17 Idiots

The opening scene of “17 Girls,” directed by Delphine and Muriel Coulin, begins in a school hallway filled with many young girls, half-naked in their bras and underwear garments. This immediately captures my attention, but it is hard to look at the girls without feeling uncomfortable. They are not at all sexy or pornographic. They appear very young and innocent, which causes me to feel like an intruder on their privacy. The inappropriateness of the opening scene does of course set the mood for the rest of the film which is about a group of French high school girls that make a pact to get pregnant together. The film is also said to be based on a true story that occurred in 2008, which is another element that makes its content even more disturbing. My first impression based on the synopsis? Lifetime movie material. Perfect. However, the movie turned out to be less Lifetime and more indie style independent drama as it unfolded into a series of two-sided events.

Each event that occurred in the film revealed the girls’ side, as well as the public’s side (their family, sane friends, boys, and teachers). The opening scene of the film is inappropriate in an obvious way. However, the rest of the material in the film is more indirect. We never actually see the girls have sex (well, for the most part – there is no nude sex scenes). However, we see the before and aftermath of their foolish decisions. It is so ridiculously unreal when the girls just simply make the decision to have sex with the sole initiative to get pregnant. The sex was just part of the course to get them there –loveless, meaningless, emotionless sex. This is the kind of sex we usually link to masculine feelings of “doin’ the dirty,” but in “17 Girls,” this is the kind of sex portrayed by the girls. The only difference is their goals. Boys would never dream of using a girl for sex for the sole purpose of getting her pregnant and having a baby. But the girls in this movie do just that. They have sex, get pregnant, and have babies, all for the sake of having children so that they will have a fun activity to share together – just as simple and fun as going to get their nails done together.

The story is one about peer pressure, friendship, and fitting in. The trend starts off with one group of friends, obviously considered by the rest of the school as the popular girls, when the ringleader of the pack, cool and pretty Camille (Louise Grinberg) accidentally gets pregnant after a one night stand she had with a boy over the summer. When we first see her discover the news of her pregnancy, she is not at all happy or thankful, as the rest of the girls appear later in the film. On the contrary, she appears extremely sad and distressed, but instead of expressing these feelings of regret and sadness to her friends, she acts calm and subdued when she tells them the news on the beach for the first time. Her friends appear shocked and ready to console Camille, but Camille does not appear to need any consolation.

It takes only a very short time before Camille decides she is going to keep the baby, and an even shorter time for her to convince her friends of what a great idea it would be for them to follow suit and get pregnant with her. Most of them agree to go along with her dreams, seeing it as a way to strengthen the bonds of their friendship together. But when other girls in the school witness their confidence and casualty, they too jump on the pregnant bandwagon. One girl is so desperate to be friends with Camille that she even uses a fake pregnancy to win her friends over. This is terribly ridiculous and sad. These actions portray these girls as brainless beings in a pack of conformists, and not at all unique and respectable individuals.

I would like to think that these girls do not represent the general female teenage population because if that is so, then I am ashamed to be a part of it. Basically, the way in which these girls are portrayed in the film is as stereotypical brainless, naïve teenagers that act without thinking and make decisions on a whim that will change their lives forever. The stupidity of these girls is appalling, and the fact that not one of them has the guts to speak up and tell the rest that they are idiots is even more aggravating. They give teenage girls everywhere a bad name. Even more aggravating is the lack of interference on the behalf of the adult community that witnesses their foolishness and fails to intervene.

Nonetheless, the way in which the film is directed is very natural, much like that of an indie film. The lighting, the camera angles, the music, and the pace are all very slow and organic, playing off of the real feel, and reminding us of the film’s “true story” attribute. Otherwise, I would not believe it at all, but then I still can barely believe it. The acting is pretty genuine for the most part, but there are times when even outstanding performances aren’t enough to make the story believable. I felt as though at times there should have been more intense emotions portrayed by the characters or that the actions and feelings associated with the girls should be dramatized. There were very few tears, screams, or breakdowns, and most of the action in the film was subtle, calm, and flat. I can’t imagine this was how the story really went, but in the film it plays off as all too casual. That being said, almost everything about the film is pretty casual. All of the scenes flow together as one like the slow rippling of water down a stream that empties into the same lake.

