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NO SIDE EFFECTS

The day ahead didn’t look good. I faced a 10-hour international flight in economy class, part one of 24 hours of sleepless travel on a return trip from The Netherlands to southern Oregon.

I had long finished the page-turner novel I began on the flight over. All I had to read were two newspapers. Both informed me just how high security levels were. We were hours away from September 11, the tenth anniversary of the day terrorists smashed jetliners into the World Trade Center’s twin towers.

My husband and I decided it was time for an unscientific test of the effectiveness of movie therapy. What did Hollywood have to offer for the trio of conditions we faced: anxiety, physical discomfort, and boredom?

A lot, it turned out. And with none of the side effects of prescription drugs. We recommend that you try this at home.

By the time we finished watching—on our separate screens—Woody Allen’s latest offering, Midnight in Paris, Sypko and I were all smiles. Ebullient. Bubbling over with joy. Eager to share our favorite scenes and comic lines.

We had forgotten that we were strapped into narrow seats and being fed soggy sandwiches, while we flew at 35,000 feet on one of the highest risk days since 2001.

Allen’s movie, which we had already seen once in a theater, is, for me, a joy from start to finish. Love oozes from almost every frame—love of Paris, art, beauty, genius, nostalgia and present-time ordinary life.

NEW KIND OF LEADING MAN

The main character, Gil, is in awe of the Paris–and the Parisians–of today and also of the 1920s, an era to which he is transported each night at midnight. While he’s confused by this inadvertent time travel, he quickly accepts it and lives each moment with intense gratitude.

Usually the lead character in a Woody Allen comedy is a stand-in for Allen himself. If this is the case with Gil–played in brilliant, low-key fashion by Owen Wilson—then I pronounce Woody Allen, cured of his neuroses.

Has his 40 or 50 years of intense psychoanalysis finally paid off? Has aging done the trick? Doesn’t matter. What does matter is that Allen has created a neurosis-free (finally, no whining) leading man in a film that transports viewers to a state of open-hearted joy—and laugh-out-loud humor—without a smidgin of sappiness.

Gil is a complete innocent, in the best sense of the word. He seems incapable of, or unwilling to, manipulate others to get his own way. This doesn’t stop him, though, from getting off several sharp, side-splitting retorts to his shopping-obsessed fiancee, her Philistine parents, and her pedantic friend. Gil is anything but a doormat.

He courageously follows his creative calling (don’t ask) even though his fiancée and her parents think he’s nuts to give up a lucrative screenwriting career. And, with just as much bravery, he looks reality in the eye and refuses to live in denial, although this means giving up something quite precious. (I don’t want to give away too much.)

Now that I think of it, Gil comes across as one of the most emotionally and spiritually healthy guys on the planet. Surprisingly, that makes him anything but dull.

Without even trying, he becomes a chick magnet. And the viewer (this viewer, at least) begins to sense why he grows more attractive to at least one beautiful woman than—get this–Ernest Hemingway and Pablo Picasso.

Is psychological health the new main quality of the guy who gets the girl? (This trait also showed up in the strongest of the male characters in another, quite different movie I viewed on this flight, Bridesmaids.)

Are joy, awe and gratitude qualities that can carry a successful film and move people to return to see it again and again?

INGREDIENTS FOR SUCCESS

Months after its opening, Midnight in Paris–a financial and critical success, with a 92-percent critics rating on rottentomatoes.com–is still playing at our small-town, main-street movie theater, Amazing since even the biggest Hollywood films rarely last here more than a week or two.

Even more amazing: After seeing this film for the second time, Sypko and I are talking seriously about buying the DVD (due Jan. 2012). We rarely see a film twice much less purchase it for our tiny DVD library.

Looks like joy, awe and gratitude can be ingredients for cinematic success, provided they go hand in hand with a good story, great repartee, and exquisite cinematography.

Inspired by Midnight in Paris, I’m collecting the titles of other films that deliver a dose of joy along with a strong story. Which ones do you recommend for my pharmacopeia of movie therapy?