Unpacking the Power of Nostalgia in 'Midnight in Paris'
“Can you picture how drop-dead gorgeous this city is in the rain? Imagine this town in the '20s. Paris in the '20s, in the rain. The artists and writers!” This line, delivered by Owen Wilson’s Gil, is from Woody Allen’s thought-provoking 2011 film ‘Midnight in Paris’. I was still in high school when ‘Midnight in Paris’ was released and admittedly was more into comic-book action movies at the time. However, I discovered this gem of a movie a couple of years ago, and it has quickly become a favorite of mine.
The film, which takes place in the present day, chronicles a troubled couple (Gil and Inez, played by Wilson and Rachel McAdams) who travel to Paris with Inez’s parents. Gil is a disillusioned screenwriter and Inez is obsessed with status and ‘keeping up with the Joneses.’ Gil’s discontentment with his current screenwriting gig has resulted in the pursuit of writing a great novel about a nostalgia shop owner. Gil himself is enraptured with nostalgia, as he wanders around Paris thinking about the city in the 1920s, when Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and more made their mark on Paris.
For Gil, the current age is cheap and spinning out of control. A better life could be found in the 1920s Paris literary scene, in which he could thrive as a writer rather than be a sell-out. Inez, however, is perfectly fine with the trappings of modern high society and has no desire to go back in time, as it were. The resulting tension between Gil and Inez drives Gil to take late-night strolls around Paris, leading to an uncanny discovery: At midnight, in a specific location in Paris, a 1920s model vehicle comes by and transports Gil to the very age he dreamed of earlier. While in the 1920s, Gil interacts with Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, dances while Cole Porter sings live, and shares drinks with Hemingway, Dali, and Belmonte. With newfound inspiration, Gil quickly produces a manuscript and gives it to Gertrude Stein. He also falls for a 1920s flapper girl: Adriana. Gil’s nightly trips to the Roaring ‘20s grow his frustration with the 2010s, as his obsession with nostalgia grows and grows.
However, as he continues to court Adriana in the ‘20s, Gil finds that she wants nothing more than to travel back to the famed Belle Epoque. The Belle Epoque in France was a period from the late 1800s to the early 1900s in which great advances were made in art and literature. Gil and Adriana are soon taken away to the Belle Epoque, wherein they encounter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Paul Gaugin, and Edgar Degas. Gil asks the trio of Belle Epoque painters what they considered the greatest era, and they all agree that the Renaissance was the greatest era. Adriana, not bothered by the above statement, decides to stay in the Belle Epoque, while Gil returns to the present day.
Nostalgia’s Understated Power
The entire film functions as a commentary on the intense power of nostalgia. Gil believes that if he can only get back to the 1920s Paris literary scene, his life would be better. Adriana believes that everything was better during the Belle Epoque, while those in the Belle Epoque wanted to get back to the Renaissance. Nostalgia can be a powerful master, but an empty pursuit. We believe that perceived periods of great advance—whether it be technological, art, literature— are just that: great periods.
We become nostalgic about periods far from which we are removed. We are not nostalgic about last year, but we can be nostalgic about two decades ago. We even become nostalgic about periods in which we never lived. I don’t want to offer a full-fledged rebuke or disassociation of nostalgia. It can be helpful, and even fun. Nostalgia can lead us into a recovery of things that were forgotten and need to be remembered. Used correctly, nostalgia is powerful to evoke positive feelings about past events that lead us into a greater appreciation of our personal or societal history. However, nostalgia is only a feeling, and feelings can offer distorted views of what actually transpired long ago.
The Harm of Nostalgia
Rose-colored glasses
In short, the harm of nostalgia is that it causes us to look at the past with rose-colored glasses. When we become dissatisfied with the happenings in our current age, we look back on the past with rose-colored glasses. Nostalgia gives us a faux-freedom to escape our current situations and relationships when they don’t live up to our standards. With nostalgia, we have a belief that the past is better. Nostalgia minimizes the issues of the past while romanticizing the things that those who came before us got right. When we’re feeling nostalgic, we can conveniently make the past fit our framework or appease our appetite for a grander narrative than what really took place.
For instance, as a Christian who often reads the Puritans, I often become nostalgic about the 17th and 18th centuries, especially in Colonial America. In times of frustration with our current situation, I let my mind wander, and find myself thinking, “Boy, those early American Puritans really had it figured out.” Now, I happen to think the early American Puritans and the early Baptists did have much figured out, but I cannot become overly nostalgic about that time. When I am nostalgic about the Colonial American period, I tend to conveniently forget the incredibly difficult life many people of that period had to live. I gloss over the societal ills of the day and bring up a convenient narrative to satisfy my disdain for 21st century America. In other words, because of the understated power of nostalgia, I gaze longingly on those earlier periods with rose-colored glasses.
