fitzgeralds lead the way through an endless nocturnal party.
Gil gets to travel between his real world and this fantastic place, whatever it might be. The fun is in watching Owen Wilson’s guileless amazement at it all. Wilson’s very good at conveying a certain innocence about seeing his dreams come true, but he’s also adept at the dawning realization that everybody always thinks there was a “good old days” that must have been better than the current age.
In some of Allen’s recent films, there has been a tendency for actors to do their own thing, as though finding their way through an improv session. Thanks to the cast here, that doesn’t happen: Along with Wilson, Marion Cotillard (from “Inception”) and Michael Sheen (“Frost/Nixon”) do nicely in supporting roles, and while McAdams has a one-dimensional shrew to play, she plays it with gusto.
Allen cherishes the lore of the 1920s Lost Generation, and he indulges a few inside jokes, including one classic involving the future filmmaker Luis Bunuel. He has also got a cinematographer, Darius Khondji, who lights up Paris with an unabashedly rapturous glow.
Not every joke pays off, but the whole thing goes down awfully easy. “Midnight in Paris” is a wispy concoction, a tiny exercise that doesn’t amount to all that much. But the glow is real.
“Midnight in Paris”
A melancholy screenwriter (Owen Wilson) finds himself magically transported to the Paris of the 1920s, where he hobnobs with his heroes Hemingway and Fitzgerald. Woody Allen’s new one is a wispy little fantasy, but it creates a wonderful glow around Paris and it has a strong cast that includes Marion Cotillard and Rachel McAdams.
Rated: PG-13, for subject matter
Showing: Guild 45th, Merdian
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