Magic In The Moonlight ***
There is an uncertain magic that keeps things playfully charming for Woody Allen and his new comedy/mystery, Magic In The Moonlight. It may well be the appeal of 1920s’ French Riviera – the perfect setting for the naughtiness and intrigue – having a significant role here, but the cast of Colin Firth and Emma Stone is a curious coupling in itself. Both play to typecast strengths – his conceited Englishman, hers sassy American cutesy, keeping things buoyant and fluffy enough. That aside there seems to be something ‘wanting’ with this particular Allen caper – like we’ve just been party to one episode of a three-part series.
English stage magician and debunker of the supernatural Stanley Crawford (Firth) is invited by a colleague to the south of France to help unmask a possible psychic fraud, young celebrated American spiritualist Sophie (Stone) who is staying with her mother as long-term guests at a wealthy widow’s house. Sophie has captured the heart of serenading love fool Brice (Hamish Linklater), the widow’s son and heir who wants to marry her.
However, as Crawford spends more time with Sophie, he starts believing she does have some sort of special powers to communicate with the spirits, or worse, he is falling in love with her, against all commonsense and logic.
Firth becomes Darcy once more – a little brasher and more sarcastic than the Austen hero, but nevertheless, suitably pompous and obnoxious for 1920s wealthy society. In fact the very beginning of Crawford and Sophie’s meeting holds the real gems of laughter and makes for riotous affair. It toys with the standard idea of Americans and Englishmen’s miscommunication and subsequent jibes that all can gleefully equate to. Add the high society bubble the characters live in, and it’s a microcosm of unregulated banter in a time before political correctness existed.
Now Darcy and Elizabeth were in the same league; it does take a huge stretch of the imagination to believe that Crawford and Sophie could somehow bond, let alone unite – but the setting again is both forgiving and magical. Firth and Stone are an utter delight, with the latter moving from insufferable intellectual snob one minute to soppy, loved-up pup the next with dashing aplomb. Stone musters up all her brisk retorts into one delicious role here, but without forgetting to ease beautifully into vulnerability at the right moment. A standout performance that keeps all the others grounded is that of Eileen Atkins as Crawford’s impassable Aunt Vanessa who is an absolute tonic to enjoy in response to Crawford’s moments of haughtiness and self-pity.
Allen’s films are all about magic, only in this one, he tries to question where real magic lies. Less philosophical and more light-hearted in nature – which opens it up to greater comparison and criticism, Magic In The Moonlight is by its very nature a piece of trickery; it captivates you in setting and performance and pulls the wool over any inquisitive eyes as to finding any greater depth. It’s about the magic of love, pure and simple, and is nothing short of a consumable and affable piece of humorist filmmaking along the lines of P.G. Wodehouse and those enchanting movies of the Forties. It’s only Allen aficionados who may take umbrage with the ‘light writing’ style.
3/5 stars
By @FilmGazer
