Pretentious, self indulgent, boring-why do people like this??? weird

Rating: 3/10 (12 March 2011)

I really wanted to like it...but cliché after pretentiousness cliché made me loath it I found it impossible to like the two American girls who come to Barcelona and meet (wait for the stereotype!!) Spanish Lothario artist. How can a director like Woody Allen who is so revered by many people make such a clichéd and smug bourgeois movie?? It kind of annoys me that some people feel obliged to like it just because it is Woody Allen when it is drivel!! The way Barcelona is portrayed, firstly, is like a tourist ad as others have said, all sanitised and stereotypical, where people randomly play Spanish guitar and there aren't any muggers or other unpleasantness. I laughed when I saw where the artist's father lived, in some fantasy villa, he was of course a poet. Some poor naive person is going to think that living in Europe is some sort of cultured fairytale, where everyone drinks fine wines and talks about art in beautiful sun dappled villas
That leads me to my next point-the utter pretentiousness of the characters. Cristina (or is it Vicky? Who cares?) is coming to study Catalan identity, as one does, Vicky is Of course WAIT FOR IT trying to be a photographer!! what a surprise!! She is not a very good or original one either...So, you know "americans trying to find themselves in Europe, and going on a cultural, sexual exploration." That would be fine if there was anything particularly shocking or original or cutting edge about it. . I have never heard to word "art" used so much and so vacuously in one film by these characters who really want to show they are higher CULTURED beings. The way they try to have an intellectual discussion about love is laughable, using all the typical art student phrases I heard so much at Uni. I wish I could remember some of those movie quotes but I've tried to block the film from my mind, there were some real script 'gems'. At one point I thought it was a big joke, like Woody was trying to make a parody of upper middle class pseudo-intellectual cultured types-was he?? The photographer thinks she is being really bohemian by living with the artist and his ex-wife, as if it is some sort of revolutionary superior way of life for artistic types, an extension of her rejection of the 'mudane' and conventional in her 'art'. Like some of my fellow haters have said, the film seemed to be trying to criticise the conventional lifestyle like Cristina's husband Doug but instead made it look more sympathetic to me. I could talk much more about how repulsive I found the attitude and characters of this movie, such as the ridiculous and unnecessary voice over, but my fellow haters have covered this in all there reviews. The reasons I have given it 3 instead of 1 is because of Penelope Cruz's performance, the only thing I liked about this movie. Unlike the 2 dimensional other characters, she was believable and much more human. Thank God for Penelope Cruz!! If you liked the highly overrated and similarly self indulgent film Closer with similar ideas in it, you will probably like this film. if you want a better version of this premise of Americans discovering themselves and exploring their sexuality amongst beautiful European settings, see the far superior and beautiful Stealing Beauty