Even the ending is casual, when Camille suddenly loses her baby in a car accident and the slow, relaxed pace remains the same. We never find out what happens to Camille after that, but we get a glimpse of what happens to the rest of the girls who go on and have their babies without her. This bothers me a lot. How can the movie have any grand conclusion when we can’t even feel for the main character? I cannot feel for her when I witness her tragedy because I never get a chance to see what becomes of her afterward. This just made me very disconnected to her character and predominately unemotional about the outcome of the film. The only emotions I had are emotions of annoyance when I witness the other girls on the playground with their babies in strollers, and then we get the final beach scene that is all so therapeutic and relaxed. There is absolutely nothing relaxing about caring for newborns. The way in which the scene is filmed strips the “true story” of its reality.

“17 Girls” (2011) – France – Drama – French – Director: Delphine Coulin, Muriel Coulin – Cast: Esther Garrel, Juliette Darche, Louise Grinberg, Roxanne Duran, Yara Pilartz – FILMS DISTRIBUTION

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May 29, 2011

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Beautifully Incomplete

Directed by Shawn Ku, “Beautiful Boy” is a story about a family, a husband and wife, played by familiar stars Michael Sheen and Maria Bello, who are torn apart by a terrible and unforgettable tragedy that changes their lives. The film follows them as they try to deal with the aftermath of the horror they face when they receive news that their eighteen-year-old son committed a mass shooting at his university then killed himself.  “Beautiful Boy” is not at all beautiful, or authentic, for that matter. For a theme that is extremely disturbing and usually complex, the synopsis of the film is quite simple really. A couple have a son, the couple weakens as they get older, the son is quiet and keeps to himself, but then when he goes off on his own to school he breaks his silence with violence as he commits a hideous crime that causes harm to others and results in his own suicide. Nothing about this film is as great or developed as it could have been—the characters, the plot, and the overall outcome, all fall short of their potential. Nothing is ever fully developed and the loose strings are either boring or annoying, but not at all satisfying.

When the boy’s parents first hear of the news, we get our first taste of some terrible acting. The dad is silent, which I guess could be somewhat believable. The mother on the other hand is not very realistic in her sadness. It wasn’t very believable to me that they wouldn’t be more in shock or freaked out. Before the boy kills his classmates and then kills himself, we see him in his dorm room on the phone with his parents, which is the last time we see him. The only time we see the boy from that point forward is twice in a television clip on the news of a video he made before the shooting of why he was about to do what he did, but we never get to see the full video, nor do we ever get to hear his explanation for why he did what he did. I think it would have been much more effective had we gotten to see the whole video of him going crazy because not only would it have been entertaining, but it would have also allowed our imaginations to connect with his character more, even though he was already dead when it came on. Then the next little piece of him we see is in the magical video that comes out of nowhere that the mom finds somewhere in the house and brings back to the hotel room where her and her husband have been hiding out. They play the video on their laptop in the hotel room, and it is short but not very sweet. The boy simply apologizes and asks his parents for forgiveness for his treacherous act. That is all. No explanation or anything. Then the dad can’t stand to watch so he destroys the tape.

There are some dramatic scenes here and there between the mom and the dad as their relationship strengthens then weakens with the fluctuation of their emotions when dealing with the aftermath of their son’s death. But these scenes are just a waste of time. They are dramatic, and that is all. Nothing brilliant is ever said, and no explanations are really made. They just argue and go back and forth about who’s to blame, until the end when they decide they are both to blame or that neither of them are to blame. It is never really said what conclusion they end up sticking with, but either way, it is all just so pointless. The movie, in itself, is pointless. The only excitement I got out of the film was the short scene in which the husband and wife reconnect over vending machine treats and a handle of liquor and then have sex like teenagers. They are cute together in this scene, drunk and depressed but too drunk to care about their depression, but it only lasts so long before the bickering and drama begins again, all for nothing really.

So what is the moral to this dragging on of sadness and dealing with the pain of the traumatic event that happens in the very beginning of the film but is never shown or explained? That couples need to lose something they both love in order to find love with one another again? That love can change but can be renewed by death or tragedy? Or what? To be honest, I am not really sure of the writer’s intentions for the film. Nothing ever comes full circle. I would have liked it better had the boy not killed himself and stuck around a little longer seeing as he was the most intriguing character in the film. His darkness was so real, and I imagine the boy, played by the young unknown Kyle Gallner, would have impressed me with some more of his seemingly authentic and talented acting skills. He was definitely creepy and disturbed, but most of all, he was sad. And I wanted to see more. And then the next time I do, he’s crazy, and I wanted to see more of that too, but all of the boy’s screen time is a tease. We don’t see enough of him to appreciate his character or relate to him or understand him. We can’t have compassion for someone who is never fully developed, and none of the characters in this film are ever really fully developed.

