Film

Vicky Christina Barcelona--Allen's Best?

by James Tynion'10

Wednesday September 3, 2008

I’ve found it very depressing over the last few years as I finally immersed myself in the prolific cinematic library of Woody Allen, to find that this once great filmmaker had fallen so far off the horse. I had trouble even getting through the half-baked Melinda and Melinda, and had basically decided to spend the rest of my days sticking to his early work when I started reading about Vicky Christina Barcelona. The cast was in and of itself too good to pass up, and while I figured that I would be merely submitting myself to yet another painful example of how some great artists should be shelved away to keep them from damaging their reputation, I was luckily, and thankfully wrong.

Vicky Christina Barcelona is not a perfect movie, but I believe that it might just be Woody Allen’s best film in over fifteen years. The beginning takes some getting used to. The characters speak in the expected Allenesque intellectual quips that tend to occupy their own reality, but rather than sticking out like a sore thumb like they have in his more recent work, the words quickly weave themselves into the tapestry of the film. You forget that real people don’t talk like this, in the way that you forgot when watching movies like Manhattan and Annie Hall. Yes, there are moments where Rebecca Hall’s character, Vicky, might have as well been Woody Allen in a dress, but it grows into the character, and the character into the words.

So, the real question is what has changed to drive Allen to produce a film that can stand next to his best work. I believe the answer is that he has rediscovered his passionate and all-consuming love with women. You can tell this from the way he lingers on Scarlett Johansson’s Christina, and Penelope Cruz’s Maria Elena. These women are beautiful, and Allen loves to showcase their beauty and their intelligence. The elegance of this film, and the unabashed passion returns to the theme that carries across all of his greatest work: what it means to be in love. It is also important to mention rugged sexiness of Javier Bardem, who might not be the most traditionally beautiful man to grace the screen, but under Allen’s guidance becomes one of the most engaging romantic leads to come to cinema in the last few years.

Vicky Christina Barcelona is a beautiful, sensual film, and I absolutely recommend it to anyone who has ever fallen in love with a Woody Allen movie and thought that the experience could never happen again. And to anyone who has anyone who has ever fallen in love. And the rest of you