Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Film review by: Witney Seibold
Vicky (Rebecca Hall) is pragmatic, engaged to be married, not given to flights of romantic fancy. Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) is passionate, has a short attention span, and can only feel romance if it’s borne of drama and impulse. We know these things about these women because an obnoxiously unnecessary narrator (Christopher Evan Welch) told us so. The two of them, best friends, are spending a summer in Barcelona together. Vicky is there to work on her thesis on Catalan culture, and Cristina is there to have fun.
They are approached one evening by a smoldering artist named Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem) who invites them both to his home village for a weekend where they will drink and look at art and make love. Cristina is interested in doing all three things and talks Vicky, only interested in two, to come along.
Since “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” was written and directed by Woody Allen (making his second film this year), it’s not long before romantic complications ensue. Soon, Vicky is doubting her need to marry her rich-yet-bland, Izod-wearing fiancée (Chris Messina), and Cristina has found herself in between – or perhaps merely happily mixed up in – Juan Antonio and his passionate-to-the-point-of-wielding-guns ex-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz).
“Vicky Cristina Barcelona” seems to take a very dim view of both Vicky’s and Cristina’s romantic views, and indeed it’s their tenacity in their respective romantic beliefs that ultimately gets them both into trouble. Vicky is too button-down for her own good, and is doomed to a marriage of passionless homogeneity. Cristina is so adventurous, that perhaps even having functional threesomes isn’t enough. The film’s central irony is that the most (briefly) successful relationship depicted is the one that, in the minds of most conventional people, is the one that doomed. At times, it’s hard to accept the film as a comedy with this pessimism running through.
But “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” still works, and is still funny, largely due to the performances of the leads. Johansson does a fine job; she seems more natural in a role like this than in, say, “The Other Boleyn Girl.” Rebecca Hall (the wife from “The Prestige”) is pretty, carries the bulk of the film’s drama, and is not getting nearly enough credit for depicting a woman who is truly torn (I understand that she’s not as famous as Johansson or Bardem, but it just seemed rude to me to leave her name and picture off of the film’s lobby posters). Javier Bardem is proving that he can do no wrong, convincing us that he believes every line he speaks, and can be just as seductive in this film as he was chilling in “No Country for Old Men.” Cruz doesn’t appear until about halfway through the film, but manages to steal most of her scenes. Patricia Clarkson appears as a rich socialite with some dubious advice.
Yes, Cruz and Johansson kiss on camera. Yes it’s sexy. No, it doesn’t turn into a porn film, ya pervs.
Woody Allen is 72 years old, and is still managing to make at least one film every year. He’s already in post-production of his next one. He gets a lot of flack from critics for not “living up to” the quality of some of his earlier films like “Annie Hall.” It seems to me that he’s still staying sharp, and while he has made a few clunkers recently (“Hollywood Ending” really, really wasn’t all that great), his films maintain a high level of quality and familiarity that audiences only sometimes get, and many critics seem to take for granted. “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” is bright, funny, and has some rather serious things to say about young romance. It’s good.
O.k. O.k. Fine. Here it is.
