Film

Barcelona

Whit Stillman's second film drops two priggish American cousins into 1980s Barcelona, where they debate feminism, capitalism and cologne while falling for local women against a backdrop of NATO protests and simmering anti-American resentment. It's a comedy built almost entirely on argument — mannered, deadpan, oddly moving — for anyone who likes romance filtered through earnest, slightly absurd conversation.

TMDb rating6.3

If you liked this

Metropolitan1990

Stillman's debut and the purest version of his voice — over-educated, under-employed young WASPs debating Jane Austen and their own romantic failures at Manhattan debutante parties. If you loved the talk in Barcelona, this is where it started.

But Almost entirely dialogue and drawing rooms — if you need plot momentum or visual spectacle, it will feel static.

Metropolitan poster

The Last Days of Disco1998

Stillman reunites Chris Eigeman with a new ensemble for a wry, melancholic comedy about young professionals navigating a Manhattan disco club's dying scene — same clipped, ironic dialogue, better outfits.

But The disco setting can feel like a costume party rather than a lived-in world; some find it colder than Metropolitan.

The Last Days of Disco poster

Lost in Translation2003

Two displaced Americans drift through Tokyo, half-connecting over jet lag and cultural bewilderment — the same ache of being a foreigner who can't quite read the room, played for quiet melancholy instead of banter.

But It's slow and mood-driven rather than plot-driven; if you want jokes and arguments, this is mostly silence and neon.

Lost in Translation poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Sun Also Rises1957no page yet

Stillman's cousins are the direct descendants of Hemingway's Lost Generation — Americans in Spain performing sophistication to mask genuine confusion about who they are.

Hemingway's disillusioned American expatriates drink, brawl and chase unattainable love through 1920s Spain and France — the original blueprint for Americans abroad using wit and posturing to avoid feeling anything real.

But Its melodrama and datedness show; the source novel's spare power doesn't fully survive the studio gloss and overwrought performances.

More like this (8)

A Room with a View1986

Edwardian Brits abroad in Florence, torn between propriety and passion, with the same comedy-of-manners energy — repressed people saying the wrong polite thing while clearly feeling the right improper one.

But The period setting and Merchant Ivory gloss are a world away from Stillman's shabby modern realism — might feel too pretty.

A Room with a View poster

Before Sunrise1995

Two strangers talk their way through a night in Vienna, falling in love entirely through conversation — proof that dialogue alone, done right, can carry an entire romance.

But It's two people walking and talking for ninety minutes straight; if that premise doesn't already appeal, nothing here will change your mind.

Before Sunrise poster

An Education2009

A sharp, funny period drama about a young Englishwoman seduced by an older man's worldliness and continental glamour — the same tension between provincial earnestness and cosmopolitan sophistication that runs through Barcelona.

But It's more clearly a drama with real stakes and consequence than a comedy — less banter, more heartbreak.

An Education poster

Midnight in Paris2011

An American abroad, slightly out of step with the culture around him, falls for a city and its romantic mythology — Woody Allen's lighter, whimsical cousin to Stillman's dry expatriate comedy.

But The whimsy and time-travel conceit are much softer and more crowd-pleasing than anything in Stillman's dialogue-driven world.

Midnight in Paris poster

Enchanted April1991no page yet

Four mismatched English women rent an Italian castle for a month and slowly thaw out — a gentler, warmer comedy of manners about what happens when uptight people are relocated somewhere sunnier.

But It's cosier and more sentimental than anything Stillman would write — no political undertow, just healing.

The Trip to Italy2014

Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon bicker, impersonate, and eat their way through Italy — a looser, funnier, more improvisational take on two mismatched men abroad clashing over everything and nothing.

But It's semi-improvised and meandering by design; if you want tight scripted wit rather than comedians riffing, it may frustrate.

The Trip to Italy poster

The Spy Who Came In from the Cold1965

Barcelona's subplot of terrorism and NATO-era anti-Americanism is mostly a joke; this film takes that exact Cold War dread and follows it to its actual, tragic conclusion.

A bleak, brilliant Cold War thriller about an agent trapped by his own government's games — the same era's paranoia and anti-American suspicion that hums under Barcelona's comedy, here played entirely straight and devastating.

But There's no romance-plot warmth or humour whatsoever; it's cold, cynical, and ends about as far from a comedy as possible.

The Spy Who Came In from the Cold poster

EuroTrip2004no page yet

Same engine — clueless young Americans abroad, chasing love and making cultural fools of themselves — run through the trashiest possible gearbox instead of Stillman's dry, articulate one.

American guys stumble across Europe chasing women, getting into trouble, and embarrassing themselves in front of the locals — Barcelona's premise stripped of all intellect and rebuilt as a gleeful, filthy teen comedy.

But It is broad, crude, and proudly stupid — the opposite of literate; anyone who liked Stillman's wit specifically will find this a jolt.

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Recommended by

Metropolitan, The Last Days of Disco