Midnight in Paris

If you have an obsession with Paris, France like I do, you have most likely seen the movie Midnight in Paris.  It's a Woody Allen film starring Owen Wilson, Kathy Bates, and Rachel McAdams.  I absolutely fell in love with the plot, and while I'm not going to review it or anything like that, I would like to discuss the message the movie delivers.  
In Midnight in Paris, Owen Wilson is a man named Gil who would prefer to live in another time period.  He is tired of the "dull" present day and would rather find himself in the Roaring 20s.  When he visits Paris with his fiancee (Rachel McAdams) and her parents, he slips into something magical.  When the clock strikes midnight in Paris, an old car drives up to Gil.  He gets into the back seat and the driver takes him back in time (literally).  He is transported to Paris in the 1920s where he meets F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda Fitzgerald, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway and Gertrude Stein.  He even begins to fall in love with a mysterious woman named Adriana , who ends up confessing that she much rather live in the late 1800s.  That was the time to live in.  Gil protests saying how, no, Paris in the 20s is the most wonderful time.  Adriana and Gil and transported even further into the past all the way to the 1890s.  Adriana loves it.  The men they meet say no!  The 1500s was the time to live in!  Gil still thinks the 20s is the time of perfection.  Adriana believes the 1890s are where it's at.  The men they meet in the bar continuously stick with the 1500s.
So that is what I learned.  Everything is relative.  There is no "right time" to live in.  The time is now.  
See, I always wanted to live in the 1950s (I still kind of do).  My second choice would be the 1920s, like Gil.  Then maybe the 1940s, the 80s, and then in Europe during the mid 1500s.  I'm not sure why, it just seems very fancy.  I suppose I find the 50s to be a classic time where people dressed impeccably and people like Marilyn Monroe and James Stewart existed.  The 2os was all about fun and freedom (I'm thinking Gatsby-ish).  The 40s came with film and Audrey Hepburn.  The 80s was all about music and the King of Pop.  Then in the 1500s-1700s I suppose everyone wore fancy gowns and life was much simpler. 
Yet, after discussing the film with my father, we both agreed that the only time to live in is now.  Do you really think the flappers of the Jazz Age thought anything special about the time they were living in?  Did people really find Elvis and Lucille Ball to be so fascinating in the 50s?  Most likely not.  That was just the norm.
One day, in say, 70 years, some people will say "Dang!  I wish I lived in the early 2000s!  It was so cool back then!"
But here we all sit.  Dreaming of a far off time, deciding that that would be a better time to live during.  Midnight in Paris taught me just that.  Why not just enjoy the period we live during?  One day, it will be apart of history.  

Midnight in Paris 

Paris in the morning is beautiful.  Paris in the afternoon is charming.  Paris in the evening is enchanting.  But Paris after midnight is magic.  

Until next time xxx.