My overall impression of the film is that it was a lazy interpretation of grief. It didn’t make me cry, but it didn’t make me fall asleep either. It was interesting at times because of the interesting subject matter, but never really exciting because I felt like I was always waiting for something to happen. I felt cheated out of the experience to see this movie unfold as it could have, had there been some changes within the script and the direction of the characters. Overall, the acting is weak, and the storyline falls short of a finished product. We never really find out why the son did what he did or get to even see the full video that is broadcasted on the news (we see a clip from it, making it hardly as entertaining or exciting as it could have been). The character that plays the son who we only see alive in the very beginning is excellent, intriguing, and mysterious. For some reason, I was very drawn to his character and I wanted to see more, or hear more from him, but sadly we never do. Although the film had the potential to be beautiful, pertinent questions are never answered and not enough happens to make it a successful film. If anything, it is beautifully incomplete.

“Beautiful Boy” (2010) – USA – Drama – 100 min – Director: Shawn Ku – Cast: Michael Sheen, Maria Bello, Alan Tudyk, Moon Bloodgood – LIGHTNING ENTERTAINMENT

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May 24, 2011

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Life, Death, and Something In Between

I am unlike my grandmother in the fact that I am not usually one to give off waterworks very easily when watching a movie. However, during “Restless,” directed by Gus Van Sant, I found myself tearing up more than a time or two, and was surprised at how emotionally attached I became to the characters. Aside from my confusion at the apparent irrelevance of the title “Restless” to the actual content of the film, the film’s construction, its themes, and the phenomenal acting of its fresh off farm cast moved me to feel something. I left the theater feeling substantially different than I had when I entered, and that says something about “Restless.” Surprisingly, I did not feel sad, but instead, simply calm and satisfied, and pleased to have had the opportunity to see such incredible talent. Although there are no crazy twists, and the storyline is pretty straightforward from the start, its artistic elements are impressive. “Restless” is a unique story about young love, life and death, and the stages in between.

A young boy named Enoch (Henry Hopper), obsessed with death, randomly crosses paths with a terminally ill teenage girl named Annabel (Mia Wasikowska) at a funeral. Annabel is at the funeral to show her condolences to a fellow patient that died, whereas Enoch is an uninvited guest, an experienced funeral crasher with no scruples whatsoever about his unusual hobby. Annabel appears different from the start, but her illness is not revealed until after her and Enoch get involved with one another. Eventually, the two become extremely close and develop an intense bond that is more than just a typical romantic teenage fling. The concept of the film seems a little controversial on paper, but on the screen it seems to somehow make sense. Everything fits together so perfectly. He isn’t normal, she isn’t normal, and their relationship follows suit.

Because death is such a sensitive subject, especially for the terminally ill, it is understandable why one would expect to feel uncomfortable about watching the relationship of Annabel and Enoch grow, because in the back of our minds, the ultimate reality still exists, and we know that it cannot last. However, by adding humor and making light of such a sensitive subject, the subject loses weight and we forget about the ultimate truth because instead our attention is drawn to the intriguing relationship that grows between the two eccentric characters. We know from the second that Annabel confesses her illness to Enoch that the story is not going to have a happy ending. The concept actually reminded me a little of the teenage drama, “A Walk To Remember,” but taken out of a high school scene, the unoriginal storyline is made unique.

In “Restless,” the characters are different, but they are real, and their relationship is not at all a picture of Hollywood glamour between hot shots like Mandy Moore and Shane West. The fresh young actors, still untainted by the limelight of Hollywood’s corruptive glare, perform with flawless authenticity, stripping the film of its chick-flick status and adding exciting twists of informality to revive the age-old theme. The fact that the two actors are not yet world-renowned stars allows us to see them as the real characters they play, and not the labels they wear in Hollywood. It is refreshing to not be distracted by big-name stars whose egos allow them to be negligent in their trade and fall short of accomplishing flawless performances.

