Word: allens
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Cristina Barcelona, and it's just fine. Not great; just fine - a breezy roundelay about pretty people finding lust with improper strangers. It is also the kind of movie that isn't made much anymore, which makes the movie seem rare, perhaps precious. So a pre-mortem revaluation of Allen has begun. In the New York Times, Manohla Dargis wrote of "his recent creative resurrection," which would mean she values (and now I have to mention them) Scoop and Cassandra's Dream more highly than reason allows. I like the new movie, within reason; the question that nags...
...this is going to turn into a panel discussion.") But a bout of stomach poisoning breaks Cristina's mood, and she must convalesce the rest of the weekend. That leaves Juan Antonio with the disapproving, and spoken-for, Vicky. She is one of those females, rife in the Allen canon, whose insecurity is expressed as hostility to men; she castrates, or at least circumcises, them with every cutting word. And Hall, with her flawless American accent, is equally persuasive at inhabiting, not just miming, the stammering tenseness of the traditional Allen heroine...
...less than Henry James, Allen is judgmental of Americans abroad - they betray a sexual naïveté when exposed to a society so much more practiced in the art of gracious loving. And no less than Vicky and Cristina, Allen is almost starstruck by the Spaniards, and the Mediterranean ease in forming, then releasing, sexual liaisons. The hallmark of his characters is the fumbling confession of furtive love; but in this idealized Catalonia, where nothing romantic is forbidden, everything is beautiful, as natural as breathing in synch with the woman who has fallen asleep in your arms...
...Well, why shouldn't Allen have a crush on Juan Antonio? For one thing, he dreamed the character up; for another, Bardem doesn't have to work hard to radiate the sensitive machismo of a man who doesn't use women so much as he allows them to briefly fulfill their dreams in him. Visually, too, the movie is in love with Barcelona, its gnarled Gaudi buildings, and with the countryside of Ovieto, a hundred shades of glorious earth tones. (The cinematographer is Javier Aguirresarobe, who has shot films directed by Pedro Almodovar, Victor Erice and Alejandro Amenabar...
...sexy that Juan Antonio's father still has erotic dreams of her, Maria Elena had been Juan Antonio's muse, competitor and wife; their turbulent marriage ended when she tried to kill him. Of course she shows up, once her ex has set up house with Cristina, allowing Allen to run further amorous permutations. A darkroom kiss between Cruz and Johansson is probably Allen's most direct expression of romantic-sexual connection...