Watched: Midnight In Paris
Observations:
- My first Woody Allen film!
- “I see… a rhinoceros.”
- I’m not sure why I loved this. Maybe because it’s an unashamed love letter to humble writers, at a time when that’s profoundly unfashionable; present-day co-stars Rachel McAdams and Michael Sheen are gleefully loathable (and both get their comeuppances in fantastic ways), and the forays into the past are as intoxicating as they deserved to be.
- Tom Hiddleston and Alison Pill as the Fitzgeralds were particularly brilliant. In fact, all of the cast were great. Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein was a surprising standout, too.
- Even ignoring the premise, it does give a swift kick to the balls of realism, though I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing - the literary greats are whirlwind caricatures, never on screen for long enough to allow you to question their verisimilitude, but given that they largely serve a simple function - to provide Owen Wilson’s wide-eyed character with the epiphany he needs - that’s okay.
- I’m tempted to seek out more of Allen’s work, now. This put a big dumb smile on my face, and a smaller smart one too. I’m aware that makes it sound like I have two mouths. Try and erase that if you can.