The love between Enoch and Annabel is so simple, but so beautifully authentic. Watching them together was as enchanting as watching a child’s ballet performance. Their innocence and lack of perfection is what makes them so perfect. It was heartwarming to see such a bizarre couple work together so perfectly. Separately, each character portrays somewhat of an outcast in their own homes and society—“the girl with Cancer” and “the boy whose parents died”—but together they are the perfect match. The apparent chemistry between the two is touching, but I have to give more credit to Hopper who practically blew me away with his performance as Enoch. He was so believably Enoch that I can’t even imagine him as anyone else. His acting was absolutely phenomenal! This was the first time I had seen him in anything before, but he exhibited star quality like that of actors in Hollywood that have been starring in prominent roles their whole careers.

Each character has some connection to life and death, and the two concepts are present throughout the film in the way in which they live their lives. But there is also some kind of inexplicable theme associated with the light that exists between the living and the dead, and that is where Enoch’s ghost friend Hiroshi (Ryo Kase), a Japanese kamikaze pilot from World War II, comes into play. We learn that Enoch’s ghost friend appeared to him first after awakening from a coma after his near-death experience when his parents died in a car crash (which also explains why he does not drive). Everything starts to unravel, the stories behind the characters’ dark pasts, and the fact that Enoch is best friends with a ghost explains why he has no hesitation to get involved with a girl he knows is going to die in three months. Strangely enough, it is almost as though this fact makes him want to be with her even more.

Annabel is charming and easy to entertain. She believes Enoch when he tells her about Hiroshi and even lets her meet him. Hiroshi represents the something in between. He is dead but he is still living and visible to Enoch only because of his near-death experience. At first Annabel cannot see Hiroshi, but she believes in him anyway, and one of the creepiest yet touching moments is when Annabel finally sees Hiroshi, indicating that she is coming close to her death. Then Enoch cannot see him anymore, and Hiroshi leaves with Annabel as she passes over quietly and peacefully to the other side. The final scene of the movie is Annabel’s funeral, one in which Enoch is actually invited. A montage of flashbacks of scenes throughout their relationship plays, and then we see Enoch standing at the podium addressing the crowd in the church. Although his first love has died, we can see that she has changed his life for good, and that her presence in his life even for that short period of time will change his life for the better.

“Restless” (2011) – USA – English – Romance – Director: Gus Van Sant – Writer: Jason Lew – Cast: Mia Wasikowska, Henry Hopper and Ryo Kase – SONY PICTURES CLASSICS

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May 24, 2011

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Less Is More

Directed by Jannicke Systad Jacobsen, “Turn Me On, Goddammit” is a Norwegian indie film set in a small Norwegian town with realistic characters and a storyline depicting raw adolescent talent. As her first entry into fiction, Jacobsen takes an untypical approach to her coming of age film in which she is very direct with her statements of teen love and trauma, and depicts life in this small town without any Hollywood glamour. It is a unique and provocative glimpse into the life of a fifteen-year-old girl struggling to cope with her sexual fantasies and flying hormones as well as the typical struggles one faces of trying to fit into the brutal high school social scene. The title in itself is highly suggestive of profanity allowing the audience to prepare for sexual content, but the movie is not simply one about sex. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the movie, at its core, really had little to do with sex but more to do with the struggle of one girl to satiate her libido in the face of disapproving social norms that restrict her and a rumor that threatens to ruin her life.

The way in which Jacobsen directs the film so candidly and simply makes it all the more real and relatable. At its core, the film is much deeper in its portrayal of female sexuality as it explores the controversies of what is acceptable and what is not. As opposed to coming across at all sexy, the film revolves around a young, awkward teenage girl that is clueless about the world outside her little town, which she and her peers are eager to escape. When we see her in all her sexual frustrations, it is not at all a depiction of child pornography, but instead comically endearing. The movie, overall, is very entertaining and comedic, in a subtle way that is comparable to the stylistic development of “Juno” or “Napoleon Dynamite.” It doesn’t tell us to feel sorry for Alma, but forces us to feel sorry for her by putting her into a chain of events that are relevant to any of our memories of high school social battles.

