Midnight in Paris Review
By David Kempler
Midnight at the Oasis
"Midnight in Paris" is many things. It is a love letter to one of the most beautiful cities in the world. It is Woody Allen speaking through Gil (Owen Wilson), the successful screenwriter and hopeful novelist, who is visiting Paris with his fiance, Inez (Rachel McAdams). Most of all, it is something that left a smile painted onto my face from beginning to end.
Gil has come to Paris with Inez, whose parents are also there. Inez's mom is pure nastiness, while her father is a powerful businessman who is neither particularly awful nor wonderful. Gil is the only one in the group genuinely excited about being there. To him, there is history everywhere and he longs to revel in it. The rest of the group spouts negativity, shops, and eats. They could be anywhere.
One evening, Gil goes for a walk. As the clock strikes twelve, a luxurious, old-model car pulls up and a voice from inside invites him to join the group. It's off to what appears to be a theme party dedicated to life in 1920s Paris. Within minutes it is apparent that it's not a pretend party. Gil has been transported into the real thing. Woody never does explain the sci-fi angle of the whole thing, but it doesn't matter. Gil is rubbing up against the likes of Hemingway, F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, and other big names of the era.
When the evening draws to a close, Gil is back in the present. His existence with Inez becomes more plainly mundane and unrewarding. The next night he heads back to the same corner and the adventure continues. This plays out every night until he has created another life that makes him insanely happy.
What Gil learns and what Woody laments, is that many of us long for a time that we never experienced. The added wrinkle is that this longing exists as a constant to all that yearn to experience a piece of the past. There is no going back, or rather, there is no one place to go back to. This could have created a mood of depression for Gil and for the viewer, but Woody handles it in a way so that we accept this, and in fact, have no problem with the fact that our dreams of a fantasy life will always remain out-of-reach. It's okay, though. For Gil, and for us.
