Would make a good tourist ad

Rating: 4/10 (1 February 2009)

I just have to say, I currently live in Catalunia. And I'm a bit fed up with all the Catalan nationalism I'm surrounded by. But this hasn't much to do with the film, actually there's hardly anything 'Catalan' in the it, only the fact that Cristina is studying 'Catalan identity' just because she likes Gaudí (quite absurd, I like Mondrian but I'm not gonna study dutch identity because of that!). The whole movie looks more like a 'visit Spain!' ad than anything else, the scenes in Oviedo are merely a touristic walk with all the Spanish stereotypes you can think of, Spanish guitars and all. The actors are good, but they struggle to make believable a script that is preposterous and ridiculous, especially Penelope Cruz has the worst character of her carrier. Allen seems to have lost not only his touch, but also common sense, putting films like this (or Cassandra's Dream) in his CV. It seems like he has to change city every 5-6 years to give some fresh air to the same old plots he has. For the ones who don't know, the film is set in Barcelona only because the government paid good money for it, otherwise it would have been somewhere else. It's just so hard to me to believe he is the same director of Manhattan.