A Rainy Day in New York is a perplexing puddle, a singular splash and a time-consuming torrent of creative shortcomings.
Gatsby Welles (played by Timothée Chalamet), a cultured student at Yardley College in Upstate New York, welcomes us to his campus with a sarcastic comment about its disposition before introducing us to his beautiful and well-established girlfriend, Ashleigh Enright (Elle Fanning). Gatsby is equal parts eccentric and old-fashioned in how he views the world. Chalamet does well in painting an unusual youth searching for something long forgotten in the alcoves of a world that has seeped its way into modernity: a “quaint” individual, a hopeless romantic, or as Ashleigh nervously describes him as, “a mere youth” who is “searching for his romantic dream in a vanished age.”
As with most of Woody Allen’s works, the film is mainly told through moody narrations, minimal master shots and piano soundtracks that function as filler moments during moments when the film forgets where it’s going. It plays out much like the protagonist’s fleeting lifestyle, directionless. Though disorienting, there is a beauty to the way Allen’s work parallels its screenplay with its directing style by linking Gatsby's wandering mind with the visual depiction of his drifting state. The film’s picturization functions as a portrayal of Gatsby’s incoherent thoughts: it is as if his mind is splattered onto the screen, displaying sentimental scene after sentimental scene. Smoking a cigarette, walking aimlessly through the rain. He is looking for a romanticized world where there isn't one, and this functions as the main principle in his character’s downfall.
The film’s minor charm does not come from its quirky dialogue or unwitty characters, though Chalamet does well in delivering one or two lines about the world’s exoteric state, but through its slice-of-life cinematography. We are swooped up in a dreamlike sequence of New York as our main couple enter a scene of bustling taxis and unpredictable weather. Gatsby isn’t interested in experiencing it alone, but rather with someone he is madly in love with and, as a postscript, someone who shares a similar capacity for appreciating the esoteric knowledge and artistry that constantly brews within the corners of his wonderlike mind. The latter fails him with his ditsy, unblemished girlfriend, who is the daughter of a wealthy bank owner and candidly “unspoiled” in her gift for honesty (even her name speaks to the correct direction of her life, Ashleigh Enright, while Gatsby’s pays homage to one of Fitzgerald’s tragic heroes). The truth of the matter is, Gatbsy and Ashleigh couldn't be more different, and this rainy day in the City That Never Sleeps is proving as much as they encounter one misadventure after another.
Despite being provided with a stellar ensemble of actors, the film fails in letting the cast bring their characters to life. The characters are bland and unstimulating, though not entirely unlikable. Gatbsy’s admiration for the more romantic things is at times charming, though his melodramatic worldview relies too heavily on his contempt for the modern world, and while Ashleigh’s unrealistic portrayal of naivety is cute at times, her bashfulness coupled with her dependency on the goodness of others makes her a tad bit unrealistic. Even Jude Law’s attempt at portraying a suffering screenwriter falls short of an Oscar, though Selena Gomez’s fresh wit does well in coloring the film in refreshing tones.
Though the film has its moments—such as eclectic shots of Manhattan's finer institutions or misty capturings of a weeping sky—it lacks in providing its viewers with a general plot. There is no coherent purpose for A Rainy Day in New York, save for the main character’s awakening near the end of the film when he discovers the true, but harrowing, nature behind his Mother’s rise from rags to riches. Allen fails to paint a realistic portrayal of a contemporary couple facing real-life anxieties about their relationship, in fact, the film does not pave a way for exploring the two characters' relationship at all. It seems that it is not so much about them as it is about Gatsby’s search for something meaningful—a love letter, written out to a bygone authenticity that was prematurely shelved away by a modern era. It feels slightly disorganized, though that may have been the intent, and at times, rushed.
Although our main character eventually does find his meaning by the credits, the film does not, clumsily panning out of a scene that does not grant a satisfactual end to the creative mishap that is Allen’s A Rainy Day in New York.
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