annoying exercise in name-dropping

Rating: 3/10 (9 January 2012)

I am a Woody Allen fan and yet I must be the lone monotone in the chorus of praise here. The gorgeous opening cinematic montage of Parisian scenes, accompanied by what I have to believe is Woody himself on clarinet in the musical accompaniment, leads us to believe we are in for a Gallic "Manhattan." But this movie is several steps down from Woody's brilliant love letter to New York. That movie had a credible and engaging - if morally questionable - plot, about a middle age man dating a high school girl (little did we know at the time). But the story here, aside from its fantastic elements, is thin and without dramatic direction. Once the initial time travel back to the Paris of the 20's happens, there is very little else of consequence. And the film has to be completely meaningless to anyone without a solid historical knowledge of the intellectual scene in Paris in the Roaring 20's. As a matter of fact it doesn't take long before the film becomes a pretentious exercise in name-dropping that actually becomes annoying. Gee let's see if we can name the next writer/artist/playwright/musician that's going to walk in the door. And Allen's political beliefs, which, if they were touched on at all in previous movies, were treated with subtle whimsy, are here wielded like a two-by-four. And I find Owen Wilson completely unsuited for the role of Allen's alter ego. He just doesn't have the feel for the Allen persona, and I'm sorry, but he should get that broken nose fixed as all it does is distract.
I was vastly disappointed, and am at a loss to explain the rave reviews this movie has received.