Compare And Contrast Our Town And Midnight In Paris

Many people take for granted the things that they should value the most and appreciate in life whether it be people they love, places they love, or even things they love. There are some who want to live life to the fullest and are appreciative of what they have, and there are some who are just greedy and are never satisfied. However, in the story Our Town by Thorton Wilder and the movie Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen, both characters Gil and Emily come to realize how much they love and value either their family or the city of Paris, and where their status is now, which they can’t change. Gil and Emily learn, even if it is the hard route, that they need to accept what they missed in life and appreciate what they did have. Yet, the difference

For instance, after wanting to visiting her family from the dead to go back, Emily says, “I didn’t realize. So that was going on and we never noticed. Take me back-up the hill-to my grave(107).” Here, Emily tried going back to the state of being alive which only hurt her more because she couldn’t bare the thought of seeing her young mother, so she accepted that she is dead and must stay amongst the dead. After she gets back from the “trip” to life Emily states, “No... I should have listened to you. That’s all I human beings are! Just blind(108),” which clearly points out Emily has recognized she should not have gone back to the living. Gil also accepts that he is from the 2000’s. In the movie, Gil tells Adriana he is going to go back to his time while she stays in her golden age called “La Belle Epoque.” Gil goes on saying that even though it was nice to see the Fitzgeralds and Hemingways that this is not his time, and he wants to go back to the 2000’s. Gil’s moment of realization links these two characters because he accepted that he needed to appreciate the time where he is