Post by Midge on Jul 27, 2011 18:58:56 GMT -6
This unusual romantic comedy stars Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams as an engaged couple who travel to Paris to meet up with her family. Gil is a successful screen writer who is bored with the superficiality of Hollywood. He is entranced by Paris and longs to move there after the wedding so that he can become a serious writer. His fiancee, Inez, is an upper class yuppie type who doesn't share Gil's romanticism. Like her wealthy, snobbish parents, she loves money and all the things it can buy. She thinks GIl would be foolish to throw away his lucrative career.
One night Gil leaves their hotel wanders off in the night, trying to get some inspiration for his novel. As a clock strikes twelve, a classic 1920s car pulls up, filled with laughing partygoers in vintage clothing who invite him to come along.
So begins a time travel fantasy in which Gil is taken to Gertrude Stein's salon and meets famous artists and writers of the Twenties such as Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso. There's also a mysterious woman, Picasso's abandoned mistress, who finds Gil irresistible.
At the end of the night Gil returns to his hotel unable to explain to Inez where he has been or what he has been doing, but his life has changed forever and so has his relationship to his fiancee.
If you enjoyed The Purple Rose of Cairo, this romantic fantasy will appeal to you. I came to the theater with no expectations, not even realizing that I was about to see a Woody Allen film. In recent years his movies have appealed to me less and less. But I enjoyed this movie very much and would recommend it, especially if you appreciate nostalgia. Kathy Bates was excellent as Gertrude Stein, and Adrien Brody was hilarious as Salvador Dali.
My one reservation is that I was not entranced with Owen Wilson as Gil. He seemed to be channeling the classic Woody Allen persona, spouting quips and one-liners in the Allen style, but it's like hearing Woody Allen's voice coming through a ventriloquist's dummy that looks like Owen Wilson. It's hard to explain. Another reviewer commented just the opposite, that Owen WIlson did not seem like a typical "Woody Allen" character, so your mileage may vary.
One night Gil leaves their hotel wanders off in the night, trying to get some inspiration for his novel. As a clock strikes twelve, a classic 1920s car pulls up, filled with laughing partygoers in vintage clothing who invite him to come along.
So begins a time travel fantasy in which Gil is taken to Gertrude Stein's salon and meets famous artists and writers of the Twenties such as Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso. There's also a mysterious woman, Picasso's abandoned mistress, who finds Gil irresistible.
At the end of the night Gil returns to his hotel unable to explain to Inez where he has been or what he has been doing, but his life has changed forever and so has his relationship to his fiancee.
If you enjoyed The Purple Rose of Cairo, this romantic fantasy will appeal to you. I came to the theater with no expectations, not even realizing that I was about to see a Woody Allen film. In recent years his movies have appealed to me less and less. But I enjoyed this movie very much and would recommend it, especially if you appreciate nostalgia. Kathy Bates was excellent as Gertrude Stein, and Adrien Brody was hilarious as Salvador Dali.
My one reservation is that I was not entranced with Owen Wilson as Gil. He seemed to be channeling the classic Woody Allen persona, spouting quips and one-liners in the Allen style, but it's like hearing Woody Allen's voice coming through a ventriloquist's dummy that looks like Owen Wilson. It's hard to explain. Another reviewer commented just the opposite, that Owen WIlson did not seem like a typical "Woody Allen" character, so your mileage may vary.