It’s never enough
Gil, when falling in love with Adriana, realized that nostalgia is as unsatisfactory as our current cultural moment. While he was hungry for inspiration that he thought could be found in the ‘20s Paris literary scene, upon arriving he realized that no age is perfect.
We all want to get back to a time when we think things were less broken. Think about President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign slogan: Make America Great Again. The “again” is an important part of that slogan. Make America Great doesn’t have the same ring to it. President Trump’s campaign wanted to tap into the power of nostalgia. The campaign wanted people to look back upon a time (whatever period that might be) when America was great, and convince the public that Donald Trump could lead them into that period of greatness again. Another example is the theme song from All in the Family. Archie and Edith Bunker sing about the days of Herbert Hoover and Glen Miller, when “girls were girls and men were men.” All in the Family is completely centered around Archie’s stubborn unwillingness to get behind the views brought on by cultural shifts in the 1960s.
However, as Woody Allen displays brilliantly in Midnight in Paris, it’s never enough. As much as I would love to go back in time to the Puritan era, I am sure they would’ve loved to live in the days of the Reformation. And if we were able to pay our Reforming friends a visit in Geneva or Wittenberg, they would’ve rather walked with Augustine or Athanasius. And so it goes. It’s never enough, and if we could time travel like Gil and Adriana, our growing appetites would never be satisfied. While our day might not have much in common with Belle Epoque or the Reformation, we do share a common theme: brokenness that leads to dissatisfaction. Nostalgia will never solve brokenness because once we begin to really look at each era, we see the sin patterns and the societal woes, the dissatisfaction of the people, and the power of sin. No era has been immune from the power of sin.
When hanging out with Adriana in the Belle Epoque, Gil finally realizes the unsatisfactory result of nostalgia: “Adriana, if you stay here though, and this becomes your present then pretty soon you'll start imagining another time was really your... You know, it was really the golden time. Yeah, that's what the present is. It's a little unsatisfying because life's a little unsatisfying.” Gil makes the sad realization that life is unsatisfying for him. Even his dream of living in Paris in the ’20s was unsatisfying. And Gil realizes that nostalgia can be an unending, unsatisfying chain.
A Christian Response
Growing up going to a Baptist church in the South, the religiosity of the mid-20th century was idealized. Billy Graham and Jerry Falwell were cultural icons and still are in many areas. Often, cities in the south still host crusades or tent revivals with evangelists who style themselves after Billy Graham himself. The prevailing motive is an attempt to get back to the “way things were before.” The result is a sad, misplaced, nostalgic fervor. Churches are not immune from looking at the past with rose-colored glasses and finding that nostalgia does not satisfy.
God has placed us in a time and place for a specific reason. You are where you are when you are on purpose. God did not make a mistake by willing that you should be where you are now. An overstated focus on nostalgia or “golden-age thinking,” can lead us to doubt God’s good purposes in having us here now. If all you ever think about is how good it was when you were a kid, or how grand it must’ve been in the Great Awakening, you’re being led astray by the power of nostalgia. You’ll be tempted to doubt God’s good providence in placing you in this day rather than that day. Nostalgia can cause us to doubt that God has perfect timing.
Nostalgia can also undercut the work of the study of church history. As Christians, we ought to seek to learn from those who walked in faith in ages gone by, but we must not be overcome with nostalgia for those days. While nostalgia is a feeling that leads to dissatisfaction, the study of church history is an attempt to follow Christ more fully by looking to imperfect people who came before us. We want our Christian lives here and now to be more in step with the Spirit, so we read people from the past and look at their lives, that we may do good works and glorify our Father in heaven.
Finally, as Christians, we deny Gil, and by extension, Woody Allen’s assertion that life is unsatisfying. As those in Christ, we wholeheartedly believe that our lives have meaning and that we can find satisfaction in Christ alone. Christ has come so that we may have life, and have it abundantly. In Christ, we are given a commission, community, and covenant commitment. We have been given a commission to advance the kingdom of God through gospel proclamation. Preaching the gospel to all nations leads to life satisfaction. We’ve also been given community. We are not on an island floating through life alone. God places us in local churches surrounded by other Christians. We’ve also been given a relationship with God through his covenant. In Christ, God has committed himself to us, and we will never be left nor forsaken.
In conclusion, nostalgia will leave you wanting. I think that’s why I love Midnight in Paris. Gil goes on a grand adventure, only to find that he really should live in the here and now. As Christians, we can take that a step further: True satisfaction is only found here and now in the person and work of Christ Jesus. And we can live our lives looking back to his sacrifice and forward to the day when he will return.