VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA (2008), dir. Woody Allen

A character remarks to Cristina (Scarlett Johansson), who has spent the last six months directing a short film about love: “That’s a mighty big subject to handle in 12 minutes.” It’s no easier in 97, which is the running time for “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.” But that’s probably the point; despite trading in Manhattan and London for Spain’s picturesque cities and countryside, like Allen’s other relationship comedies, his latest is concerned with the elusive nature of love, how, as he himself put it once: “The heart wants what it wants.”

Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Cristina, two Americans abroad, are best friends with very different attitudes and expectations about love. The former, who has come to Barcelona to do research for her Master’s thesis, plays it safe and as such, is engaged to a boring-but-nice yuppie back home. Cristina, on the other hand, is recently single and on the lookout for love of the fiery kind. After exchanging glances with an intense-looking artist named Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), the trio has another change encounter, at which point he propositions them to spend the weekend with him.

Cristina readily accepts, Vicky begrudgingly to keep her friend out of trouble. Once all the dialogue regarding how Cristina could possibly find his come-on attractive dies down, what follows resembles a Merchant-Ivory production, thanks in no small part to the most adventurous cinematography in an Allen film since “Husbands and Wives” (Indeed, this could be the first time he’s ever used gauzy camera work – seemingly the tell-tale sign of adult sophistication) and the Americans abroad plot. The sights of Barcelona and Oviedo are used to particularly-romantic effect, with fountains, churches, and in one key scene, the famous Tibidabo Amusement Park practically standing-in as characters.

But at its heart, “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” is, like “Annie Hall” and “Manhattan,” a relationship movie where the plot goes hand-in-hand with the characters’ psychologies. As such, even after some unexpected hitches and emotional upheavals, Vicky and Cristina continue pursuing what they want, or believe they have always wanted. That, in turn, either takes them to the next logical step in their own respective relationships, back into orbit with one another, or into the company of new characters, such as Juan Antonio’s brilliant, but unstable wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz, stunningly dressed-down).

The rest of the cast does uniformly good work as well, moving comfortably with the ebb and flow of a screenplay where events don’t necessarily happen as we expect. But we always have a good idea what the characters are thinking (also due to voice-over narration by Christopher Evan Welch, which actually seems unnecessary and intrusive at times), so the movie never feels dishonest. The end result is comedy and verbal sparring, romance, personal angst, postcard settings, and an underlying message as well, that it’s human nature to long for what we cannot have, and to long for something else once we get what we want. Viewers may long for something more than that seemingly-anti-cathartic lesson, but in the end, the movie is only 97 minutes.

Overall rating: ***1/2 (out of ****)