Alma (Helene Bergsholm) appears at first like any other fifteen-year-old girl, she is a little awkward and unsure of herself, but she has dreams and fantasies of what she wants in life and is willing to do what she must to achieve them, even if that means resorting to phone sex. Although she is very imaginative and determined, she is still very innocent and naïve. Alma dreams of a boy at her school, Artur, who plays the role of her sole infatuation within her sexual fantasies, but she is too shy to tell him how she feels. When they are at a party together at which they had been drinking, Artur follows Alma outside and out of nowhere pulls out his penis and pokes Alma’s leg with it. Alma is shocked and confused, but instead of keeping the incident to herself, she makes the pivotal mistake of telling her friend about it who happens to also have a crush on Artur. Arthur denies it and Alma’s friend does the honor of making Alma look like a fool by telling everyone else about what she said so that they would think Alma was a perverted liar. Rumors spread fast and Alma’s little simple world begins to crumble.

After the incident at the party, Alma’s life spins into one rejection after the next as she is made an outcast at school and loses all her friends. Artur stands by like a coward and refuses to speak up for Alma’s sake and admit the truth. This causes Alma to feel hopeless and powerless to change the minds of her peers who are all naively influenced by the leadership of the girl who spread the rumor in the first place, Alma’s old friend, who was clearly jealous of Alma because of her feelings for Artur. As if things couldn’t get any worse for her, Alma’s mother then finds out that she has been calling a phone sex hotline, which causes her to feel shamed by her daughter and disconnect from her as well. At this point, Alma is alone. She has no one to talk to and she must cope with her struggles on her own.

It is easy to feel sorry for Alma because she is a character that is clearly misunderstood and helpless to control her feelings. She never does anything wrong accept try to alleviate her sexual frustrations in the only way she knows how, by masturbating on the regular. But after she is theft of this outlet as well, she must give up trying to satiate her needs and focus on resolving the problems she faces at school and with her mother, who is now disgusted by her and will barely speak to her anymore. Eventually, she runs away to the city for a night to escape from it all and for the first time in the film, we are happy to see that Alma has friends to talk to that seem to understand her more. When she returns home, her mother is more forgiving and simply glad to have her daughter back safe and sound.

Once home again, Alma breaks down into the arms of her mother who finally consoles her. Things start to look up again when Artur visits her and confesses his love, and thankfully, she turns him down. Then, finally, when Alma returns to school, Artur is standing up holding a sign in front of everybody admitting the truth – that he really did poke Alma with his dick, and then order is restored. Alma and Artur join together as a couple at last, and Alma’s life turns around in a new direction, suggesting hope for her future libido as well. The ending is so great because it embodies all of the things we love about romantic comedies, it’s the awkward fairytale-like ending that leaves us happy and content, and relieved to witness the magic of the moment when the boy and girl can live happily ever after. Like the flow of the rest of the movie, all is simple in Alma’s world in the end just like it had started in the beginning. The simplicity of the film and the careful but relaxed approach to how it is constructed proves that for this kind of work, less is more.

“Turn Me On, Goddammit” (2011) – Norway – Comedy – 76 min – Norwegian – Director: Jannicke Systad Jacobsen – Cast: Helene Bergsholm, Matias Myren, Malin Bjorhovde, Lars Nordtvedt Listau, Beate Stofring, Henriette Steenstup – CELSIUS ENTERTAINMENT

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May 22, 2011

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Unbeaverlievable

With an all-star cast consisting of Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster and directed by Foster herself, “The Beaver” was surprisingly better than I ever expected it to be. Going into the premiere, I did not even read the summary, and therefore had no idea what to expect but based on the title, I did not have many expectations. The film begins by showing us the world of Walter Black (Mel Gibson), an executive of a toy company and family man who is evidently in a very deep depression in which he has disconnected himself from his family. Although the first half of the film starts off as a comedy, the latter half transcends into a story that is much more deep than a talking beaver puppet, a story in which mental illness is portrayed in a sensitive light but not so sensitive that we have any trouble watching it unfold. Foster’s talent at directing the film makes the emotional subjects easy to watch and relate too while adding an abundance of comic relief that is not at all insulting, but instead charming and sweet.

The “picture” is at first very grim: Black is kicked out of his own home and forced to be alone in a hotel room where he is finally free to let the self-destruction begin. His only friend for the night is a beaver puppet he finds in a garbage bin, and as he drinks himself to oblivion, he begins to believe the puppet is real and talks to it as such. He tries suicide but even that is a failure. It is evident that Walter is suffering from severe self-loathing and depression and it isn’t until after he adopts the beaver puppet as his sole means for communicating with his family and co-workers that his attitude begins to change. The beaver, although seemingly ridiculous, provides him with an outlet for his feelings without having to share them directly in his own words.

