Magic in the Moonlight

Woody Allen's latest film Magic in the Moonlight, is a light and fluffy piece of movie confection set on the photogenic Cote d'Azur that delights the eye but hardly taxes the brain.

Set in the 1920's, Colin Firth plays Charlie Crawford, better known by his stage-name Wei Ling Soo: a magician who staggers his audience nightly by making elephants disappear and by teleporting across the stage.

As a quick aside, Firth's characters is almost certainly based on the American Chinese-styled magician Chung Ling Soo who amazed Victorian audiences with his magic and inscrutable attitude but died (messily) on stage at the Wood Green Empire in London when a bullet catching trick went wrong. Whilst never ever speaking English in public to maintain his mystique, his last words (in English) were "Oh my God. Something's happened. Lower the curtain.". Strange but true.

But I digress.

Crawford has an ego the size of one of his elephants, with a cynical and wholly scientific approach to life, devoid of passion, romance or any frivolity. Wholly unpleasant to all around him, he revels in the public and publicised debunking of fakery in the form of tricksters and mystics. As such, when his lifelong friend and fellow magician Howard Burkan (Simon McBurney, the archbishop from BBC TV's "Rev" ) confesses to being completely stumped as to how young and attractive mystic Sophie Baker (Emma Stone) is fooling her rich and gullible marks, Crawford can't resist the challenge. Leaving his fiancée, ice-queen Olivia (Catherine McCormack - "Braveheart", "28 Weeks Later"), in London, Crawford travels to the south of France - a man with a mission.

There he meets up with Sophie, her supportive mother (Marcia Gay Harden) and the rich Catledge family, who have fallen hook line and sinker for the young psychic's charms. This is particularly true of the younger son, the awful Ukulele-strumming crooner Brice (Hamish Linklater) who is already madly in love with her and intent on marriage. As a fully independent test, Crawford drives Sophie to visit his Aunt Vanessa (Eileen Atkins) in Provence and cannot believe what he sees and hears, becoming convinced - against all his normal instincts and beliefs - that Sophie is the 'real thing'.

Is Sophie actually the genuine article, and if not then how on earth is she tricking not one but two expert magicians? Can she possibly reject the millionaire Brice and walk off into the sunset with the spiky and unpleasant Crawford? All is revealed over a stress-free and untaxing 97 minutes.

After the joys of last year's "Blue Jasmine", Magic in the Moonlight is a much more back-pedalling sort of affair for Woody Allen. It comes across as extremely theatrical in nature, feeling more like it was written for the stage rather than the screen: you can almost hear the stage hands shifting props between some of the scenes.

I'm a fan of Colin Firth, but I'm afraid he rather over-eggs the acting pudding in this. The particularly obnoxious Charlie of the first half of the film is about 20% over-cooked for me, and a long way from his Oscar-winning performance in "The King's Speech", although the performance improves towards the end as his character thaws a bit into more 'Firth-friendly' territory.

Emma Stone is, as always, delightful. A wise woman (my wife!) commented that in 20 years Stone will "be the new Meryl Streep", and I would agree. A quality actress with a wide range that feels like it hasn't been fully tapped yet.

But the performance of the film for me was Aileen Atkins as Aunt Vanessa, who is just marvellous in every scene she appears in, particularly the two-hander with Firth in the final reel. An actress with 50 years of hard-won experience in TV acting behind her and every hour of that experience up on the screen. I doubt she'd get it, but it would be lovely to see a Best Supporting Actress nod for her for this role.

The scenery is stunningly photographed by Darius Khondji, although one scene really puzzled me: at the first meeting of Charlie and Sophie the shot is almost directly into the sun, with a character's parasol sometimes (but not always) blocking the sun out and delivering more lens flare, albeit genuine lens flare, than a JJ Abrams movie. I'm not sure why this was done this way, but it just came across as amateurish and irritating.

The soundtrack is taken from jaunty jazz staples of the era which work well for most of the time but are at times jarring and ill-suited.

In summary, not a classic Woody Allen but a very pleasant and lightly humorous film that older audiences in particular will enjoy. If you liked "The 100 Foot Journey", you'll probably enjoy this too.

(If you enjoyed this review please see my archive of other reviews at bob-the-movie-man.com. Thanks).

A romantic comedy about an Englishman brought in to the help unmask a possible swindle. Personal and professional complications ensue.

