Midnight in Paris (2011)

Actors: Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Kathy Bates, Kurt Fuller, Michael Sheen, Carla Bruni etc
Director: Woody Allen

This piece of cinema is about nostalgia and exploring yourself. Perhaps not the finest piece that Allen has directed but a good effort.
Gil (Owen Wilson) is an successful Hollywood writer who is in Paris with his girlfriend Inez (Rachel McAdams) and her parents on a trip. Gil wants to become a serious author but is not having much success in this department. He is searching for himself. There is some amusing and really funny scenes when the couple spend time with some long lost friends and the pompous Paul brilliantly played by Michael Sheen drives Gil to despair. He is also reminded that perhaps it is not all that rosy in his relationship with Inez. Gil is also obsessed with the 1920's intellectual Paris.
Unexplained one night at the stroke of midnight a grand old car stops and picks Gil up. He is transported to the very era and gets a chance to meet Gertrude Stein, Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, Cole Porter to name a few. This happens night after night and he even gets critique of his novel by Gertrude Stein.
Gil is transformed and takes all his impressions in. Naturally is his girlfriend convinced that he has an affair. The aspect of time travel is never explored but just happens which is refreshing and is not needed.

Is nostalgia necessary? Would it be better to live in a different era? How can I make the most of my own time? Allen tries hard to address these issues and sadly it is mostly felt like a half bake cake. He never really manage to answer any of theses potentially interesting questions nor to show any resolve in the story.
Perhaps the answer that is indeed answered is to make the most of the time we live in now and that each era has its own merits. Our main character is faced with a dilemma when he with a girl is transported back to Moulin Rouge during "La Belle Epoque". She is from the 1920's but is longing to another era. According to her that is the best era. This makes the main character to think about his own situation and eventually break up with his most unsympathetic girlfriend. Eventually he meets a girl who shares his beliefs that Paris is at its most beautiful when it is raining.
This film have some funny moments and some interesting thoughts. However it at times become almost tedious when the main character bumps into yet another intellectual legend never seemingly learning anything. He is only impressed and shows how one dimensional he sadly is.
The outcome of the film is probably to make the most of the time we live in. It is great to have a notion of nostalgia but you only think about a fraction of the aspects of the time.

Rating: 3 out of 5