Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Vicky Cristina Barcelona

2008

Director: Woody Allen

Writer: Woody Allen

96 Minutes.

Passion verses complacency.

Like most of Mr. Allen’s film, he’s poses a question. He has a debate. In this film, the question is: Do you want to live your life inside the box or outside? Do you want passion? Or do you want comfort? Do you want art? Or do you want the white picket fence?

For Vicky and Cristina, the question is tested in Barcelona.

Vicky (Rebecca Hall) is structured and focused. Cristina (Scarlett Johansson) is free-spirited and impressionable. And then comes Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem). Juan offers both girls a weekend away to see art, drink wine, and make love. Vicky is insulted. Cristina is intrigued.

They go.

Over the weekend, the rational Vicky gets caught up in a passionate moment with Juan Antonio and has sex with him. Though a mistake, this act sends Vicky to question her life choices. She balances between the passionate Juan Antonio or her boring fiancé Doug (Chris Messina). Luckily, Doug remains in New York.

Then Doug flies into Barcelona.

Juan Antonio goes onto date Cristina, where then his crazed x-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz) comes in and the true questioning of a structured life begins. Cristina will find her impressionable life has unfulfilled holes that neither Juan Antonio or Maria Elena cannot fill.

Again, she's lost.

But our hero is Vicky. Vicky never forgot that night with Juan Antonio. Even when Doug makes spontaneous plans to wed in Barcelona, she is unimpressed. She has been turned on by passion, which is more exciting than complacency.

In the scene above, Doug runs into a colleague of his (and the colleague's wife) and the couples go out to dinner. During dinner, they talk about airline entertainment, installing cable lines, and decorating their homes, all which seem like boring topics to Vicky.

Is this what her life will be – talking about how expensive oriental rugs are?

And that’s the question we all must ask ourselves: is this what our lives will consist of? Dinner parties and golf outings? Or will there be passion, art, and love?

Mr. Allen poses the question, tests it, and in the end, the outcome is very realistic and pure. The outcome is exactly why this film didn’t do well at the box office.

Because it was real.

And most audience don’t want a real outcome because it reminds them of their life, their questions, and their own doubts. As Mr. Allen is trying to help explain these subjects, people go to moves to forget about them.

But whatever happened to Vicky and Cristina in Barcelona, changed their lives forever. And they have Mr. Allen to thank.