Analysis Of Midnight In Paris

In the first place, in Midnight in Paris, the plot mainly focuses on how the main character Gil Pender travels in time from his present to Paris in the 1920s and realizes the significance of being in the present moment faithfully. The plot of the film primarily follows the basic plot structure of fiction – exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution – depending on the external and internal conflicts that revolve around the lead character Gil. From the beginning part of the movie, for the exposition of the plot, Gil’s dissatisfaction of his present life as a famous movie writer in Hollywood is clearly revealed. In the first scene of the film, while praising the beauty of the city Paris, Gil says that “If I had stayed here and …show more content…
His confused mind, after his determination to live in Paris, is illustrated with a short series of scenes that shows Gil spending some time while walking alone on the street in Paris. His facial expression which loses focus and his wandering steps register his profound anguish at his future life. Then the resolution of his inner conflict suddenly appears with the character Gabriel, who says that “Paris is the most beautiful in the rain.” This quote of Gabriel flashbacks Gil’s line which refers “Can you picture how drop dead gorgeous this city is in the rain?” in the first scene of the movie. With Gil’s brightened face after bumping into Gabriel, who feels the same way with Gil about Paris, the movie implies that Gil’s future life in Paris in the 2010s would be quite hopeful. Additionally, as the resolution of the plot, the last scene effectively suggests the main theme of the movie – the past is the driving force to take a new leap in present life – with two characters Gil and Gabriel who try to live their present faithfully while keeping the nostalgia of the …show more content…
In particular, three women characters – Inez, Adriana, and Gabriel – are around Gil the protagonist of the film. As the story develops, three women characters around Gil appear in the movie one by one and each character builds a relationship with Gil. Through several episodes and the relationships between Gil and each woman character, the film suggests Gil’s changing attitude to his life in three stages and his realization the importance of living the present at the end. First of all, Inez, who is the fiancée of Gil, represents Gil’s unsatisfactory present. Inez is the character who is the closest but least familiar with Gil. Although she is the fiancée of Gil, her personality is the most different from him among the three women. While Gil is an imaginative and romantic person, Inez is portrayed as a materialistic and realistic person with her sarcastic attitude to Gil’s fantasy about Paris in the 1920s. Her contrasting attitude to the past with Gil reveals during the conversation between Inez and her friend Paul. During the dialogue, Inez completely agrees with her friend Paul, who says “Nostalgia is denial. Denial of the painful present,” and her different stance on pursuing the past from that of Gil shows the severe personality