Magic in the Moonlight is a film directed by Woody Allen and stars Emma Stone and Colin Firth. It is obviously a romance. I'm not entirely convinced by woody Allen since there are years he'll hit you with movies like Match Point or Midnight in Paris and then, years when you'll get You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger or Scoop. Nonetheless, this movie throw two very talented actors, in the middle of a quite boring story. In fact there is no tension until ten minutes left of the movie. As usual there are moments where the writing is very clever and seems fresh but they don't overcome the cliché moments though. this film fits perfectly the build of standard romantic comedy structure: guy meets girl, they do not get along very well at first as they're opposing, then they start to like each other and suddenly problems happen. In this case nothing really happens, I mean nothing really unpredictable. Colin Firth is very good as this very rude, very mean and hard to live with character. Plus, Emma Stone is really charming, lovely and beautiful; she is also very good.

Overall Magic in the Moonlight as whole is watchable but very conventional; that I could see where the film was headed from the beginning. I am a little bit disappointed because everybody know that Woody Allen is a really talented writer.

"A relationship, I think, is like a shark. You know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is a dead shark." - Alvy Singer

A gorgeous, sumptuous movie: wonderful cinematography, great, Jazz Age music (as well as Beethoven), the Cote d'Azur, Eileen Atkins, Colin Firth in full Mr. Darcy mode, Emma Stone… what could possibly be amiss? Well, it seems in the midst of all the prettiness and lovely fixtures, Woody forgot to include some energy. The result is a film which, while sporadically quite enjoyable, and even funny, feels curiously airless. Falls into the category of Woody's oeuvre which includes "A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy", "Radio Days", "Melinda and Melinda", and "Scoop": movies which are not at all bad, but are almost instantly forgettable.

Despite some bad reviews I read, this is an enjoyable Romantic Comedy.

The premise is rather simple. There is a twist but you may guess it from the beginning of the film.

The movie has a nice, pleasant cinematography and a good soundtrack to go with it.

The script is very good with a clear theatrical tone (this movie could well be a play) and the performances of some veteran actors are beyond criticism.

Colin Firth is the one who holds the movie on his shoulders though. It's not for an Oscar nomination but I could not think of another leading man to deliver a certain degree of cynicism and arrogance but still be likable and maybe even gallant.

Emma Stone is OK but another leading lady could be more suitable.

I'm not a big Woody Allen fan but this is more enjoyable than, let's say, Midnight in Paris. Less original, but more enjoyable.

Overall: Good enough to check it out especially if you are a female, or with a female company.

Most viewers are taking this film as a conventional (and admittedly entirely predictable) romantic comedy which happens to be about a magician who debunks fake spirit mediums, and a beautiful young woman whom he believes is just that. But that's getting it *entirely backwards*. It is in fact a thought-provoking exploration of the extreme materialistic worldview -- the view that holds that modern science has eliminated the possibility of the existence of the soul, an afterlife, and God -- and an exploration of the psychological relationship between embracing that worldview, and being pessimistic and unhappy. As such, it is one of Allen's most personal and thought-provoking films in years.

And if that sounds "heavy," the miracle of the movie is its very lightness. Obviously, the themes enter in so effortlessly that many people are missing them entirely! You need to be interested in the tension between the materialist worldview and the conventional one that accommodates the spiritual and the mysterious, but if you are, you will be astonished at how delightful and entertaining an exploration of those deep themes can be.

The age discrepancy between Frith's and Stone's characters, which I am sure will bother many, is in fact completely necessary: he must be old enough to be set in his pessimistic ways, and she must be young and beautiful enough to challenge them at first sight.

Obviously there are happy atheists and there are miserable spiritual people, so the question that Allen is asking here is whether some unhappy atheists have embraced the soul- and God-denying position too vigorously, as a sort of defense mechanism to shield themselves from the fundamentally irrational possibility of falling in love. The way the movie knits together the materialist / spiritualist question, the possibility of love, and the metaphor of magic -- well, it's sheer magic itself.

This is far from Allen's funniest movie, and it's only a 7/10 as entertainment. But not only does it easily gain an extra point for its depth, it almost gains two. Admittedly, I am fascinated by the movie's themes, but I think that anyone who is interested in them may find themselves as charmed and, ultimately, as deeply moved as I was. 89/100.