The movie enchanted me with its soft hues and shots of medieval spanish architecture -- cobblestone streets, courtyard style villas, earthy tones, linen donned characters -- of Barcelona and other Spanish towns. These visuals both as backdrops and fleeting incidentals had me on the edge of my seat as a thriller would. And it doesn't stop with the stunning cinematography. The movie draws subtle contrasts mocking American corporate stereotype against the art-inspired, free, experimental lifestyle of Barcelona painters.
Vicky Cristina Barcelona -- Spanish Bohemia meets trite, cookie-cutter corporate-bots
Vicky's husband is a corporate-smart clown who is completely out of place when faced with the ideas of freedom and spontaneity. He feels the need to reduce everything to commonplace mundane labels (Cristina made love with Elena once, so that makes her a bisexual!) or pout apparently high-minded but equally meaningless rhetorical statements like - 3 way relationships undermine the preservation principle and destabilize social order. Ha! Now don't get me wrong, it is alright to wonder aloud and pontificate with the intention of learning and expanding one's mental horizons, but it is oppressively repugnant to listen to a pseudo-expert trying to win a argument by using academic jargon and making meaningless predictions.
The character wants to plays golf in the rustic Barcelona (note the irony; Golf today and for some time has been treated less as a sport more as business deal making medium - "I played golf with him" has the same vein as "Are you on facebook?"), is completely in his element in an amusement park, is giddy with excitement as he discovered a gadget that would have allowed him to catch a Mets game on his flight to Tokyo, and has a friend whose wife is in raptures about the prospect of procuring an oriental rug -- classic examples of stunted, confined sensibilities. Once hiking in Yosemite, I overheard a couple talking animatedly about how US can tap into Alaskan oil fields in a tone that would have made them right at home in a G8 summit. I came out infinitely glad that this movie duly exposed their unimagined spheres.
Antonio's father is a poet and refuses to publish his emotion-colored poetry to the world that hasn't learned to love in 2 centuries. Hmm. He is not a world-citizen, he hates this world. He also refuses to speak in any other language other than his native Spanish as as a poet he feels that a foreign tongue violates the musicality of his construction. (I am appalled by us Indians, including me, who have traded our mother tongues for a socially convenient international language. There is no poetry, no profound expression in the crudely stitched, melange like version of hinglish). He is old but vitalizes himself by expressing that he has erotic dreams about his son's passionate and slightly deranged ex wife. What really touched me about the portrayal was Antonio's lack of exaggerated response and the way his father's expression is blended in a poetry-and-art-is-no-big-deal way into the company of Antonio and Vicky.
And finally, the movie rejuvenated my memories of Madrid, the numerous flamenco performances, poetic Spanish guitaring, narrow cobblestone streets flanked by old medieval looking buildings that pull you right into their history. Never before have I felt more strongly to make Spain my home.
PS - The above is merely a set of impressions I carried back and not a movie review in the usual sense of the phrase.
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