Midnight in Paris

You’re in love with a fantasy

There’s no doubt Midnight in Paris will be hailed as a return to form for Woody Allen. Regardless of the quality of his most recent films; Midnight would still suffice as a charming, witty and funny film about nostalgia, love, culture and inspiration.

Owen Wilson stars as Gil Pender, a screenwriter taking a break from Hollywood in Paris, a city that confirms his status as a hopeless romantic. During his stay he’s in the throes of penning his first novel while preparing to wed his fiancée Ines (a suitably pretentious Rachel McAdams). Lacking the required creativity to finish his book he wanders the streets of Paris only to get lost. When the clock strikes midnight, a cab comes to pick Gil up and he’s transported to 1920s Paris.

The premise is totally ridiculous (time travel!) but it’s endearing in a magical way. During his time in 20s Paris, Gil falls in love and spends time with cultural icons like the rambunctious Ernest Hemmingway (Corey Stoll), Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston and Alison Pill), while also managing to dally with Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali (Adrien Brody, having a lot of fun). Although there are some references that could go over your head (as they did mine), the ones you do catch will leave you smiling. Gil’s romance with Marion Cotillard’s muse Adrianna is a warm one, both performers easily slipping into a romance that you wouldn’t think feasible at first.

The performances across the board are engaging, whether it’s Wilson’s starry-eyed turn or Ines family and friends who hit the right note of being equally obnoxious and vapid. The magical reality that Allen brings evokes a sense of a cultural Golden Age and provokes a dilemma in Gil as to whether the past is better than the unsatisfying present.

Less a travelogue of Paris like some of Allen’s previous films have been, Midnight in Paris is a fine film with some sparkling performances.

8/10

This post was originally published on MouthLondon

Review: King Kong

“Monsters belong in B movies.”

I’ve had this film on my shelf for three years now and this is the first time I’ve watched it. It’s the first time I’ve seen Peter Jackson’s King Kong in any form since I saw it in the cinema some five/six years ago. I thought it was fantastic piece of cinema back then and my thoughts haven’t altered much from that viewpoint.

Despite the backlash that the film suffered, whether that was down to its long run time (as I remember some may have put that down to self-indulgence on the part of Jackson) or certain parts of the audience expecting a repeat of the success of Lord of the Rings, I found King Kong to be a superlative, stirring piece of fantasy cinema. They don’t make films like this too often and while that’s not a [good enough] reason to cherish this film any more than any other fantasy film, there’s a sense of adventure and grandness that films often strive for but in my mind fail to achieve.

Review: Predators is a pulpy sci-fi B movie

Good lord you're ugly

“They can hear you. Smell you. They see you.”

 

Predator like the Alien franchise has suffered a bit of late. After Predator 2 (shh…it never happened) and the AVP films (shh…they never happened) sapped the credibility of the franchise, it was in need of a pick me up. The original Predator is not a stunning film; you could well argue that seen today it’s not even a good one. It’s an enjoyable one with plethora of great quotes (“I ain’t got time to bleed”) and a good quota of dialogue against shit being blown up/spines being ripped out. Predator 2 and AVP were not so enjoyable so Predators had to up the quality and in doing so rescue the franchise and more importantly the predator itself from being a forgotten relic. Did it achieve its goal?

Eh…kind of.