He uses an Australian accent when he talks through the beaver and all seems hysterically absurd, but when he starts making changes in his life that lead to the repair of his relationships with his family and success in his job (all thanks to the beaver’s inspiration), the beaver seems like the best thing that could have ever happened to him. Then the picture changes again when we watch sympathetically as he loses himself by hiding his sorrow behind the toy puppet, and is unable to let the puppet go. Then, his relationships with his family, particularly his wife Meredith (Jodie Foster) and son Porter (Anton Yelchin), start to crumble once more. Then by the end of the film, the picture is hopeful, after Black is committed to a mental institution, has a meeting in which it seems as though he has resolved the long-lasting conflict with his oldest son Porter (Anton Yelchin), and then in the final scene when we see the family on a rollercoaster.

Most of the acting is great, but that shouldn’t come as a surprise when referring to Foster and Gibson who have played roles in some of the greatest movies through the ages, but it is especially important to give credit to the fresh faces of Yelchin and Jennifer Lawrence who plays Yelchin’s equally depressed and troubled intellectual love interest. These younger stars really shined and demanded attention on camera. Yelchin even went as far as to steal the show from polished Gibson in scenes where the two interacted together. Playing the part as Walter Black’s son Porter, Yelchin was believably damaged as we watch him pound his head into the wall in his bedroom until he punches a whole through to the other side. He is so hateful towards his father, but he hates so well. Usually, the constant hatred of an actor could come across as over the top or obnoxiously cliché, but he made it very real.

Foster, on the other hand, who also directed the film, seemed to play more of a part in the production process than she did in the film, which I suspect might have been on purpose. Her role is very little and not as intense or developed as Gibson or Yelchin’s roles, but her act as a director is impressive. To see such a talented and well-renowned actress being able to so successfully direct a film as well is inspiring to me. She did a great job of making a film with such a unique storyline and unbelievable plot play on camera as relatable to a sane audience, but the storyline also makes me question the extent to which anyone of us is really completely sane, which is an unspoken commentary I imagine the writer and director were implying throughout parts of the film. I am definitely interested in seeing more of Foster’s work after this.

One might think the concept a bit too unrealistic: man meets beaver, man and beaver become one, beaver takes over man, then man kills beaver, and in doing so kills himself (but not really – just the demented self that he was). But what makes the film so endearing and fascinating to watch is the transformations that this man goes through in dealing with his depression. The Beaver as Black’s tool for healing himself represents the things we lose as we get older, are introduced to the real world, have to work and raise a family, and then when we get caught up in it all – the stress and anxiety that comes as a result of feeling overwhelmed by the responsibilities we carry. The Beaver is a toy, and like any toy from our childhood memory, he represents peace and innocence during a time when we are free to simply play and just be. But then, the Beaver is corrupted as well as he enters the commercial material world with Black, and ultimately controls him as he loses his last bit of sanity.

“The Beaver” (2009) – USA – Drama – 100 min – English – Director: Jodie Foster – Screenwriter: Kyle Killen – Cast: Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster, Anton Yelchin, Jennifer Lawrence, Cherry Jones – SUMMIT ENTERTAINMENT

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May 19, 2011

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Midnight In Cannes

The opening film premiere of “Midnight In Paris,” written and directed by Woody Allen, set the mood for the 64^th annual Cannes Film Festival by introducing its overall theme—art and film through the ages and the fantastical concept of going back in time. Not only does the film take its leading actors, Owen Wilson and Kathy Bates, back in time, but it also takes its audience back through its unique depiction of life in the 1920s. This wasn’t just the typical time-travel film, but instead one in which an age-old theme comes across as unique and original. The script was very detail-oriented, especially in the development of its legendary characters.

The storyline evokes feelings of nostalgia for those who remember life during this decade, but for present generations it is harder to relate. References to Hemingway, the Fitzgeralds, and Picasso are intriguing and dreamy, that is, if you have even studied these artists or at least have an idea of who they are. Surely, a younger crowd could not appreciate some of the humor or understand the characterization of these antique roles. The movie caters to an intellectual elite, which is why I personally enjoyed it. But with that said, it is not a universally relatable picture, and that may hurt the film in the box office. Nevertheless, it was a safe choice for the opening film because the crowd at the film festival is all of the above—older, intellectual, and art-conscious.

