Sporadically Interesting, Constantly Clumsy and Inaccurate

Rating: 6/10 (9 July 2018)

My video store was doing an everything-must-go operation on their music and film articles so I bought a Blu-Ray copy of Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona for 5$ as I remembered that Penelope Cruz's performance was exceptional. When I put it on this evening I couldn't believe how insufferably bad everything else about it was.
The story is pretty simple. It's a soft love/sex quadrangle between a guy and three women with a vague Woody Allen lemon flavor. The first woman (Rebecca Hall) is square, rich and fond of art, poetry and music. The second woman (Scarlett Johansson) is more unstable, not-so-rich but not-so-bad and fond of art, poetry and music. The third woman (Penelope Cruz) is self-destructive, not-so-rich but not-so-bad and an artist herself. The guy (Javier Bardem) is square, extremely rich and an artist himself. Together, they go sight-seeing, develop pictures in their darkroom, paint, write poetry, listen to Catalan guitar, have sex and drink expensive wine. And then everyone goes back where they came from and it's over.
Almost a decade after watching it for the first time, I can say that Cruz's performance holds up in depth and subtlety and that the film is still worth watching for that (the confrontation scene in the kitchen is brilliant). It actually makes up for Johansson and Hall's often-embarrassing screen time.
Having said that, it's not their fault; it's the director's. Woody Allen's reputed technique of having his ensemble cast recite his dialogue is responsible for a lot of the film's mediocrity because the lines themselves lack the sarcasm and the grace of his finer work. As for Javier Bardem, he's stuck in neutral gear, trying to temper the monstrous imbalance between Cruz's atomic bomb of a performance and Hall and Johansson's unflavored acting.
One of the most frustrating elements of the entire film is the voice-over that constantly explains what the audience is supposed to figure out on its own if the film is well directed, but for some reason Allen doesn't want you to think. He'd rather have a narrator tell you what the characters are feeling or take you through an ellipsis of questionable subtlety. So for example the voice-over would tell you someone's sad when they're supposed to be sad. Maybe the director doesn't want you to think as mentioned before, or perhaps wants to think for you for ego-related reasons, or maybe tell you what to think for pretentiousness-related reasons. Whatever the case, the audience ends up feeling useless and stupid.
I find the use of voice-over in a fiction film very questionable in general, and quite problematic in Vicky. I always have trouble understanding why some directors try to blur the line between cinema and literature. There is no separation between novel language and screenplay language in here. The voice over in Vicky Cristina Barcelona is like an audiobook with optional shots.
Not to mention that the characters speak nothing like real people. Woody Allen's really happy having one woman recite another woman's character bible instead of giving the audience the pleasure and luxury of unveiling it. This might have been fun a few times in the past but now it looks like narrative incompetence (which might actually be true).
The editing is flaky as well. I can mention several close-ups where I would've liked to see the reverse shot instead of being stuck with the original shot lasting several seconds longer than needed (which, in a feature film, can feel really awkward).
You've asked for a Woody Allen film and you're getting one.
You get the color corrector who explodes the yellows to make the film look Spanish, artistic and old. Spain is yellow.
You get the aforementioned manipulated acting (if you mute some scenes you'd think Scarlett Johansson is saying "I was told to stand like this!").
You get punk rock explained to you by Woody Allen: a grandfather who refuses to publish his poetry because SCREW THE SYSTEEEEEM. See, Woody knows everything about the Sex Pistols.
An excerpt from an unknown black-and-white film also makes its way out of nowhere to accompany a piece of lost voice-over midway into the film. Vicky Cristina Barcelona wouldn't be a Woody Allen film without him lecturing us on cinema. On classical cinema. On what's "good cinema" and what's "bad cinema". And we could go on and on about almost all other artistic disciplines. Classical guitar, for example, is "good music". It's the Catalan version of a standard Woody Allen jazz soundtrack. Taking pictures is also "good art" (with a silver camera, of course, not those decadent digital cameras!).
Also, the more sensual scenes of the film beg the question: has Woody Allen ever actually seen a romantic sexual encounter, let alone between two women? I'm speaking for myself but I don't think two people have ever caressed each other's arms for two seconds and started having sex right away without prior signals. Ever. Not even in Humphrey Bogart movies; at least they argued before every kiss. The events that lead to sex in Vicky Cristina are too neutral.
But the worst sin of the film is that its creator has no clue whatsoever who he's catering to.
Who are the people who watch romantic comedies?
Who are the people who watch sex comedies?
Who are the people who watch the romantic sex adventures of Woody Allen characters in Spain?
Who are the people who watch comedies, considering that Vicky qualifies as a comedy in Woodyland?
"Two university graduates go wine-tasting."
"Two BFF's suddenly have passionate sex and fall in love with a wealthy painter (throw in a suicidal ex-lover because otherwise it's a non-story)."
"A woman happens to be studying Catalan painting and happens to fall in love with a Catalan painter who happens to still have feelings for his destructive ex who happens to be a Catalan painter."
What's the demographic for that?
After some thinking, now I know.
It's the people who, like Woody, think that only straight, vanilla, female polygamy is cute and acceptable and who worship the director for "shining a light" on that.
It's the people who, as much as you criticize a Woody Allen film, will always answer "Hey, it's Woody!"
It's the people who refuse to admit that there are very specific reasons why 9 Woody Allen films out of 10 lose money and that "art-house" is not an excuse.
Vicy Cristina Barcelona has its interesting aspects but it perfectly shows you that Woody Allen really lives in his own bubble. Almost all of his movies from the 21st century lack the substance to make up for that and Vicky's one of them. This used to bother the fans, now I don't think anyone bothers anymore.
All in all, the quality of the film is awfully mediocre. Long story short, towards the end, the square girl gets shot by the unstable woman. The square girl tells her husband Doug that her former Spanish teacher shot her by mistake. Doug buys it. That's the movie we're dealing with.
And that's one of the "good" 21st century Allen films. If you want, you can go watch Larry David scream at the camera for an hour.