The overall moral to the story is that people, in general, tend to want to be somewhere they are not and are never completely satisfied with where they are. It is the cliché viewpoint that for humans, the grass always seems to be greener on the other side. For the characters in this film, that is the essential theme. Gil’s greener pasture is blunt and obvious–he isn’t happy with his generation, his work, or his location and wishes he lived in Paris in the 1920s. His fiancé, Inez, played by the “Mean Girls” star Rachel McAdams, takes her mean girl side to a whole new level in “Midnight In Paris.” But Inez too, wants what she does not have—that is, a new fiancé—the ever so annoying pedantic character Paul, played by Michael Sheen. Overall, Woody Allen’s visions are elegant, but his inability to follow through with effective brilliance makes the moral weak.

As far as the acting in the film goes, my biggest complaint goes out to McAdams. I have never been so annoyed with McAdams in any movie ever before, nor any actress in any movie ever before for that matter. This film certainly did not exhibit her true talent as an actress as she came across incredibly shallow and flat. I thought this not only hurt her role as an actress in the movie, but also hurt the overall quality of the movie itself. Wilson was the same old Wilson, witty and charming, but his lack of chemistry with McAdams made their relationship in the film come across just as hollow as McAdams’ character. I really wanted to punch her character Inez in the face, more than once, as she continually failed to exude any depth from her role, especially toward the end when her heartless actions fell flat and inexplicable. She was too bland for my taste, and although still very beautiful, obnoxious as hell. Her nagging was not cute, sexy, or typical talented Rachel, as it was in her “Mean Girls” role as high school beauty queen devil Regina.  I actually don’t know if I would have rather Gil punch her in the face or taken the honor for myself.

While Inez is overly amused by Paul, Gil is entranced by the setting of the film and wishes he could make his vacation permanent. The cinematography captures the beautiful sights and breath-taking views of Paris, showcasing its glamorous attractions, and making us wish we were there with him. But at night, the scenery changes, and we go back with Gil to a time when all was “swell,” the Roaring Twenties. Everyone can relate when Gil is seduced by the scenery, but not nearly anyone can probably relate to Gil’s inexplicable good fortune as he is so lucky to meet some of the most riveted artists of our time, and is even able to get feedback on his screenplay by the writing legends themselves.

The gap between Gil’s reality and his nightly adventures into the ‘20s are hard to comprehend. There is never really any evidence of how or why he is able to go back, but he does so with ease and an unrealistic simplicity is what follows throughout most of the action in the film. Nothing can be so simple as when he and Inez just conveniently end their relationship for good and Gil is finally free to roam the streets of Paris for as long as he wants. No one cries, no one dies, and the rainbow magically appears after the storm, which is of course, the breakup scene in the hotel room between him and Inez. The storm did not last very long, and let’s just say in the case of acting, it was one fight that had more thunder than actual lightning. It was far too unrealistic of Inez to admit so shamelessly to her fiancé that she had been having an affair and similiarly unrealistic when Gil lets her off the hook so easily and is barely fazed by the news.

In the final scene, the record sales lady comes back and it is all so convenient that she happens to appear right after Gil’s breakup with Inez, as he is walking in the streets of Paris, at midnight, and in the rain—so very cliché. But then isn’t this a movie in which clichés provide effective templates for the overall themes? I am still undecided on how I would rate this movie overall. It was fun and interesting, a feel-good, safe film, straightforward and deliberate in its motives to captures the imaginations of its viewers. Other than the poor excuse of an ending, the movie was pleasant to watch. However, I would not be at all eager to see it again, and I do not feel that I would have missed out on anything had I not seen it at all. It did not change my perception on life or make me think about anything special or particular, despite its achievement of convincing me all the more to plan a trip to Paris.

“Midnight In Paris” (2011) – USA – Romance, Comedy – English – Director: Woody Allen – Cast: Adrien Brody, Carla Bruni, Kathy Bates, Marion Cotillard, Michael Sheen, Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams – IMAGINA INTERNATIONAL SALES

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May 18, 2011

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